The Amazing Spider-Man

Rebooting the Spider-Man franchise so soon after Sam Raimi's disastrous Spider-Man 3 may seem a little quick-on-the-draw, but with The Amazing Spider-Man, director Marc Webb (500 Days of Summer) and company make it very easy to set aside the tongue-in-cheek yucks of the previous trilogy in place of this expertly crafted superhero flick. The plot is familiar, but undeniably entertaining the second time around: orphaned as a young boy and left with his aunt and uncle (the pitch-perfect Sally Field and Martin Sheen), teenage genius and outcast Peter Parker (Andrew Garfield) struggles to find his identity--when he's not swinging from NYC rooftops and battling a reptilian scientist (Rhys Ifans).

The kinetic action sequences go above and beyond your typical fight scenes as Spidey leaps and crawls from one inventive set piece to the next (in impressive natural 3D, with no post-converted nonsense). But what makes Webb's vision stand out is its attention to the little things. From a quirky and almost slice-of-life lovestruck conversation between Peter and his crush Gwen Stacy (the insanely watchable Emma Stone) to a hilarious sequence with our hero awkwardly stumbling around his new abilities, The Amazing Spider-Man is more interested in investing its audience in its characters than wowing them with gee-whiz special effects. That being said, the entire film truly belongs to Garfield, who grounds the blockbuster with his dedicated and often heartbreaking performance, making Peter's journey from a jittery and compassionate loner to a quippy and confident hero relatable and moving. If you're part of the ever-growing audience that can stand behind a man fighting crime in a spandex suit, it doesn't get much better than this.