Sam Raimi's Spider-Man Trilogy
Spider-Man 2
Film · 2004 · 127 minutes · Raimi Trilogy
Two years after becoming Spider-Man, Peter Parker is struggling to balance his crime-fighting duties with his personal life, including his strained relationship with Mary Jane Watson, his studies at Empire State University, and his friendship with Harry Osborn. The stress causes Peter's spider-powers to intermittently fail. Meanwhile, brilliant physicist Dr. Otto Octavius attempts a fusion experiment using four sentient, AI-guided mechanical arms fused to his spine; the experiment goes catastrophically wrong, killing his wife and leaving the arms permanently attached, corrupting his mind and transforming him into the villainous Doctor Octopus. Manipulated by Harry, who blames Spider-Man for his father's death, Octavius attacks Peter and later kidnaps Mary Jane to lure Spider-Man into helping him complete a new, even more dangerous version of the experiment. After nearly giving up his powers entirely, Peter reclaims his identity as Spider-Man, stops Octavius's runaway reactor with the villain's own last-minute sacrifice, and saves Mary Jane, who ultimately learns his secret and chooses to be with him.
Follows on from
- Spider-Mandirect-sequel — Picks up two years after the first film, continuing Peter Parker's story, his relationship with Mary Jane and Harry Osborn, and the aftermath of Norman Osborn's death as the Green Goblin.
Leads to
- Spider-Man 3direct-sequel — Continues directly from Spider-Man 2: Harry Osborn's discovery that Spider-Man is responsible for his father Norman's death, and his simultaneous discovery that Peter Parker is Spider-Man, directly set up Harry's Goblin-technology vendetta at the start of this film.