When you watch Othello onstage, you know without a doubt (assuming you're familiar with the play) that Othello will strangle Desdemona and then commit suicide before the curtain falls. No matter how many times you see it, that part of the story never changes. But then, no other part of the story changes, either. Iago always exploits Roderigo's jealousy, encouraging Roderigo to turn Desdemona's father, Brabantio, against Othello, and Roderigo always picks a fight with Othello's lieutenant, Cassio, thus allowing Iago to persuade Desdemona to defend Cassio when Othello strips him of his rank, which helps Iago further sow the seeds of jealousy, etc. The story is fixed.
I suppose this is why Gwen Stacy's death, in The Amazing Spider-Man 2, bothered me so much. The stories in the Spider-Man movies don't strictly follow any kind of canonical script; they're not pulled verbatim from the comic books. Yes, some bits and pieces are very similar (e.g., Spider-Man uses the vibrations of ringing bells in a bell tower to rid himself of the symbiote costume in both the comic book and the third Sam Raimi movie), and the broad stokes are generally the same (e.g., Peter Parker's Uncle Ben is killed by a thief shortly after Peter gains his powers, to show him that with great power comes great responsibility), but the specific plots of these films cannot be found in any comic book. Instead, the stories of Spider-Man versus the Green Goblin, or Electro, or Doctor Octopus, etc., are told and retold, again and again, with the details changing for each iteration.
Nonetheless, Gwen Stacy's fate seems rigidly predetermined. Among comic book fans, she is known as the one character in the Marvel Universe who will stay dead.1 She was Peter Parker's first love, and her death in the comic book series is nearly as important a milestone in Spider-Man's life as was the death of Uncle Ben. It reminded us that Spider-Man cannot always save every person who's put in danger by the villains he fights--even if the ones in danger are close to him personally.
But in the first Amazing Spider-Man movie, the death of Gwen's father, Captain Stacy, has already made this point quite clearly.2 So is it important, even necessary, to kill Gwen as well?
Apparently so.
What's the big deal? you may ask. If it's such an important moment in Spider-Man's mythology, why shouldn't it be recreated in the movies? I'm not saying it shouldn't, but if she had to die, I would have preferred her death to have been handled a little differently.
The first aspect of Gwen's death in The Amazing Spider-Man 2 that bothered me is the fetishization of it. Exhibit A: Here's Emma Stone, as Gwen Stacy, on the film set.
Gwen, you do not want to be wearing that outfit.
Exhibit B: The fateful panel from The Amazing Spider-Man issue 121, in which Spider-Man accidentally snaps Gwen's neck while trying to stop her fall from the top of the Brooklyn Bridge.
See, Gwen? I told you! That's your Official Death Outfit.
As soon as those of us "in the know" saw Emma Stone in that outfit, we knew it was all over for Gwen. Hard to believe a green coat, a purple miniskirt, and black boots could be considered the Mark of Death, but there you go. Essentially, Gwen was doomed by her wardrobe. And that's a bit, well, icky, isn't it? From the moment she appeared in that ensemble, all I could think was, "Well, she's gonna die soon--she's wearing the clothes." She might as well have been wearing a death shroud.
This form of predestination, despite all the events surrounding her death in the movie being a bit (or even a lot) different from the events surrounding her death in the comic book, feels forced. In Othello, the story is fixed; in this retelling of Spider-Man's relationship with Gwen, everything's a little different--except for this one detail. It's like poor Gwen is trapped, like Phil Connors in Groundhog Day, in some loop where she's doomed to repeat her life over and over again, with all details changing (in the comic she's thrown from the Brooklyn Bridge, in the movie she falls inside a clock tower; in the comic the Green Goblin is Norman Osborn, not Harry Osborn, etc.)--except for the one detail that counts.
Which brings me to the second reason why I'm bothered by her death. The filmmakers seem to have killed her because as far as they're concerned that's simply what Gwen is for: dying. Despite whatever else her character might bring to the movie (and you couldn't ask for a more vibrant actor to play her than Emma Stone), her death is considered essential. It is, ultimately, the thing that defines her as a character (again, as far as the filmmakers seem to be concerned). I say this because Gwen's death served no greater purpose in the film. Had she died just two minutes earlier, while helping Spider-Man restore New York City's power grid, that would at least have given her sacrifice some meaning. Instead, she dies about ten minutes from the end of the movie, just for being in the wrong place at the wrong time (like most damsels in distress). And in those ten minutes after Gwen's death, Peter Parker attends her funeral, grieves, gives up being Spider-Man, eventually rewatches the speech Gwen gave at their high school graduation, is inspired by her words to become Spider-Man again, makes a few wisecracks, saves a kid from the Rhino, the end. Had she died, say, halfway through the movie, resulting in Peter's grief--and his guilt3--being more central to the plot, the film might have been suffused with a level of gravitas that was otherwise, frankly, lacking. Instead, Gwen's death had the ineffectiveness of an abrupt afterthought.
I realize, of course, that not all movie deaths need to "mean" something. Some of the greatest works of art are consumed by the meaninglessness of death.4 But action/adventure movies like The Amazing Spider-Man 2 require the deaths of significant characters to propel the hero to some important action. Killing off the hero's girlfriend just so that he can decide he'll go ahead and fight some newfangled yet decidedly second-tier villain (i.e., the Rhino) after all, is not what I'd call "important." (See the New York Times article by Alexander Huls for more about the spreading misuse of death in superhero movies.)
I guess this means we'll meet Mary Jane Watson in The Amazing Spider-Man 3. She should consider herself lucky: Mary Jane never dies.5
Pointless Footnotes
1 There have been a number of Gwen Stacy clones over the years (yes, I mean that literally, and no, you don't want me to explain it to you), but the "real" Gwen Stacy, in regular Marvel continuity, has never returned--despite the fact that, as in soap operas, many characters who die in comics don't tend to stay dead forever.
2 Captain Stacy also died in the comic book series, three years before Gwen died, but he's killed saving a child from being crushed by falling debris during a fight between Spider-Man and Doctor Octopus. In the comic book series, his death is used more as a complication in Peter's relationship with Gwen, who blames Spider-Man (whom she doesn't yet know is actually Peter) for her father's death.
3 Peter's guilt is present in the comic books but not so much in the film, because with just ten minutes to go there's just no time left to deal with it.
4 E.g., Hamlet (to reference Shakespeare...again).
5 Even when her plane explodes in midair.
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