I'm not sure why Spiderman 3 opened everywhere else before it hit the US, but we saw it the day it opened in Europe, May 1. I am a huge Spiderman fan from way back, probably one of the only girls in my class who actually looked forward to the next Spidey comic book. So I am a bit biased.

I was passing my time during the film being in a lovely state of suspended disbelief and thoroughly enjoying everything from the filmic references to Frodo and the Ring, to The Mask, to a bit of Gene Kelly, to the old 'thirties musicals, to the grey shading of all the characters (there isn't a single one-dimensional character here of note, except perhaps for JJ, Peter Parker's choleric editor - and even he is good at being the comic relief). All the main characters, including the villians, actually have some depth, thanks to the writing/directing/acting.

I didn't care that the origin/motivation of the malicious black goo from beyond is never explained and strains credulity even for people like me. I thought it moved itself around in a groovy, insect-like fashion, and the way to get rid of it is super cool. I thought James Franco was fab, and Thomas Hayden Church just keeps blowing me away (pun intended) with his choice of roles. I loved Peter Parker trying to be cool - a sort of latter-day Nutty Professor high on space goo. I loved how the movie gets into different perceptions of what the characters see as right, wrong, and their responsibility towards being truthful with themselves.

So, in the middle of this, my 12-year-old daughter turns to me and says with a sigh, "I'm bored." Then she apologized for dissing my favorite superhero, and politely sat through the rest of the film.

What to say? I loved it, she was just killing a couple of hours. The movie is long, a bit convoluted, and bites almost but not quite more than it can chew. Can't wait to see it again...but I'll probably have to take a different date.

I haven't seen the movie yet, so I'd like instead to comment on the reviewer.

Ms. Zacharek says "'Spider-Man 3' is the most ambitious and complex Spider-Man movie yet. Its multiple plots wave themselves around, defiantly declaring their unmanageability like Doc Ock's tentacles..."

This is a nice contrast from all the other critics who have pronounced themselves confused and bewildered by the multiple plot streams, and so they hate the movie.

I like to read reviews by people who "get" that genre of movie. Ms. Zacharek "gets" the comic book movies and similar melodramas. I can't judge how she does on the prissy art-house movies that Salon sophisticates groove on - because I'm not a sophisticate myself - so I won't say anything about that, either.

I, for one, have been waiting for this new installment in the legend of Spider-Man.

If you're any fan of the comics, you know that the brains over at Marvel Entertainment have re-configured the story several ways to Sunday without getting the core wrong; a nerdy kid finds a voice and a purpose courtesy of a radioactively mutated spider that, instead of conferring sickness and death on him, transfers its abilities to him. Now this nerdy kid named Parker isn't just...a nerdy kid. He's something much more and the story of Spider-Man is about how Peter deals with being more than he thought he was. Tell it in a thousand different ways, change the villians around, etc. It's still the same story. I used to hold onto the old comics like they were gold (which now that there's eBay, they could've been), and laugh at how Spidey would taunt his opponents who could literally squash him like a bug and somehow get the better of them. I used to dig how human the character ultimately was when he'd go home after battling the Green Goblin, or the Vulture, or Dr. Octopus and still have rent to pay, relationship issues, and worries about his Aunt May or his school work. I remember one story where he trashes a villian called Mr. Hyde and goes home to soak his ankle that he twisted in an earlier battle. It's that mix of sarcastic wit and the very human effort to deal with what his life is that these movies really capture well. Not to mention the special effects, which are astounding, amazing, mind-blowing. Spider-Man is an amazing piece of contemporary mythology, and it's damned fine escapist fun. So for those here that would go on about the latest antics of our so-called "Commander guy", I would say hey, let's lighten up a bit, shall we? Plunk down the ten bucks, grab your treats and enjoy the ride. And no cluck about how it's 15 minutes too long (as some reviewer in USA Today claims). It's not like you're really jonesin' to get back to reality that soon, are you?