It is no easy task to follow up a movie like Spider-Man 2, which critic Roger Ebert rightly declared as “the best superhero movie since the modern genre was launched with Superman.” For once, a film adaptation of a comic didn’t require us to pardon its dialogue, suspend our logic, or force us to reread those comics when all else failed (and in this genre, all else frequently failed). With Spider-Man 2, director Sam Raimi showed us a film that could be intelligent and breathtaking all at once, yet remain true to the lore of the source material.

So, once again, it is no easy task to follow up a movie like Spider-Man 2. Which is not to say the personnel behind Spider-Man 3 don’t try, resulting in the arrival of one of 2007’s most drooled-over films. We return to the realm of Peter Parker aka Spider-Man (Tobey McGuire), whose oft-troubled world seems to be smiling upon him at last. He’s less insecure, more in love and finally being appreciated by New York. His girlfriend Mary Jane Watson (Kirsten Dunst) has a spot in a Broadway musical, and sequined dresses have never looked slinkier on her.

Of course, nothing is ever smooth-swinging for too long. Three villains soon invade Pete’s idyllic neighbourhood: the New Goblin aka Harry Osborn (James Franco), who continues his quest for revenge over his father’s death; Sandman aka Flint Marko (Thomas Haden Church), an escaped convict whose tumble into a giant sand blender reconstitutes his chunky bod; and Venom aka Eddie Brock (Topher Grace), Peter’s rival photojournalist who gets swamped by the alien symbiote that crashed onto earth via a meteor and found early affinity with Spidey himself.

It does sound like an intricate mythology requiring some deft spinning, but Raimi does well to avoid getting tangled by over-explaining the individual motivations and back stories, believing that the audience will be generous with our suspension of logic. More astutely, Spider-Man 3 instead hooks itself onto the looming arc of love. Anything produced at US$270 million (or, if you believe Radar Magazine, half a billion dollars) is bound to contain the requisite whizbangs, but a large part of the film is also concerned with Spider-Hunk and his numerous rendezvous with Mary Jane. With dollops of comic book camp, our web-crossed lovers frolic on a webby hammock, plot a marriage proposal in a French restaurant, and exchange weepies on a Central Park bridge. It’s all rather cheesy, no doubt, but to Dunst’s credit, she flashes enough dimple to distract us from all the hamming.

But no cinemagoer queued up hours to be privy to Hindustani Hollywood. Unfortunately, in its context, the Spidey action mildly disappoints. The first intended gape-in-awe sequence comes with the birth of the Sandman, and continues into Harry’s first aerial duel with Peter. All this builds into an epic battle between the four superheroes, loaded with dizzying drops, agile prances and sudden jolts worthy of any theme park ride. But after the stratospheric standards set by the first two instalments, nothing here is truly genre-redefining. Nothing is truly iconic either, unlike the upside-down kiss from the first film. The one moment that could have been that, i.e., the introduction of Venom, is instead a gross anti-climax, with the villain’s salivating, fanged mouth more akin to a perv who read too much Hustler.

Yet what makes Spider-Man 3 ultimately viewable, over and above all its vices, is the continuing notion of the darkness beneath our skin. Raimi, in not too subtle ways, stresses the point that both hero and villain are dealt bad hands in life, and both have a choice in their response. When Spidey dons the black suit, we get a glimpse of the kind of baddie he could be: an obnoxious, narcissistic chauvinist who will never be cool enough for the ladies, and who is destined to collapse into a self-induced hole of rejection and cold-heartedness. His nemeses fare no better: the Sandman is another victim of the justice system, while Brock is literally an accidental rogue who suddenly realises his need for the darkness to give him the X-factor he so craves. And Harry Osborn’s tortured battle against his father’s vengeful inner urges make us wish Franco got the role of Anakin Skywalker instead.

Of course, probing for depth in a superhero movie should be done with much restraint, and Raimi makes sure we remember to take the chill pill—after all, his film wasn’t made so its symbolism could be dissected by some budding film school undergraduate. Case in point: at the peak of the finale, there is a delightful exchange between the Daily Bugle editor Jonah Jameson (J.K. Simmons) and a little girl with a camera—as if to remind us what kind of movie we are watching. Spider-Man 3 might not have topped its predecessor, but it does a fine job in completing a film trilogy to rival The Godfather, The Lord Of the Rings and Star Wars Episodes IV to VI. And, if you believe the recent rumours about a fourth instalment already being planned for release in 2009, then it’s time to mark those calendars once again.