I will stipulate, like many others, whether they love or hate Marc Webb's The Amazing Spider-Man, that it was perhaps a bit premature for a reboot. That said, however, I believe the new movie is superior in many ways to Sam Raimi's version from last decade (which I also liked), from the acting to the atmosphere.
I had the advantage of viewing the new Spider-Man in IMAX 3D, and the effect was indeed amazing. It was immersive without being "in your face" either literally or figuratively; I felt part of the action without it being either dizzying or intrusive. None of the 3D effect was obvious; it just was.
The familiar plot has been somewhat altered; gone is the Daily Bugle except for one small reference, and Peter (The Social Network's Andrew Garfield) is less an aspiring photojournalist and more an aspiring young scientist. Mary Jane (Kirsten Dunst) has been replaced by Emma Stone's Gwen Stacy. Rather than an aspiring actress, Gwen is a bright young future scientist working as an intern at visionary scientific research company Oscorp. And Peter's parents have disappeared, apparently going underground in fear of a big secret being stolen or revealed. That secret, once discovered by Peter, drives the plot of The Amazing Spider-Man.
The secret is a crucial algorithm developed years earlier, and it leads Peter to Oscorp, which was founded by Peter's father Richard and his partner Curt Connors (Rhys Ifans – pronounced Reese Ee-vans). It's while poking around Oscorp that Peter receives the fateful spider bite that irrevocably alters his existence, granting him superpowers and the ability to repay the jerks who've bullied him for years.
Since Richard's disappeance, herpetologist Connors has run Oscorp, turning it into a mega-success. But what really drives him is his desire to replace his right arm, lost long ago. He runs Oscorp with the singular goal of developing cross-bred genetic mutations that can result in the regrowth of limbs, which will not only heal him, but benefit humankind. Unable to identify the one essential algorithm he needs to make the experiment work, Peter, without realizing the genie he will let out of the bottle by doing so, provides him with the long-since missing key to Connors' grand experiment.
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