Star Wars: The Empire Strikes Back (1980)

The Empire Strikes Back is the reason people love the Star Wars saga as much as they do — and much of the credit goes to the recently departed James Earl Jones, the voice of Darth Vader.

The wonderful first Star Wars is kind of a kid’s movie: a fun, plucky, wonderfully inventive, tongue-in-cheek space caper and crowd pleaser that deserved its massive box office. But The Empire Strikes Back is about growing up.

Easy decisions are often the wrong ones. Everyone is constantly calculating current sacrifice against future reward. And just when things start to seem simple, they become incredibly, impossibly messy.

It also contains the flat-out best reveal of any movie, ever. If you saw it as a kid, in a theater, as I did, without knowing what was coming in Cloud City, then you know what it’s like to have a story viscerally and completely explode your simple childish beliefs.

Spider-Man 2 (2004)

This is one of the best superhero movies ever made, because of the serious questions it asks about what it takes to be a hero. Can Peter Parker (Tobey Maguire) be the savior of New York City as Spider-Man, and also carve out a small measure of happiness with Mary Jane (Kirsten Dunst)? Director Sam Raimi doesn’t make it easy.

But in the film’s greatest moment, after a stunning subway battle with Doctor Octopus (Alfred Molina), Peter learns that he doesn’t always have to save the city. Sometimes the city can save him. It’s one of the most obvious choices of the many superhero sequels better than the originals.