Marvel Finally Lets Spidey Shine

It’s opening weekend for Spider-man: Brand New Day, the fourth film in the Marvel Cinematic UniverseWhen it first began in 2008 with a little film called Iron Man no one suspected the empire that would follow. Superhero movies in the past, especially those not featuring either Batman or Superman, were usually terrible. And yet, Iron Man would lead to a long series of successful films, launching the most successful cinema brand in history: the Marvel Cinematic Universe. SpidermanSure, DC Comics has Batman, Superman, and Wonder Woman, but among the most popular superheroes stands a guy from Marvel Comics, a younger hero dressed in red and blue who shoots webs and sticks to walls. Introduced in the 1960s, Spider-Man has been a constant presence in comics and more, featured in movies regularly since his big screen debut in 2002. franchise, and it’s already a monster hit. Worldwide sales are reported between $820 and $920 Mil, for a single weekend, which could very well make it the most successful first weekend for any film ever, possibly besting even Avengers: Endgame. I’m going to let that sink in for a second because, regardless of the quality of the film itself, just about everyone loves Spider-man and clearly the hype for this film (messy as the trailers were) was real.

In a way I almost feel like that makes a review like this irrelevant. Anyone and everyone that loves Spider-man, who is currently the most popular superhero on the planet, is likely going to go see this film. Even if you’re burned out on Marvel, or burned out on superheroes, or even just tired of all the big-budget Hollywood blockbusters, more than likely you’re going to see the film. Good or bad, it’s Spider-man. We all want to see Spidey on the big screen, to be there to see what he’s up to next. Spider-man is about as close as we have to a truly teflon superhero. Nothing bad can stick to him.

It is a good thing, though, that this new film is actually pretty darn great. While it’s questionable if the hype for the MCU is still there, and no one really knows just how well Avengers: Doomsday is going to do in the grand scheme, Spider-man: Brand New Day helps to prove that superhero fatigue isn’t real. All it takes is a superhero that’s been treated well over the years (and Marvel has had three pretty good to great films, with Homecoming, Far From Home, and No Way Home building a lot of love for this iteration of the character) getting a solid film, and people will show up in droves. Spider-man: Brand New Day was exactly the film the character needed, and Marvel and Sony are going to get paid-off huge because of it.

Spider-man: Brand New Day picks up with Peter Parker (Tom Holland) four years after the spell was cast that functionally removed him from the memories of everyone he knew. We get a montage of him watching the people he was friends with move on with their lives for four years, throwing himself instead into work as Spidey, helping to protect the city from all manner of dangers. He says he’s rewarded by the work he does, but it’s an isolating experience that leaves him cut off from the very life he once was able to lead.

This eventually leads to his body going through some major changes. His spider genetics begin to take over, most obviously in the form of natural web shooters, and it throws everything else about his powers off as well. This comes at a bad time as there’s a new villain in town, attacking facilities run by the Department of Damage Control. Spidey, the dedicated superhero for the area, wants to help, but he’s unable to track down the villain, in no small part because the fiend is able to jump from body to body, leaving Spidey without a way of following them. And until Peter figures out what this new foe wants, he may not be able to protect New York at all…

Clocking in at just shy of two-hours-thirty, Spider-man: Brand New Day is a long film, but that doesn’t make it a bad one. It gives the film time to breathe as it deals with all of the various elements of the plot as the factor in. There’s Peter’s isolation, his longing for his friends (Zendaya's Michelle "MJ" Jones-Watson and Jacob Batalon's Ned Leeds), his spider changes, the new foe in town (who I won’t spoil here since the film treats it as a big secret), what DODC is up to, and all the Marvel cameos as well. Yes, it’s a lot, but it all actually works really well in harmony together.

The key plot thread that I think the movie develops best is the isolation Peter feels. It would have been easy for the film to say “hey, it’s been four years. Here’s Peter’s new life,” and move on as if it was a completely fresh reboot. But that wouldn’t have gotten to the heart of the sacrifice the character made, and what kinds of trauma that would have caused him. The film, wisely, sticks to what Peter has gone through, and the effect it would have on him as a character (not just as a hero), exploring those aspects to maximum effect.

A good part of the first hour of the film is spent focusing on how isolated Peter is. He didn’t just avoid his past friends (despite promising them that he’d reconnect); he’s been avoiding making connections with anyone, keeping his identity a secret to all. He’s basically been operating full time as Spidey, ignoring the Peter Parker side of his personality for almost four years. He even has connections with other heroes, like Frank Castle / The PunisherAn anti-hero who was never meant to be a hero in the same way as the Avengers, the Punisher has taken on his own life in pop-culture, but that doesn't change the troubling qualities to his characterization. (Jon Bernthal) and Yelena Belova / Black WidowNatalia Romanova was one one of the greatest and most effective Russian spies, a deadly killer who could blend in anywhere. Then she was turned and became one of SHIELD's most effective, and trusted, agents. (Florence Pugh), and they don’t even know his face or who he is. Peter is functionally alone, and it’s a driving force for his plotline, especially once the villain finds him and uses that isolation against him.

Without spoiling things about that villain specifically (I’m sure I’ll do a spoilers article soon after this), I will note that they are more complicated than they first appear. The villain (or, really, we should probably call them the “main antagonist” instead) has their reasons for going after DODC and it’s not just greed or power. They have a specific motivation that’s understandable, and while I wouldn’t call it the deepest plotline the writers could have come up with, it works well not just in the context of this film, but for where that character could be utilized in the future as well. They’re someone that could show up in other, non-Spider-man works, showing Marvel slowly building out their universe again, although in this case it’s the right way to do it. Small threads, little hints, without over-promising or under-delivering.

I think what’s most important here, though, is that despite all the other characters that appear here (hell, even Mark Ruffalo's Bruce Banner / The HulkOnce the brilliant Dr. Bruce Banner had dreams of making the world a better place by building super soldiers to act as a shield for all mankind. Then an accident at his lab bathed him in gamma radiation. Now he has a living nightmare, as a big green guy lives within, just waiting for the rage to take over so he can be free. shows up for a couple of scenes), this never stops feeling like a Spider-man movie. That was one of my key gripes about each of the previous films, where each time Peter was given a mentor to work with, as if Marvel didn’t trust us to accept a Spider-man movie where Spidey was the sole lead. We got him under the wing of Tony Stark / Iron ManBillionare Tony Stark has a secret: while he travels the world by day as a playboy philanthropist and head of Stark Industries, he combats the evils of the world as the armored Iron Man. in the first film, Mysterio in the second, and then Doctor StrangeSometimes thought of as the magical version of Tony Stark, Doctor Strange is the "Sorcerer Supreme", a mystic who was once a brilliant neurosurgeon until an accident robbed him of the use of his hands. But he found a way, in Tibet, to gain back not only his hands, but so much more... in the third, and each time it felt like the movies were co-opting time with Spidey to show us someone else and carry other plot threads along.

This time, though, this is all Peter. When the other heroes show up it’s for cameos. These scenes feel more like crossovers in the comics, where you know that Peter exists in a world of superheroes and sometimes they see each other. Yelena shows up as a contact Peter uses for some information. Frank arrives on the scene to try and stop a bad guy before Peter shuts him down. Peter goes to Bruce to ask some questions about science. Each character suits a specific need for a specific scene, but they are in service to Peter’s story, not the other way around. This is as pure of a Spider-man movie as we’ve gotten in some time, and I really liked that.

Now, I could gripe about a few small things. I don’t feel like the head of the DODC, William "Bill" Metzger (Tramell Tillman), is ever fleshed out enough to feel like a friend or foe. You can tell the film wants us to distrust him from his very introduction, but because it doesn’t invest in him at all as a character, he feels less like someone to pay attention to and more like a cardboard standee of a character. Then there’s Punisher, who we do get to spend time with and invest in, but he feels like a different version of the character from the one we just saw over in The Punisher: One Last Kill, which is less of an issue with this film and more a problem with Marvel’s overall continuity. And by the same metric, Banner here feels like he’s regressed in his control of the Hulk from over in She-Hulk: Attorney at Law, without much explanation for it. Again, this is a Marvel issue more than an issue in this film, but it is noticeable.

And then there’s the nitpicks you can make about Peter’s home life. He lives in New York, in a pretty spacious apartment, getting Door Dash pretty regularly, but he doesn’t seem to have any means of income. He works as Spidey full time, not even selling photos of the hero (that we know of) to the Daily Bugle. How does he have cash? Is this an inheritance he got from Aunt May? How could he cash that in if he wiped everyone’s memory of him. Does Peter Parker still exist in this world or did the magic wipe him out entirely? Or is he getting paid, somehow, by the NYPD, who he helps via his contact in the department, Detective Jean DeWolff (Liza Colón-Zayas). A simple two sentence comment at some point in the movie could have helped us a lot as too many people (myself included) all are left wondering, “just how can Peter afford to live in New York and be Spidey full time?”

These issues aside, though (and I really don’t feel like they’re major issues), Spider-man: Brand New Day is a really excellent film. If it weren’t for the existence of the two animated movies, Spider-man: Into the Spider-Verse and Spider-man: Across the Spider-Verse, I’d even call this the best Spider-man film we’ve ever gotten. It’s certainly up there with the likes of Raimi’s two excellent films, SSpider-man and Spider-man 2, and it sits right near the top of everything the MCU has done with the character. This is a well plotted, well shot, well acted, and all around well made movie that treats Peter / Spidey right, and it’s everything a fan could have wanted after the ending of Spider-man: No Way Home.

It’s no wonder, then, that this is likely going to be one of the highest grossing films ever made. With how well Sony and Marvel have been treating the character, just about everyone has been primed to want to see this film. Spider-man is on a roll and, at this point, I think we’re all excited not just for this film but where he’s going to go next.