As Spider-Man Brand New Day opens, Spider-Man has turned into Batman, an obsessed crimefighter living in a gloomy, gadget filled mancave. His social life consists of battling his rogues gallery with occasional excursions to Staten Island to rescue The Punisher from certain death. His only real friend is Capt. Jean DeWolff (Liza Colón-Zayas) who consults with him on unfolding crimes, such as implausible high speed bank robbery chases through the streets of Manhattan.
It’s a tough life. Peter Parker (Tom Holland) is still grieving over his decision to make everyone forget he exists in order to heal the multiverse in Spider-Man: No Way Home. He’s reduced to snooping on Ned (Jacob Batalon) and his true love, MJ (Zendaya) while longing for all his old friends and life.
But soon Peter must confront his misery even more directly. When the Scorpion is captured and locked up at Damage Control central, something weird starts happening: people are being mind-controlled by some powerful force that can zip from brain to brain.
Meanwhile, something weird is also happening to Peter: his wrists are tingling and he’s having a lot of headaches – as revealed in DeWolfe’s motherly concern “Are you still having those headaches?”
Peter goes looking for answers on all of this from some old friends in the MCU, including Prof. Bruce Banner (Mark Ruffalo), now teaching at Empire State, and Yelena/Black Widow (the always amazing Florence Pugh), who true to her Russian heritage, takes meetings in a banya. He also runs into the Punisher (Jon Bernthal) who is not the tortured soul of the TV version, but comedy relief, a much more palatable role for the character.
He also encounters Sadie Sink, whose role in the movie was spoiled for me only one hour before seeing it. If you can avoid spoilers try for it! I won’t spoil it here.
The fourth installment of the Marvel/Sony Spider-Man franchise, is directed by Destin Daniel Cretton, new to the franchise, and written by Chris McKenna and Erik Sommers, who worked on the previous three. Early reactions have been rapturous and it’s already at a 98% audience score on Rotten Tomatoes.
As I watched this movie, I honestly wondered if I was too old and confused to appreciate it. I thought all three previous movies were delightful, especially the Triple Spidey overload in No Way Home – which also gave us a priceless Willem Dafoe meme.
But this movie was so disjointed and on the nose I found myself mentally picking it apart.
How on the nose? The Hand attacks Spidey in a classic shot from countless Kung Fu movies, and Spider-Man says, aloud “THAT’S SO COOL.”
I repeat, he says that aloud. Spider-Man is admiring a fairly decent shot in an action movie ad the filmmakers are essentially patting themselves on the back – I thought that was only for Deadpool movies?
Other scenes are equally annoying: one key moment comes when a character tells another in crisis to “be yourself.”
In addition there is a horrible amount of jargon in this movie! Whenever the emotional stakes begin to pick up steam, Peter returns to his Batcave or a meeting with someone and they start talking about fields, inhibitors and other words that made me want to fall asleep. The intent may have been to show Spider-man is smart, but they tended to sap the dramatic moments in the film.
I realize the whole point of this movie was to show Spider-Man rejecting friendship and suffering from his solitude, giving up on the community that he loves…and that often loves him back. There’s no J. Jonah Jameson in this movie, and Spidey is generally beloved by New Yorkers. But a Spider-Man who is not interacting with everyday New Yorkers is a pretty boring Spider-Man. The movie revved up for me whenever Spidey and the Punisher were trading barbs. Bernthal is equally at home with the super intense PTSD Punisher and the more over the top character here. I loved him and his dubious chili.
But this potential buddy film also reminded me that Spider-Man is also most effective when he’s fighting mundane foes. All the inhibitor and fluxus field chatter gives this movie the same soulless sheen as typical MCU movies, and there was a lot of toppling and crushed buildings giving it a samey feeling that previous installments did not have.
Also as much as I hate whatabboutism, for everyone who said Supergirl had a bland villain….the villain in Brand New Day makes that one look like Heath Ledger. I realize that is part of the head fake/spoiler in the movie, but this character will obviously be returning and needs a LOT of fleshing out.
I think what audiences are enjoying about this movie is the undeniably charismatic star power. The audience at my screening was almost all very young couples or friend groups, and the females in particular were gasping and oooing at every twist in Peter’s quest to regain MJ. They were invested.
I am not ready to say that Tom Holland is the BEST Spider-Man, but he is now the MOST Spider-Man and he has aged into a good actor. He’s absolutely stellar in a role that requires him to wear a mask 80% of the time. He’s also hit the gym and not skipped leg day, something the movie is proud to point out with numerous underoo scenes. Young audiences just LOVE Tom Holland!
Zendaya is also a huge star to contemporary movie-goers. MJ comes off as a bit dour in this movie, though – perhaps the scowl that Zendaya wore in Dune didn’t have time to wear off. Jacob Batalon is always a joy as Ned, and he has a few standout moments here.
At this point, Florence Pugh is the best thing in the entire MCU. Yelena has two scenes and she crushes them both. I would watch Pugh do anything, anywhere. Mark Ruffalo does Mark Ruffalo things as the Hulk, and it’s fine. Sadie Sink is excellent and obviously poised for a long run in the MCU, and her training on Stranger Things reacting to frightening lights and loud explosions will serve her well for years to come.
Aside from the lovable cast, there are so many things that annoyed me about this movie. For one thing, it is not set in a New York City that resembles anything real, perhaps because they shot it in Glasgow. There are many ominous shots of the 59th Street Bridge but most other locations are made up CGI. Roosevelt Island, scene of so many Spider-Man film moments does make a cameo in an overhead shot. This fake world didn’t create a sense of community for Spider-Man to be isolated from, a fairly big flaw.
Also, where did Spider-Man get all the money for his gadgets? Is he being supported by Stark Industries? Also WHY can’t his organic webshooters and mechanical ones work at the same time? That makes no sense. Why why why.
Spider-Man Brand New Day ends with more questions than it started with so we will see an inevitable fifth episode. Tom Holland is a grown man of 30 now, and he’s going to have to start having grown man adventures, perhaps in Doomsday. I’m sure this movie will make an insane amount of money, but for me, it continued the MCU’s track record of shiny, noisy episodes whose main purpose is to introduce more characters who can then go on to have their own shiny, noisy episodes.
