I am getting a little tired of opening all my reviews of
every Spider-Man movie with a spiel about how they’re all the product of Sony’s
relentless refusal to give the rights back to Marvel (you can find a more
detailed version of that rant here
and here),
but it’s kind of necessary for putting Spidey’s place in the superhero pantheon
into perspective. Their attempts to hold onto the rights of arguably the most
valuable asset of the Marvel canon led to them running Sam Raimi’s Spider-Man series into the ground,
making two of the most cynical cash grabs of the new millennium, a solo movie for
a villain no one wanted or asked for, and only made a good movie when Marvel
finally stepped in and showed them how it’s done. Although Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse could be viewed either another tax
write-off or a Hail Mary attempt to get it right by throwing their arms in the
air and going “Screw it, let’s just make a cartoon”, the end result is easily
the best Spider-Man movie in fourteen years. Hey, even a broken clock is right
twice a day.
Our story follows Miles Morales (Shameik Moore), a teenager
from Brooklyn who becomes the new Spider-Man after he’s bitten by a radioactive
spider while doing graffiti with his uncle (Mahershala Ali) and witnesses the
death of Peter Parker at the hands of Kingpin (Liev Schreiber). Kingpin has
been working on a super collider that brings in five alternate versions of
Spider-Man from different dimensions: a middle-aged, out of shape version of
Peter Parker (Jake Johnson) who survived but fell on hard times, Gwen Stacy
(Hailee Steinfeld), Peter’s old girlfriend who got bit instead of him,
Spider-Man Noir (Nicolas Cage), a hard-boiled detective from the 1930’s, Penni
Parker (Kimiko Glenn), a Japanese tech wiz who built her own spider robot, and Spider-Ham
(John Mulaney), who is a cartoon pig. Unfortunately, the super collider
threatens to destroy all dimensions, so Miles has to stop Kingpin and get the
other Spider-Men back home.
While the MCU has been doing gangbusters with its classic
lineup, Marvel Comics has been quietly shaking up the status quo by introducing
a newer, younger, more diverse cast of characters, with Mile Morales, a
black/Puerto Rican kid as the new Spider-Man, leading the charge. Naturally,
people have been clamoring for him be put in front of the camera for ages, and Into the Spider-Verse manages to do
that, as well as introduce the equally lauded Spider-Gwen, pay respect to the
past, and bring the pulpy stylization of the comics to the big screen in a way
that only animation can. On paper this sounds like a page ripped from the story
bible of a scrapped Amazing sequel,
but put in the hands of three animation veterans and the duo behind The LEGO
Movie, and you end up with something completely transcendent.
The animation helps enhance this exponentially. I was a bit
concerned at first because the frame rate looked a little choppy, but once things
are put in motion, you hardly even notice it anymore. The art style is designed
to replicate a fusion of pop art, digital cel-shading and comic book aesthetics,
complete with Ben-Day dots, splash pages, motion lines, narration brackets and onomatopoeia.
The Greek chorus of trans-dimensional Spider-Men, meanwhile, reflect the art style
of their respective home worlds. Spider-Man Noir is done in the inky black and
white shadows of a Frank Miller comic, Penni Parker is presented with the exuberant
expressiveness of an anime, and Spider-Ham is animated in the rubbery stretch-and-squash
style of a funny animal cartoon from the 40’s. The boundless limitations of
animation allow for some spectacular camera trickery that the live-action
movies weren’t capable of like the high-speed web-slinging through cities and
forests, or having characters appear upright as they’re walking on the walls. Hard
to believe that this came from the same studio that gave us The Emoji Movie.
The emotional through-line of the plot is that being the new
Spider-Man is just another addition to the mounting stresses of Miles’s life.
He’s torn between his duties at an elite prep school and pleasing his
straight-laced cop dad (Brian Tyree Henry), and his fun but troubled uncle who
nurtures his passion for graffiti, and feels duty bound to honor Peter’s death
by taking up his mantle. Those insecurities are only enhanced with the pressure
to stop Kingpin even though he’s only had his spider powers for a few days and
all the alternate versions of him are way more experienced. To that extent, the
oafish dad bod Spider-Man he gets saddled with provides the perfect foil shows
him that even the greatest heroes have a hard time getting their lives
straightened out. It’s kind of a remix of the whole “with great power comes
great responsibility” mantra that has to be incorporated into all renditions of
Spider-Man, but with the added bonus of the old adage that a great hero can
come from anywhere or look like anyone. And with the ever-shifting landscape
both in entertainment and politics, where underrepresented groups are making
their voices heard, a message like that is vital. Judging by the line of kids I saw waiting to pose and take pictures with the cardboard cutouts after the
show, I think they succeeded.
Bottom line, Spider-Man:
Into the Spider-Verse is a triumph on every level. It takes a well-worn
character and makes it fresh again. The writers (Phil Lord and Chris Miller,
the wonder team who made The LEGO Movie
into something transcendent) took possibly the most toyetic Spider-Man premise
ever brought to the big screen and turned it into a heartfelt character piece,
a high-flying action movie, and if the hype surrounding an upcoming Spider-Gwen sequel is anything to go by, a reassuring signifier of things to come.
8/10
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