Thoughts on movies, comic books, life, and other nonsense, by someone who should know better
It’s hard to believe, but as of this year’s Avengers: Endgame, Tom Holland has donned the spider-suit in more movies than any other actor, and it’s only been three years since his first appearance in Captain America: Civil War! To my knowledge, only Nicholas Hammond has played the character more than him. This time around, it’s in his second solo outing, subtitled Far From Home.
Two Spider-Man related movies in two weeks (for me), and the hands-down winner is Spider-Man: Into The Spiderverse, a movie that just about succeeds in every department. In contrast, Venom, the second live action appearance of this character from Marvel Comics (the first being 2007’s misbegotten Spider-Man 3), falls flat just about everywhere, with only the character of Eddie Brock saving the movie from being a complete bore. A lot better than being a disastrous piece of crap like Bird Box and Holmes and Watson, but still nothing to get even mildly enthusiastic about.
If you’ve been following my reviews, you know I trend toward genre movies, and as someone who has written for Marvel Comics, I’m predisposed to seek out superhero movies, even if I don’t think they’ll be that great. Hey, I’m a nerd, what can I say? I don’t remember hearing about Spider-Man: Into The Spiderverse until about a month before it dropped – the fourth quarter of 2018 was a busy one for me – and at that time I hadn’t seen Venom, so I missed out on the post-credits preview too, but I finally saw it just after Christmas, and I have to say it’s my favourite Spider-Man movie to date.
So the headline describes this movie perfectly for me. Marvel’s 19th movie in its cinematic franchise is a hugely impressive piece of movie making, given the sheer scope. I’m not just referring to the visuals, since this is generally the part of a CGI fest I find the least impressive. No, the technical aspect I’m talking about are all the behind-the camera stuff, from script to production and everything in between (the legal department must have worked overtime for weeks on just the contracts). Avengers: Infinity War is finally the main event that the franchise has been building toward since 2012’s Avengers, arguably 2011’s Captain America.
Since I watched Spider Man: Homecoming, The Amazing Spider Man 2 has been on heavy rotation on TBS, and I’ve caught a few sequences over the past few days – enough to remind me how mediocre it was – indeed, some parts just descend into outright awfulness. I was never a fan of Andrew Garfield’s two movies – the first one was serviceable, but I joined the naysayers because of the rebooted origin. If there’s anyone alive who knows the character, they already have the origin story down. Dressing it up a little differently and adding a veneer or familial mystery didn’t disguise the fact it was a stupid idea to essentially reboot the character as if the Raimi movies never happened. At the very least, this is what Spider Man: Homecoming gets right.
AT THE FOOTHILLS OF MADNESS 