SPIDEY 4 becomes AMAZING becomes Marvel's SPIDER-MAN

[Ben]

Mark Kermode loved it on the BBC Film Review show today, and gave it great enthusiastic coverage without a single spoiler. He even said he was purposely keeping the surprises.

[ShyViolet]

Original JK Simmons screen test for J. Jonah Jameson:


https://youtu.be/MJJqwf4_aqY


Actual scene in the 2002 Spider-Man:


https://youtu.be/b5G9reMt5FE


He was so perfect for the part! Definitely one of the best supporting characters in contemporary comic book films! .

(In my opinion only second to Michael Gough as Alfred in the Tim Burton films.)

[Ben]

I. Freakin'. LOVED. This. Movie!

Most fun I’ve had in a Spider-Man film since Raimi/Maguire's trilogy, and quite possibly the best superhero adventure I’ve seen since Spider-Man 2, or at least Infinity War. It blows Endgame out of the water.

Loved the callbacks, and so cool to see the other Spider-Mans on screen again, with Garfield not looking a day older (well, it hasn’t really been *that* long) and even Maguire not reminding us that his films were twenty years ago. Honestly, if they'd kept going and been on Spider-Man 12 by now, he’d still be rocking Peter Parker.

Loved the theme reminders of each Spidey, and especially that they used Horner's Amazing motif instead of Zimmer's lazy bored of writing superhero themes version. So well placed, too, and not where you'd expect.

This. Was. Epic. So emotional too, especially for those that saw the original Spider-Man, and even Amazing Spider-Man films in theatres: this was a fantastic encore for those two, and even did the unthinkable in bringing up the Garfield films to a new level. I’d always liked him in the role, but the writing was so bad: here he had the material to really work with, with a couple of really, really nice emotional beats (you know the one, especially). I’d still like to see the Richard Parker (not the tiger) story completed if they can make that happen, since it was all just left so open. Loved how they made that work here, though, and the hints at life between both older Spideys' last films and this one.

Loved the Uncle Ben parallels, and the feel of the location of a certain moment at the end, and actually gasped out "oh, f—-!" when something happened to someone toward the end that I was so wrapped up in how entertaining it all was that I didn’t see coming, silly me.

Molina was excellent, and the effects to bring him back are just astounding. All the villains were great, and done well. This was just too-notch blockbuster filmmaking and I actually can’t wait to see it again sometime. This is the kind of film that I love to run in our theatre, and the sound was awesome.

Now…the imperfections and holes: some *really* dodgy CG when Holland's Spidey takes off or lands, or gets knocked away. It just looks cartoony. And two things bothered me: the total lack of villainy once they all went off (I wanted to see what they were getting up to; surely a place for an extra set-piece?), and my brain is completely fuzzed by the ending, which raises a billion questions:

If no-one can remember Peter, how does everyone else's life work out? Why would Happy even know Aunt May? Where did Peter go to school if he wasn’t with MJ? Who brought him up if he wasn’t with May? Suddenly he gets an apartment at the end without a job?

It’s unclear how far this goes: did Spider-Man still happen in the previous films, but no-one knows who he is? There's too many obstacles to clear to make all that work, even as a magic spell, and I thought it was a bit lazy just to wipe it all away like turning back the world or a magic kiss, but not working nearly as well as those fairly simple ideas.

But those are two fairly minor things, even if the last one still befuddles me. What it *does* do, quite cleverly, is reset things for us to get a really for real Spider-Man in the MCU or, as it looks like, in an adjacent Spidey-Verse where Sony's other films can start to blend in, as looks to be the case with Venom.

And I look forward to those, because Holland has finally won me over as Peter Parker, after not really gelling with the character so much in his first two solo outings. Here, he channels the deeper inner turmoil of Maguire in Spider-Man 2, and develops as a character as as an actor of this character. Spider-Man really is a Spider-MAN in this one, and it’s just so nicely done and layered with his two counterparts.

Perhaps the most fun I’ve had at the movies with a big silly blockbuster that was certainly big, but not that silly, despite some wonderful flashes of humor from the three Spider-Mans and their relating their experiences and trying to work together.

Yes, it's not as almost perfect as Spider-Man 2, and I could actually have done with a teeny bit less of Doctor Strange, but otherwise it was just so wildly entertaining and enjoyable, and its two-thirty hour runtime seemed to flash past, only pausing (if only slightly) just a couple of times.

Did I say I loved it?

[EricJ]

But those are two fairly minor things, even if the last one still befuddles me. What it *does* do, quite cleverly, is reset things for us to get a really for real Spider-Man in the MCU or, as it looks like, in an adjacent Spidey-Verse where Sony's other films can start to blend in, as looks to be the case with Venom.

It did seem to be less of an actual narrative story, and more of a fourth-wall MCU-enabled "apology" for their own multiverses of the Raimis and the Amazings, by getting all the characters, both the heroes and villains, to sit around in their own respective fan round-tables (like William Shatner's old "The Captains" series), and grill each other on "Oh, and the Rhino was a Russian guy in a machine? What the heck was THAT about?"
Hence the scenes of "Wait, [Tobey MacGuire] shoots it out of his wrist?"

And, once they get everything sorted out under one roof, the official garage-sale picking of what to keep and what to throw away, before moving forward with that MCU Phase IV they kept promising was going to happen--
Like Jamie Foxx's Electro being a badass now, even though Garfield says "Wait, didn't you used to be a sweet nerdy guy with glasses?"

[Ben]

Hidden your reply for those who haven’t caught up yet.

But…I don’t recognise any of those quotes from the film I just saw. The lines were delivered very differently and in context, not that anything really made any sense (like how the villains were not only from different universes but seemingly from different times…but let’s not go there). It ran with an idea and did it very well, many caveats aside.

[Randall]

Wow, Ben actually likes a current film. It MUST be good!!!

[EricJ]

And at least--not coincidentally for the first time, with all the canons trying to justify themselves--they addressed the question of whether Zendaya's "MJ" is supposed to be Mary Jane Watson...Sort of.
Like the rest of the movie, they wanted to leave things up in the air and have all the canons be correct, in case they have to change them back later.

[Ben]

Wow, Ben actually likes a current film. It MUST be good!!!

See…it CAN still happen! There’s just so much bad and mediocre stuff out there these days that people accept as "good" that it makes things like this even more special when they come along, and this is that rare event where the massive box-office business is justified and clearly the result of repeat business, which I can totally understand. And even knowing many of the "surprises" in store, I was still totally blown away.

And at least--not coincidentally for the first time, with all the canons trying to justify themselves--they addressed the question of whether Zendaya's "MJ" is supposed to be Mary Jane Watson...Sort of.
Like the rest of the movie, they wanted to leave things up in the air and have all the canons be correct, in case they have to change them back later.

Well, er…no, again. They still didn’t address it, since it was addressed in the previous film, but have totally left the door open for MJ to turn up in a later film. The other MJ. Or even Gwen. What was nice here is that they all had "an Uncle Ben", and all had "an MJ". And the canons were all pretty much set in stone as a result of that, with little if any wriggle room for future reversionings. It was all done very deftly and confidently, actually, and quite remarkable in how straight and firm they were in how these things were laid out.

[Daniel]

Honest trailer:

[Ben]

Even HT can’t really kick this movie!

[Daniel]

A new cut, dubbed "The More Fun Stuff Version", will be released in theaters September. Trying to go for that $2 Billion I see.

[EricJ]

Meanwhile, elsewhere on the Spider-verses, Sony thought those Internet kids LOVED Morbius, just because social media went around quoting "It's Morbin' time!", and re-released the movie in theaters last week.
You know what happened. Big time.

(Someone should really break the bad news about Internet Irony to Sony, that just because everybody likes to quote you on social media...
Or even get Samuel L. Jackson to explain to them about his own experiences with "I'm sick of these MF'in' snakes!")

[Ben]

A new cut, dubbed "The More Fun Stuff Version"…

Glad I didn’t pick up the disc yet now. Surely a packed SE to come at Crimbo!

[Daniel]

Seems like a sure bet! Here's a list of five scenes that will likely be included:

Interrogation Scene Extended – 2:25 min
Peter Day at Midtown High – 5:25 min
Undercroft Montage – 1:35 min
Happy’s Very Good Lawyer – 1:35 min
The Spideys Hang Out – 4:25 min

[Randall]

The Hang Out bit was the best part of the film for me, so I'd be happy to see more of that.