Spider-Man: No Way Home
[info headline="Release date"]7 December 2018[/info]
[info headline="Language"]English, Hindi[/info]
[info headline="IMDb Rating"]7.4[/info]
[info headline="Genre"]Action, Fantasy, Science Fiction[/info]
[info headline="Cast"]Jason Momoa, Amber Heard, Patrick Wilson[/info]
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The best of “Spider-Man: No Way Home” reminded me why I used
to love comic books, especially the ones about a boy named Peter Parker. There
was a playful unpredictability to them that has often been missing from modern
superhero movies, which feel so precisely calculated. Yes, of course, “No Way
Home” is incredibly calculated, a way to make more headlines after killing off
so many of its event characters in Phase 3, but it’s also a film that’s often
bursting with creative joy.
Director Jon Watts and his team have delivered a true event
movie, a double-sized crossover issue of a comic book that the young me would
have waited in line to read first, excitedly turning every page with breathless
anticipation of the next twist and turn. And yet they generally avoid getting
weighed down by the expectations fans have for this film, somehow sidestepping
the cluttered traps of other crowded part threes. “No Way Home” is crowded, but
it’s also surprisingly spry, inventive, and just purely entertaining, leading
to a final act that not only earns its emotions but pays off some of the ones
you may have about this character that you forgot.
Note: I will very carefully avoid spoilers but stay offline
until you see it because there are going to be landmines on social media.
“No Way Home” picks up immediately after the end of
“Spider-Man: Far From Home,” with the sound of that film’s closing scene
playing over the Marvel logo. Mysterio has revealed the identity of the man in
the red tights, which means nothing will ever be the same for Peter Parker (Tom
Holland). With an almost slapstick energy, “No Way Home” opens with a series of
scenes about the pitfalls of super-fame, particularly how it impacts Peter’s
girlfriend M.J. (Zendaya) and best bud Ned (Jacob Batalon). It reaches a peak
when M.I.T. denies all three of them admission, citing the controversy about
Peter’s identity and the roles his buddies played in his super-adventures.
Peter has a plan. The “wizard” he met when he saved half the
population with The Avengers can cast a spell and make it all go away. So he
asks Dr. Strange (Benedict Cumberbatch) to make the world forget that
Spider-Man is Peter Parker, which, of course, immediately backfires. He doesn’t
want M.J. or Ned or Aunt May (Marisa Tomei) to forget everything they’ve been
through together, and so the spell gets derailed in the middle of it. Strange
barely gets it under control. And then Doc Ock (Alfred Molina) and the Green
Goblin (Willem Dafoe) show up.
As the previews have revealed, “Spider-Man: No Way Home”
weaves characters and mythology from the other cinematic iterations of this
character into the universe of the current one, but I’m happy to report that
it’s more than a casting gimmick. My concern going in was that this would
merely be a case of “Batman Forever” or even “Spider-Man 3,” where more was
often the enemy of good. It’s not. The villains that return from the Sam Raimi
and Marc Webb films don’t overcrowd the narrative as much as they speak to a
theme that emerges in the film that ties this entire series back to the other
ones. For a generation, the line about Spidey was “With great power comes great
responsibility.” “Spider-Man: No Way Home” is about the modern Peter Parker
learning what that means. (It also helps a great deal to have actors like
Molina and Dafoe in villain roles again given how the lack of memorable
villains has been a problem in the MCU.)
So many modern superhero movies have confronted what it
means to be a superhero, but this is the first time it’s really been
foregrounded in the current run of Peter Parker, which turns “No Way Home” into
something of a graduation story. It’s the one in which Parker has to grow up
and deal with not just the fame that comes with Spider-Man but how his
decisions will have more impact than most kids planning to go to college. It
asks some interesting questions about empathy as Peter is put in a position to
basically try to save the men who tried to kill other multiverse iterations of
him. And it playfully becomes a commentary on correcting mistakes of the past
not just in the life of Holland’s Parker but those of characters (and even
filmmakers) made long before he stepped into the role. "No way Home"
is about the weight of heroic decisions. Even the right ones mean you may not
be able to go home again.
Watts hasn’t gotten enough credit in his other two
Spider-Man movies for his action and “No Way Home” should correct that. There
are two major sequences—a stunner in a mirror dimension in which Spidey fights
Strange, and the climactic one—but it’s also filled with expertly rendered
minor action beats throughout. There’s a fluidity to the action here that’s
underrated as Mauro Fiore’s camera swoops and dives with Spider-Man. And the
big final showdown doesn’t succumb to the common over-done hollowness of MCU
climaxes because it has undeniable emotional weight. I also want to note that
Michael Giacchino’s score here is one of the best in the MCU, by far. It’s one
of the few themes in the entire cinematic universe that feels heroic.
With so much to love about “No Way Home,” the only shame is
that it’s not a bit more tightly presented. There’s no reason for this movie to
be 148 minutes, especially given how much the first half has a habit of
repeating its themes and plot points. Watts (and the MCU in general) has a
habit of over-explaining things and there’s a sharper version of “No Way Home”
that trusts its audience a bit more, allowing them to unpack the themes that
these characters have a habit of explicitly stating. And, no offense to
Batalon, turning Ned into a major character baffles me a bit. He always feels
like a distraction from what really works here. On the other hand, this is the
first of these three films that has allowed Zendaya and Holland’s chemistry to
shine. In particular, she nails the emotional final beats of her character in a
way that adds weight to a film that can feel a bit airy in terms of
performance.
“Spider-Man: No Way Home” could have just been a greatest
hits, a way to pull different projects into the same IP just because the
producers can. Some will see it that way just on premise alone, but there’s
more going on here than the previews would have you believe. It’s about what
historic heroes and villains mean to us in the first place—why we care so much
and what we consider a victory over evil. More than any movie in the MCU that I
can remember, it made me want to dig out my old box of Spider-Man comic books.
That’s a heroic accomplishment.
In theaters on December 17th.
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