A analysis and personal thoughts of “Spider-Man: Homecoming”?
[HEAVY SPOILERS]
February 2015 was a month no Marvel fan could ever forget: Marvel Studios and Sony announced that both studios will from now on share the rights to Marvel´s most beloved hero, The Amazing Spider-Man. To make things easier, both studios agreed on a second reboot of that franchise.
During the production process of “Captain America: Civil War” Marvel announced that Tom Holland was cast as their flagship hero. And after his presence in “Civil War”, fans loved the new take on Peter Parker and wanted to see more.
And they got their wishes granted with the release of “Spider-Man: Homecoming” during this summer. Critics and fans praised it as one of the best takes on the character and loved the tone, cast and action of the movie.
But does it really deserve all the praise?
The protagonist: Spider-Man! (Or Iron Man junior?)
Peter Parker was created by Stan Lee and Steve Ditko back in 1962. Stan “the Man” got the idea after he saw an insect in his office crawling at the wall while he was thinking of a new hero to publish. Another train of thought gave him the idea to create a hero like DC´s Robin or Marvel´s own Bucky, a teenage hero. But in contrast to both mentioned teenage-heroes, his new creation was supposed to be without a mentor and able to learn that “with great power comes great responsibility” by making his own experiences.
His personality was always shown to be a shy, introverted nerd as Peter Parker but as Spider-Man he became a self-confident, sarcastic and witty hero. He also proved his intellect by creating his own web-shooters and tracers and by outsmarting various villains such as Doctor Octopus, Rhino and the Lizard.
Peter was also burdened with the responsibilities of his normal life: caring for his aunt May, falling in love with Gwen and later on MJ, keeping his friendship with Harry alive, getting pictures for the Daily Bugle and struggling to make a living.
His actions as Spider-Man would carry consequences over to his personal life outside the mask. His relationship with Betty ended because of his mask, Harry became an enemy, Gwen died and many more instances.
Being Spider-Man was not only a gift, it was also a curse.
The reason this all has to be brought up here is to compare how well Marvel Studios really transitioned their hero into the new movie.
Peter is still the shy nerd and witty hero. The scenes that show these contrasts the best are Peter´s shaky interactions with his crush Liz Allen and his antics as Spider-Man when he mocks the robbers that wear the Avengers-masks.
But otherwise the movie lacked a lot of the things that made Spider-Man Spider-Man:
In “Civil War”, Peter stated he made his own web-shooters, which impressed Tony Stark. Stark gave him later his new suit with new gadgets. But this takes away from Peter´s own smarts.
He becomes dependent on another hero to make his shooters, tracers and some new stuff like a drone and various kinds of web-grenades and even a parachute in his back. The movie takes a step further and gives his suit even it´s own A.I., which is dubbed Karen by Peter.
Karen replaces Peter´s famous Spider-Sense in the movie, which takes a lot away from the character:
His Spider-Sense was a unique power and one of his most beloved and important ones. Taking this away feels like taking Wolverine´s claws away and replacing it with gloves that have knives on them.
Giving him a suit that is basically just a recolored Iron Spider suit and expecting it to be accepted as the regular Spider-Man costume weakens Spidey as an individual character. It contradicts the basic idea of Stan Lee to have a teenage-hero without a mentor.
It further puts him down to a sidekick-level that he has to deliver a daily report to Stark by calling Happy Hogan everyday.
Another instance that dulled Peter down, even just a bit, was consisting the Chitauri core, a bight purple glowing source of energy used by the Vulture and his goons to power their weapons.
Peter and his movie-best friend Ned Leeds study it during a workshop class in school, and they get a small hint of it´s power. And even before that Peter witnessed it´s power first hand, when he faced off Jackson Brice, a battle from which he retrieved the stone. And after their studies in the workshop, they witness how Herman Schulz is tracking down the stone due to it´s radiation and Peter even overhears it.
This created a minor plot hole: Why would Peter and Ned, if both are so smart, put the stone just like it is into a bag, without any protection? The movie tells the viewer that Peter and Ned are smart, but it barely shows it.
It´s understandable, that Marvel wants to show a teenage-hero struggling, which is great. Peter struggled in his early years, too. But the difference was: He never needed Iron Man to save the day. When he got surprised by the Vulture and was thrown into the river, he had to be dragged out by an auto-piloted armor from Stark.
The destroyed ferry was saved by Stark and his drones, while Spidey looked completely incompetent. And at the Washington Monument Peter was only able to save Liz, Ned and everyone else in the elevator, just because Karen took over, piloted the drone and dropped more than just hints to Spidey on what he had to do.
In the comics, Spidey always had to do this on his own. And he would not always be successful, but that´s what made him better on later occasions. These failures drove him, not some threat by Stark about taking his suit away and Peter wanting to become an Avenger.
Some people argued that these scenarios had the intent to make Peter realize that he had to get responsible in his actions. But we always had the death of uncle Ben for that. Of course Marvel Studios wanted to avoid to tell the audience the origin of Spider-Man and killing off Ben a third time. And there was at least a small mention of the spider bite and that May went through a lot in recent times. But considering that a father figure just died six months prior to the events of the movie and Peter was indirectly responsible for the death, the gravitas of this incident felt very small.
“Being Spider-Man” didn´t felt like a curse to Peter and the consequences of being a hero weren´t strong. Peter left the debate team because of his heroic duties, but he was instantly welcomed back when the plot asked for it. And even Liz forgave him at the end, when he left her standing at the homecoming dance. The consequences were kept tiny to little.
Peter´s credibility as a hero was also hurt by various random jokes on his behalf. Even after all his active months as a hero, the viewers are supposed to believe and laugh at him that he is still unable to swing through the city with his web-lines. And in a later scene he was made fun of by a small criminal Peter wanted to interrogate.
The only moments in which the viewers get an actual glance at a heroic, classic Spider-Man is when he is trapped under the rubble and fights his way out, which was a nod the classic Amazing Spider-Man #33 from 1965, and stops the Vulture at the end.
The supporting cast
One of the biggest strengths of the Spider-Man comics have always been his supporting characters.
Every Spider-Man fan loves Mary Jane, who even married the web-slinger. Aunt May, who was the mother Peter needed when he had no one. J. Jonah Jameson, Flash Thompson, Betty Brant, Harry Osborn, Black Cat and so on. All these characters carried the stories forward and were interesting enough to keep the fans attached to them for decades.
The movie uses some of the characters, but most of them were this character just in name only.
Aunt May was closer her Ultimate universe incarnation, created by Brian Bendis and Mark Bagley in 2000. Not a bad decision, considering that the original version has already been portrayed by Rosemary Harris in Sam Raimi´s trilogy and Sally Fields acted as an hybrid incarnation of both characters in “The Amazing Spider-Man” and it´s sequel.
Marisa Tomei is a very capable actress and breathed some new life into the character of May. She was shown as the caring mother figure, that she was in the comics, too. Just a bit younger.
Peter´s love interest was Liz Allen. This was close to Stan Lee´s and Steve Ditko´s early work on their Spider-Man comics, in which Peter also had a huge crush on her before he started dating Betty Brant. Laura Harrier had even some resemblance to Liz´ incarnation in the TV-show “The Spectacular Spider-Man” from 2008.
Contrary to her (blonde) comic incarnation, this movie´s Liz was a more sympathetic and smart girl, instead of the somewhat shallow and petulant cheerleader she was before she got feelings for Peter, too. And similar to the comics, a relationship could never blossom because both went separate ways.
Ned Leeds, Peter´s best friend in the movie, was a total departure from all previous incarnations of the character.
In the comics, Ned was a tall, well-build blonde man that was introduced in as an adult. He was one of the best reporters working for the Daily Bugle, where he met his later wife Betty Brant. During one of the stories he worked on, he got caught by the Hobgoblin and was used as decoy and killed by the assassin called Foreigner, who got hired by Jason Macendale.
The movie Ned was mostly based on a completely different character called Ganke, who is related to Bendis´ own pet project Spider-Man Miles Morales.
Ned was the typical loser nerd, that felt like he belonged into any episode of “The Big Bang Theory”, but not into a superhero movie, especially not Spider-Man. After a while he became “the man in the chair” and a similar annoyance like other characters that filled out that role, like Felicity Smoak on CW´s DC comics adaption “Arrow”.
A really important character in the Spider-Man comics was always Flash Thompson, a jock that bullied Peter during their school days. But as both grew older, their rivalry developed into mutual respect and even blossomed into a great friendship. Flash was even Peter´s best man when he married Mary Jane.
Flash has already been portrayed by Joe Manganiello in Sam Raimi´s first take on the franchise, and by Chris Zylka in Marc Webb´s reboot. Even if those movies never fully tapped into the potential of their growing friendship, it was still close to Peter´s and Flash´s typical “nerd vs jock” rivalry.
This time around, everything was different. Tony Revolori was cast in the role. A young, talented actor but a huge miscasting for that particular character. Marvel wanted to take a new road and portray him as a more “modern” bully. But this Flash was impossible to take seriously and was more often than not a joke and left the viewers surprised asking themselves “Why is this kid even allowed to be at a school for geniuses?”.
He had more resemblance to a troll on the internet, who are no way as threatening than actual bullies. If this is the modern definition of a bully, people have to feel sorry for the generations to come.
Michelle was a new character, that has created some kind of cult on some sites of the internet, most in particular Tumblr and DeviantArt. But why is the question. Michelle was a nearly forgettable, moody and rude kid, that occasionally showed up to deliver an unfunny one-liner and to be caught by a random camera, so that the viewers would be reminded of her existence.
The only thing she will be remembered for is taking the initials “MJ” from a classic and beloved character, that was once more popular than another particular Marvel redhead called Black Widow.
When the trailers got released, many fans feared that Tony Stark would steal Spidey´s spotlight. And like it was described in previous statements about Peter´s character in this movie, those fears were valid. Even the closing scene of the movie was a banter between Tony and Pepper, with Happy in the middle. This scene made the viewers forget for a minute that they were actually watching a Spider-Man movie, not an Iron Man flick.
The rest of the supporting characters was mostly forgettable, which is sad for fan favorites such as Betty Brant and Cindy Moon. Only Donald Glover as Aaron Davis was somewhat memorable.
Chris Evans´ cameos as Captain America were fun, but nothing more.
The villains
Without a doubt: Michael Keaton as Adrian Toomes, the Vulture was the best part of this movie. Easily lining up with other memorable MCU villains like Loki, Kingpin and Kilgrave.
Considering that the comic version of the Vulture was always a fan favorite, but by far not that dangerous member of Spidey´s rogues gallery, this is an impressive feat on the script and Keaton himself. Coming from the middle class and just wanting to give his family a stable home after losing his job, Toomes became a sympathetic villain, that was easy to relate too. But he doesn´t stop there, he is also intimidating, which is shown when he threatens Peter after figuring out that the boy who is dating his daughter is also Spider-Man.
His relationship to Peter was closer to the one Peter had to his arch-nemesis Norman Osborn in the comics, than the rivalry to the actual comic Vulture.
Even if the twist of Adrian being Liz´ father was a fresh surprise, it felt somewhat forced. But it worked for the intent to deepen the animosity between the hero and the villain.
Michael Keaton´s Vulture is a villain, that will hopefully return in later Marvel movies.
The Shocker was always a small-time crook in the comics, that became a huge fan favorite despite being a somewhat unimportant character. The movie played a bit with the character and actually delivered two men in that role.
Logan Marshall-Green portrayed Jackson Brice, the first man in the movie who was called “Shocker”. Jackson Brice is known to comic fans as Montana, the leader of the Enforcers, a trio of thugs that occasionally hired by mobsters to do the dirty work. The movie incarnation was inspired by Montana´s take in the “Spectacular Spider-Man” show, in which Montana became this series´ incarnation of the gauntlet wielding seismic villain.
Bokeem Woodbine was the classic Shocker, Herman Schulz, who became the villain in this movie after Toomes somewhat accidentally killed Brice, because he mixed up a deadly gun with their anti-gravity weapon. Schulz was the typical henchman, a role he was also known for in the comics.
The way they used both men in the movie was really good, even though there was that small bit of disappointment of not seeing one of them in a full Shocker costume.
Michael Chernus as the Tinkerer Phineas Mason was a much younger take on the character. He created all of the equipment used by Toomes and both Shocker´s. Otherwise his involment in the movie itself wasn´t notably big, but a perfect utilization of the classic villain.
Another well known and beloved villain from the printed pages appeared in a nearly forgettable role.
Michael Mando was a potential buyer of Toomes´ weapons. Notable was a huge scorpion tattoo on the neck of his character, and he was supposed to be Mac Gargan, known as the Scorpion.
He could become more important in future movies and turn into the villain he is known as, because he was seen in the mid-credits scene set in the prison and talked about friends on the outside- This could be a potential build-up to the Sinister Six or other criminal organizations like the Maggia.
Further thoughts and opinions
That this movie won´t feel like a typical Peter Parker story was made clear from the first scene in which the titular hero appeared: a Vlogging-montage.
This scene made instantly clear at which audience this movie was aimed at, and typical Spider-Man fans that loved shows like “The Spectacular Spider-Man” and it´s 1990s predecessor or the Raimi trilogy and the old school comics, where not part of it.
While everybody can agree on the fact that humor is subjective, the jokes in this movie were most of the time bad. The most annoying of these was the “Penis Parker” one, which wasn´t funny the first time it was heard and the way it was dragged out made it even worse. And making Peter/ Spider-Man the punchline of most of the jokes does also hurt the character.
The worst scene was probably when Peter had to leave Liz´ party and lend Flash´s car to chase down the criminals. Why does this scene exist? He is Spider-Man, why would he need a car to hunt down the villain? Because Marvel needed a reason to throw in some product placement for Audi.
In my personal opinion, I have to say that this movie was probably the worst cinematic take on Spider-Man, which pains me to say, considering how much of an importance this character always had and still has in my personal life.
Hopefully the sequel will be a huge improvement and use the planted potential. And hopefully we will get the real Mary Jane in it, too.
This movie is a decent teenage-comedy, but in regards to an adaption of Spider-Man´s comics, it felt more like a parody on a child-friendly Family Guy-niveau.
Talking my smack on that movie,
BakugoValentine