RELEASING just in time for Christmas, is Spider-Man: No Way Home, serving as a capstone to a busy past few months in the Marvel Cinematic Universe. Unlike the two most recent Marvel entries, Shang-Chi and The Eternals, that added new characters and mythology, here we’re getting something more familiar.
At the end of Spider-Man: Far From Home, Peter Parker’s life gets metaphorically blown up when it’s revealed to all the world that he’s Spider-Man. And a murderer. You’d think saving the world would earn him some leeway to clear his name.
As seen in the last trailer from a few months ago, Peter visits fellow New Yorker Doctor Strange to cook up a spell to send everything back to square one. Things don’t go according to plan and villains from throughout the history of Spider-Man arrive in his world.
Now, it has to be clarified that while these villains have a history of fighting the webhead from Queens, it’s not the Tom Holland iteration of the character that they remember going up against (Doc Ock brings it up in the trailer).
This brings us to the big rumours (that might or might not be confirmed) that previous movie Spider-men, Tobey Maguire and Andrew Garfield are also popping up in No Way Home. After all, if the bad guys can travel across dimensions then why can’t other heroes too.
Surprisingly for a trailer (presumably the final one) to a Marvel movie, a twist this big remains hidden – though expect social media to blow up with spoilers once the movie premieres.
However, despite the big reveals of the villains – the previously shown Doc Ock, Green Goblin, Electro, Sandman, the Lizard, (maybe Venom) – there are some worrying signs that the movie might be a tad overstuffed.
Historically, comic book movies – especially Spider-Man movies – with too many bad guys don’t turn out too well. Spider-Man 3 (2007) had three, The Amazing Spider-Man 2 (2014) also had three. Batman & Robin (1997) is another classic example. No Way Home right now has five and there could be more.
As an aside, in the comics and animated shows, Spidey’s enemies often join forces and form their own team – The Sinister Six (who doesn’t love a little alliteration). They have never been seen in live action and it looks like we’ll finally be seeing them here.
In addition to fighting his rogues gallery in one movie, Peter will likely have to deal with Doctor Strange and various larger MCU shenanigans. After all, these Marvel movies are always setting up the next adventure even before the current one ends – the plates are always spinning.
All these plot machinations threaten to overshadow the main character and his relationships. It’s always worth worrying that character is often ignored in the service of plot, especially in movies of this scale. The emotion is sacrificed in the name of memes.
There’s an interesting philosophical crux brought up in the trailer where Peter is seemingly hesitant to kill the villains even though it is their shared destiny. Doctor Strange – who probably knows the bigger picture – wants to play things out as they should, but Peter resists.
The idea of fighting fate is always interesting, and hopefully it isn’t lost in the storm of superhero action and jokes that Marvel has perfected into a formula since the first Iron Man. – The Vibes, November 17, 2021
