The relationship between Sony and Marvel fans is a love-hate relationship. The Raimi trilogy is a love letter to all Marvel fans, but the Webb duo-logy is like a slap- in- your-face breakup scene mostly found in your typical romantic TV series.
Now with Spidey's coming home to MCU, and Sony now collaborating with Marvel Studios, seems like this movie is a apology letter to all Marvel fans. But after dozens of trailers that was said to "give away nearly everything" (thank goodness I avoided it), and many TV spots, does this movie deliver what it should be?
The answer: YES they delivered.
Spider-Man Homecoming is easily one of the best MCU movies to date, and the best Spiderman movie in a very long time. At last, finally, our friendly neighborhood superhero has received a good movie of his own, and he deserves it.
Tom Holland was born to be Spider- Man. He was very very good in this movie. Robert Downey Jr. as Iron Man is also very good in this movie, he's like the Uncle Ben of the MCU. Also, he's not in every scene, probably had the least screen time of all the main stars in this movie (Nope, this is not Iron Man 4 ft. Spider-Man, it's the opposite). Marisa Tomei as Aunt May is also really good in this movie, and she's not acting sexy and anything, she's just a normal, everyday woman. The guy who play Ned is a great comic relief, and Liz who is Peter's crush is also really good in this movie. Michael Keaton as the Vulture is one of the best MCU villains so far (on par with The Winter Soldier). He has more depth than I thought. At battle he's merciless, ambitious guy, but when he's not the Vulture, he's a hardworking, normal, everyday guy, and that gives us more sympathy to him. The biggest surprise in this movie is Jon Favreau as Tony's bodyguard. His role is much more expanded in this movie and he did a great job. Pepper Potts is back, and despite brief it's such a great moment in this movie, and it's good to have her back, even for just a minute or so screen time. Chris Evans as Captain America is one of my favorites in this movie, and probably one of his best on screen appearance in a MCU movie so far.
The story of the movie is much more light-hearted than most MCU movies right now, plus the exploration about Spidey's journey when he's in high-school (not just glimpses when he's in high-school, a mistake in The Webb duo-logy) makes it more interesting, in fact almost all the scenes in this movie is school related, and that's great. The action scenes is not as explosive as most MCU finale acts, but that's okay considering the light-hearted tone. The twist in the end is amazingly executed. The editing is also amazing, it's funny when it tries to be funny, and tense when it tries to be tense. In fact there's a scene between Holland and Keaton where I had chills on my spine because how intense it is.
However, there's some things in this movie that bugged me. One, there's a lot of penis jokes and adult jokes in this movie. Is it too much? For this kind of movie it seems pretty inappropriate.
Two, The side characters are "useless", Ned in particular. He's mostly the thing that hinders Spider-Man for his goal in this movie, to capture this particular guy (Keaton). Most of the time he screw up Peter's attempt to hide his identity, and that became repetitive and that just won't work. Even times when he's shown to be useful, he's only useful for about 5 minutes. The screenwriters should add more to his character. It's not Spider-Man and his "useless" friends, Spidey is human, he still needs help from his friends. There's also this Michelle character who's just a stalker like character that's kinda creepy actually, and the bully guy who makes penis jokes makes me want to yell: enough already!
Three, there's no real tension in this movie. There's no life-or- death threat that many lives at stake thing. All this movie has is Spidey trying to capture Keaton's character, and that's it. There's no real danger for everyone in the city, and that disappoints me.
Four, I don't know if it's just me, but this movie has the worst credits sequences of all the MCU. In "The Winter Soldier", the credits sequence is visually pleasing along with an amazing soundtrack by Henry Jackman. How about in "Thor: The Dark World" where the credits sequence is a handmade painting-like sequences, with a amazing score by Brian Tyler. Or take a look at MCU's latest example: "Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2". That movie has a visually impressive opening scenes, along with fourth wall breaking, and a song that's actually really good. In this movie, despite it's visually pleasing, it is accompanied by a very bad, horrible music. It's just really bad to me. The movie seemed rushed so that they had no time to make the credits sequence more "tidy" IMO.
The last but not the least, is that's there's. so. much. product placements. Sony and Marvel probably working together with a condition that there will be no more Sony product placements, but Sony still wants to do it. So, who you gonna call? Audi! That's right! When Sony can no longer do it, let Audi do the work for you!! Yaaaayyy!!! (?)
But overall, this is the Spider-Man movie we all wanted to see, and Jon Watts and his crew delivered what's promised. It's not perfect, but it's definitely Sony's best attempt so far. Hands down, the best Spidey movie yet.
Now let's just hope Sony don't screw up Venom...
Now with Spidey's coming home to MCU, and Sony now collaborating with Marvel Studios, seems like this movie is a apology letter to all Marvel fans. But after dozens of trailers that was said to "give away nearly everything" (thank goodness I avoided it), and many TV spots, does this movie deliver what it should be?
The answer: YES they delivered.
Spider-Man Homecoming is easily one of the best MCU movies to date, and the best Spiderman movie in a very long time. At last, finally, our friendly neighborhood superhero has received a good movie of his own, and he deserves it.
Tom Holland was born to be Spider- Man. He was very very good in this movie. Robert Downey Jr. as Iron Man is also very good in this movie, he's like the Uncle Ben of the MCU. Also, he's not in every scene, probably had the least screen time of all the main stars in this movie (Nope, this is not Iron Man 4 ft. Spider-Man, it's the opposite). Marisa Tomei as Aunt May is also really good in this movie, and she's not acting sexy and anything, she's just a normal, everyday woman. The guy who play Ned is a great comic relief, and Liz who is Peter's crush is also really good in this movie. Michael Keaton as the Vulture is one of the best MCU villains so far (on par with The Winter Soldier). He has more depth than I thought. At battle he's merciless, ambitious guy, but when he's not the Vulture, he's a hardworking, normal, everyday guy, and that gives us more sympathy to him. The biggest surprise in this movie is Jon Favreau as Tony's bodyguard. His role is much more expanded in this movie and he did a great job. Pepper Potts is back, and despite brief it's such a great moment in this movie, and it's good to have her back, even for just a minute or so screen time. Chris Evans as Captain America is one of my favorites in this movie, and probably one of his best on screen appearance in a MCU movie so far.
The story of the movie is much more light-hearted than most MCU movies right now, plus the exploration about Spidey's journey when he's in high-school (not just glimpses when he's in high-school, a mistake in The Webb duo-logy) makes it more interesting, in fact almost all the scenes in this movie is school related, and that's great. The action scenes is not as explosive as most MCU finale acts, but that's okay considering the light-hearted tone. The twist in the end is amazingly executed. The editing is also amazing, it's funny when it tries to be funny, and tense when it tries to be tense. In fact there's a scene between Holland and Keaton where I had chills on my spine because how intense it is.
However, there's some things in this movie that bugged me. One, there's a lot of penis jokes and adult jokes in this movie. Is it too much? For this kind of movie it seems pretty inappropriate.
Two, The side characters are "useless", Ned in particular. He's mostly the thing that hinders Spider-Man for his goal in this movie, to capture this particular guy (Keaton). Most of the time he screw up Peter's attempt to hide his identity, and that became repetitive and that just won't work. Even times when he's shown to be useful, he's only useful for about 5 minutes. The screenwriters should add more to his character. It's not Spider-Man and his "useless" friends, Spidey is human, he still needs help from his friends. There's also this Michelle character who's just a stalker like character that's kinda creepy actually, and the bully guy who makes penis jokes makes me want to yell: enough already!
Three, there's no real tension in this movie. There's no life-or- death threat that many lives at stake thing. All this movie has is Spidey trying to capture Keaton's character, and that's it. There's no real danger for everyone in the city, and that disappoints me.
Four, I don't know if it's just me, but this movie has the worst credits sequences of all the MCU. In "The Winter Soldier", the credits sequence is visually pleasing along with an amazing soundtrack by Henry Jackman. How about in "Thor: The Dark World" where the credits sequence is a handmade painting-like sequences, with a amazing score by Brian Tyler. Or take a look at MCU's latest example: "Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2". That movie has a visually impressive opening scenes, along with fourth wall breaking, and a song that's actually really good. In this movie, despite it's visually pleasing, it is accompanied by a very bad, horrible music. It's just really bad to me. The movie seemed rushed so that they had no time to make the credits sequence more "tidy" IMO.
The last but not the least, is that's there's. so. much. product placements. Sony and Marvel probably working together with a condition that there will be no more Sony product placements, but Sony still wants to do it. So, who you gonna call? Audi! That's right! When Sony can no longer do it, let Audi do the work for you!! Yaaaayyy!!! (?)
But overall, this is the Spider-Man movie we all wanted to see, and Jon Watts and his crew delivered what's promised. It's not perfect, but it's definitely Sony's best attempt so far. Hands down, the best Spidey movie yet.
Now let's just hope Sony don't screw up Venom...