I was not expecting this movie to feature a homecoming dance.
That's the first thing you need to know about this movie. That title was on point. On the nose, even. On par with the movie titles of yore, that stayed on subject and on time right at the beginning of the film. On balance, Spider-Man is maybe a little more subtle, because it wasn't on record with the conflict as well as the setting.
I just wanted to get that out of the way.
All right, another Spider-Man movie. Woo... hoo. Sorry if I seem a little jaded, but this is literally the sixth big-budget Spider-Man blockbuster released in my lifetime. Even worse, after so many Spider-Man movies, this is also the first one that isn't targeted directly at me. The original Spider-Man trilogy released while I was in high school, then the Amazing Spider-Man duology came out while I was in college. In both of those cases the teenaged/early 20's Peter Parker was pretty obviously meant to attract my demographic.
Spider-Man: Homecoming's title character is pretty obviously still meant to target that demographic, but I'm not in it anymore. Frankly, I find myself relating a lot more to J. Jonah Jameson these days than Peter Parker.
So, before I really delve into my budding crotchety-ness and put a wicker chair on my front porch so I can yell at the neighbor kids, let me just say in summary that I was Spider-Manned out before this movie was even released. Even if the majority of Spider-Man movies to this point were good (3/5ths, so not a huge majority), I'm just kinda sick of this character being re-invented.
All that being said, I'm very, very grateful that this incarnation of Spider-Man didn't include an origin story. They just kinda went "yeah, there's this kid in New York who has these powers" and we were all like "okay, deal." In the MCU, this really isn't a hard pill to swallow. I'll also give credit to the writers behind Homecoming for putting Spider-Man into some settings where his web-slinging prowess doesn't immediately put him into a class of his own. The suburbs, the Washington Monument, and on a plane are all places where the kid is immediately disadvantaged due to the lack of tall buildings.
That was a novel take on the Spider-Man formula, and I liked it. I also liked the inclusion of Tony Stark as a bad-but-trying father figure, to kinda hang a lantern on the fact that Peter really is lacking a role model both for aspects of his social development and his super-heroing. That was some welcome character development we hadn't seen before for both Tony and Peter.
In addition, the movie also did all the typical action movie stuff we expect from an MCU movie really well. It was well shot, the choreography was fun, and the effects were absolutely top notch. Just the best. Unfortunately... that's not really a selling point when three MCU films are being released ever year, especially when the other two are Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2 and Thor: Ragnarok. Both of those films had unique visual stylings and alien settings that set them apart from the more mundane action movies.
Homecoming didn't. And maybe that's my biggest issue with this movie. Not that it was bad, or even that aspects of it were bad, because frankly, the movie was technically well made and I don't have serious complaints with the quality of any particular thing. However... I don't honestly remember much of the movie beyond what was shown in the trailers. Spider-Man: Homecoming was a good movie that unfortunately didn't do enough to stand out among what is now a veritable ocean of quality superhero movies. It didn't have the visual punch of Doctor Strange, the unique pacing of Ant-Man, or the humor of Guardians.
It did manage to be a better movie than Civil War, but I'm somewhat afraid I'll still remember Civil War better going forward because I had actual issues with the way that movie was made. I'm not saying it's worse to be forgettable than to be bad, but... well actually, in today's Hollywood, it might just be. I'm not likely to forget Justice League anytime soon, for example.
Though sometimes I wish I could...
That's the first thing you need to know about this movie. That title was on point. On the nose, even. On par with the movie titles of yore, that stayed on subject and on time right at the beginning of the film. On balance, Spider-Man is maybe a little more subtle, because it wasn't on record with the conflict as well as the setting.
I just wanted to get that out of the way.
All right, another Spider-Man movie. Woo... hoo. Sorry if I seem a little jaded, but this is literally the sixth big-budget Spider-Man blockbuster released in my lifetime. Even worse, after so many Spider-Man movies, this is also the first one that isn't targeted directly at me. The original Spider-Man trilogy released while I was in high school, then the Amazing Spider-Man duology came out while I was in college. In both of those cases the teenaged/early 20's Peter Parker was pretty obviously meant to attract my demographic.
Spider-Man: Homecoming's title character is pretty obviously still meant to target that demographic, but I'm not in it anymore. Frankly, I find myself relating a lot more to J. Jonah Jameson these days than Peter Parker.
So, before I really delve into my budding crotchety-ness and put a wicker chair on my front porch so I can yell at the neighbor kids, let me just say in summary that I was Spider-Manned out before this movie was even released. Even if the majority of Spider-Man movies to this point were good (3/5ths, so not a huge majority), I'm just kinda sick of this character being re-invented.
All that being said, I'm very, very grateful that this incarnation of Spider-Man didn't include an origin story. They just kinda went "yeah, there's this kid in New York who has these powers" and we were all like "okay, deal." In the MCU, this really isn't a hard pill to swallow. I'll also give credit to the writers behind Homecoming for putting Spider-Man into some settings where his web-slinging prowess doesn't immediately put him into a class of his own. The suburbs, the Washington Monument, and on a plane are all places where the kid is immediately disadvantaged due to the lack of tall buildings.
That was a novel take on the Spider-Man formula, and I liked it. I also liked the inclusion of Tony Stark as a bad-but-trying father figure, to kinda hang a lantern on the fact that Peter really is lacking a role model both for aspects of his social development and his super-heroing. That was some welcome character development we hadn't seen before for both Tony and Peter.
In addition, the movie also did all the typical action movie stuff we expect from an MCU movie really well. It was well shot, the choreography was fun, and the effects were absolutely top notch. Just the best. Unfortunately... that's not really a selling point when three MCU films are being released ever year, especially when the other two are Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2 and Thor: Ragnarok. Both of those films had unique visual stylings and alien settings that set them apart from the more mundane action movies.
Homecoming didn't. And maybe that's my biggest issue with this movie. Not that it was bad, or even that aspects of it were bad, because frankly, the movie was technically well made and I don't have serious complaints with the quality of any particular thing. However... I don't honestly remember much of the movie beyond what was shown in the trailers. Spider-Man: Homecoming was a good movie that unfortunately didn't do enough to stand out among what is now a veritable ocean of quality superhero movies. It didn't have the visual punch of Doctor Strange, the unique pacing of Ant-Man, or the humor of Guardians.
It did manage to be a better movie than Civil War, but I'm somewhat afraid I'll still remember Civil War better going forward because I had actual issues with the way that movie was made. I'm not saying it's worse to be forgettable than to be bad, but... well actually, in today's Hollywood, it might just be. I'm not likely to forget Justice League anytime soon, for example.
Though sometimes I wish I could...
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