Review of Spider-Man: Homecoming (2017) by Anzaan A — 19 Nov 2017

With good CGI and an interesting take on The Vulture, but extremely cringy jokes forced in seemingly every line of dialogue, bad acting by everyone except Keaton and Holland, and the inexplicable reason to have Iron Man & his tech dominate a film that isn't even his (and make Spider-Man seem weak/dependent). SM: Homecoming is disappointing. 4/10.

... *Spoilers* (Compensating for shockingly overrated reviews).

I don't want it to seem like I'm a hater. I love Spider-Man. He's my favorite Marvel hero and one of the first ones I ever followed as a kid. But, that doesn't mean I can just ignore this very flawed film, especially when critics are unfairly over-inflating reviews for Marvel movies again (literally every one gets 90%+ when maybe 1/3 of them deserve that high.. fishy) and even mentioning it in the same sentence as "greatest superhero film ever" when in reality, it's not even the best Spider-Man movie.

Let's start with the bad. First, the jokes. Literally almost every line of dialogue in the movie had extremely cringy jokes forced in centering around immature and stupid things like puberty, Larb (you'll understand once you see it), male body parts (repeatedly, Flash is soooo clever with that joke man), pretend-hugging to open doors, and Zendaya's hipster girl hating on everything & flicking off the camera for no reason. I understand Peter's in High School, but the jokes were INSULTINGLY juvenile & unbearable even by MCU's joke standards (which have been bad). I really want to like Marvel's movies and do for many of them like Civil War and Winter Soldier, but I cannot explain this weird trend they've been on recently to kill their own movies with overloaded humor and make the movies jokes instead of art.

Also, the acting and characters except for Michael Keaton and Tom Holland were just horrible. Usually don't go into superhero movies expecting Oscar-level acting unless it's The Dark Knight, but this was so bad I felt the need to point it out. Spider-Man's overly giddy best friend is annoying and overdone in superhero movies, while every other supporting character like Zendaya's hipster girl who hates everything, Flash Thompson who is completely miscast, and Aunt May who people bizarrely crush over are dull, uninteresting, and badly acted.

Next, the one I came into the theater fearing the most: Iron Man and his tech DOMINATED the movie when it's not even his. I like Iron Man, but his forced shoehorning into a movie he had no business being in was a hated decision by many from the beginning (myself included), but was worse than I thought it'd be. He, Happy, and his tech in the suit literally make up 3/4 of the movie, so much that it's made to seem like Spider-Man is weak and dependent on Stark's tech when in the comics he doesn't have an ounce of that sophisticated tech. Also, he is belittled by Tony constantly, a fact that as a Spider-Man fan, I find absolutely infuriating when Spider-Man is Marvel's best/most recognizable hero.

Finally, the film is riddled with plot holes, action scenes not nearly as wowing as other superhero films, and forced diversity. Spoilers- E.g., how could aunt May not see Peter's suit when he reveals to Ned for the first time and puts it on the ground when she walks in? Also, the movie begins after Avengers in 2012, then jumps "8 years" to 2020 but is after Civil War in 2016??.. The diversity in the movie is so overly forced to copy WW's praised real diversity that it ends up rubbing off the wrong way like it's a last-second afterthought to increase box office #'s instead of cleverly working it in. Every single couple in the movie is biracial, which is cheating diversity-wise as it's the easiest by FAR to write in. Finally, there were sequences that were just dumb, like the selfie video sequence that lasted a good 15 minutes in the beginning of the film.

While there was a tornado of cons, I looked for positives too. There were bright spots. For one, the new suit looks great. Having an All-CGI suit was actually a good idea as it came out beautifully, even if I hate how they made it too tech-based. The CGI throughout the film was admittedly good as well, especially in Vulture's case, although with an insane budget like this movie had, that should be a given instead of an achievement. Holland was a good Spider-Man, although he sometimes overplayed the role by talking too much.

Also, Michael Keaton as The Vulture was great. Keaton is a gifted actor (Batman!) and gives a new light to a previously cheesy villain and makes him likable. His character was well fleshed-out and his take on the character fascinating, which is why he should be even more upset the rest of the movie did not perform to his level.

Overall, I came in wanting to love this movie as much as I loved the originals, but was very disappointed. Convinced there is something going on here as I cannot possibly explain how the MCU gets 90's every time from critics, influencing the public perception into wanting to agree based on the basic psychological want to agree with people of perceived higher authority like critics instead of thinking differently.

Raimi's Spider-Man 2 = still the best Spider-Man film by almost EVERY metric of cinema.

Most Memorable Moment: Plane-side Spider-Man vs Vulture fight.

Pros: Good CGI and a great Spider-Man suit, good performance by Holland although occasionally overacted, great performance by Keaton.

Cons: Extremely cringy jokes forced in seemingly every line of dialogue, bad acting and characters except Holland/Keaton, Iron Man and his tech dominate Spider-Man's movie and make him seem weak/dependent, plot holes, forced diversity by lazily making every couple biracial instead of writing in cleverly, action scenes not as wowing as previous MCU entries.