Review of Spider-Man: Homecoming (2017) by Yorkman — 16 Nov 2017

Are we tired of superhero movies yet? The box office returns would say no, but the ever-increasingly lacklustre reviews of each subsequent Marvel or DC movie releases would suggest otherwise.

The problem is trying to capture the spirit of the comics, translating that onto the screen, whilst also creating an interesting storyline and investing characters.

Clearly it's not easy, but S:H comes closer to this 'perfect formula' than most. Not to say it's a fundamentally flawed movie, because it is, but it's a fun journey from beginning to end and Tom Holland as 'Spidey' is by far the best on screen version we've had.

The story eschews the whole 'origin' element, and follows on from Spidey's appearance in Civil War. We're back to the idea of a character balancing his life as the dull, studious, intelligent, geeky and awkward 'Peter Parker', and his ever-increasing desire to use his prodigious abilities to help others and fight crime.

The fundamental flaw mentioned earlier stems from the notion that this would actually be possible in the modern age, something that the film makes some subtle nods toward from time to time, but also something that you really can't gloss over.

Add to this the now completely overused superhero movie tropes (the main villain being directly related to a character Peter Parker is embroiled with, amongst others) and the narrative falls apart at the end.

But, if you walk into the movie with that level of expectation, you WILL be surprised. The film does come together extremely well, it doesn't feel like it's about half an hour too long (even if some scenes do drag on a fair while), and the big action set pieces are great spectacles.

Throw in some fine acting (Michael Keaton nails his role, and is more menacing when he's not 'The Vulture' than when he's CGI'd up), decent soundtrack, a nice little set of cameo appearances from other Marvel characters, and you get something which is better than I thought it would be.

However, the Superhero genre is now getting into severe overkill levels of releases, and because of that there is a sense of 'Christ, not another one'. For me, that notion of this (or any superhero) movie just being a small part of a larger 'extended universe' diminishes it somewhat.