Review of Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse (2018) by Shayan S — 14 Dec 2018

Sony hasn't exactly been kind to the Spider-Man universe and its lore the last couple of years since Sam Raimi (gracefully) decided to call quits on continuing his series of films after Spider-Man 3 was essentially forced to be finished by Sony due to creative disagreements. And since then a failed (and deserved tbh) rebooted series, iffy and bad spin-off to a well utilized villain, and refusing to give just in general the rights back to the character to Marvel haven't necessarily been in favour to the studio (not even counting what happened with Ghostbusters and their comedy films.) So suffice to say I wasn't, very worried how despite how surprisingly blown away I was by the animation from the marketing material for this film came along I wasn't, still worried as hell (and Sony Animation? You mean the same people of The Emoji Movie? *Shudders* no please god no.) But then the names of Phil Lord and Chris Miller (two duo directors i've heavily respected and enjoyed from The Lego Movie and One High) were attached, with Phil taking screenwriting credit and Chris producing, and suddenly I felt myself get a bit excited given their talent. And once the marketing got me assured that this wasn't being completely tampered by Sony, I kept my excitement and finally got to see the film finally. And seeing it the first time I came out of it feeling " a bit underwhelmed that this didn't grab me as much as I hoped it would", I think after another re-watch I can say while that may ring still, I'm still happy to say that it's still a damn fun ride that does manage to FINALLY add and give Spider-Man fans (myself included) another nice iteration of the universe.

As before with having some personal gripes on how some of the story was handled, I can say now that while being very great to its core, some things that did hold me back from enjoying it fully with small issues ike dialogue often feeling a bit weirdly forced in exposition from time to time, personal preference of some of the rap songs feeling really pointless and forced (still the Sony ones, except Sunflower), and a personal preference worth mentioning for using for the sequel: missing A HUGE chance to give the film some more runtime and pacing (Ala Lego Movie) with the alternative Peter Parker (and Gwen's especially) to help tie into the arc to Miles, and only one major issue with unfortunately a lot of the pacing of hurting some of the scripts story and clear emotional moments and as a result can make especially Miles story just a tad underwhelming. But other than that, I'm happy to report that the team involved with the Spiderverse material really put a lot of heart and soul with absolutely no-duh beautiful and sometimes jaw-breaking animation that really is a first and rather than feeling pretentious adds so much character to Spidey as a whole it just goes without saying to mention its amazing, a very solid script courtesy of Phil Lord and Rodeny Rothman that shows a lot of just great wit but especially understanding to emotional weight and investment that sure has its hiccups due to its pacing still shines through when it does work, the themes and especially its emotional impact when it's presented in the story feeling genuinely engaging, speaking of which the character work for Miles especially working so well being a re-work of his origin story and emotionally all the way just works so well and I loved every second of it, all of its goofy but yet especially serious tone and even mature character work working so beautifully well, a very surprisingly well oriented score that actually probably gives some of my favourite Spider-Man music since Danny Elfman's, all of its cast really owning their roles very well (especially Shameik Moore's Miles who despite not even being a darn kid like gets the feel of the character so surprisingly well on top of Jake Johnson's typical but still off-beat performance and Hailee Steinfield unrecognizable but great work on Gwen; its clear they put a lot of work and feeling to their characters.).

So goes without saying that Into the Spider-Verse is definitely a great ride, and definitely this time around feeling much more impactful and entertaining with a second watch. And while it may not be something i'll see myself ALL the time going back to due to its very minor but weird inconsistencies, still for what we got it's a great rendition and take on all of Spider-Man that it ain't worth missing out on, so definitely check this out when you can and give it some love (even if it IS Sony) cause it definitely deserves it! Oh and all I can say is if you enjoy a lot of the inside joke memes of Spider-Man, just all I can say is stay till the end credits. I promise you won't be disappointed.