Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse (2018) - Cinema Review

Review:

*Originally written December 9th, 2018*

Damn, no way was this meant to happen. Spider-Man has had a rough ride in terms of consistent quality with its films, there was a long stretch after Sam Raimi's Spider-Man 2 when we didn't even get a good one for 13 years with the excellent Spider-Man: Homecoming. After many false starts and uncertainty with what Sony is doing with the franchise, I never expected Into the Spider-Verse to not only be as good as it was, but also the best Spider-Man film we've had yet. 

While superhero films are becoming quite stale at the moment, often walking a line between mediocrity and excellence (The MCU delivers some of the most serviceable, but vanilla films in the past decade), Into the Spider-Verse comes along and derails everything in a self-aware piece of gorgeous animation that has more in common with The Lego Batman Movie than anything that's come before it. 

I'm not that big into comics, but I know Miles Morales is someone everyone has wanted to see in a film as Spider-Man for years and I can see why. He's both similar to Peter Parker in some ways, but is also a very different person with a different origin story and personal life. From the opening moments he's a very likeable character that's easy to get behind, forced into an elite school by his father where he feels he doesn't belong, only to get bitten by a radioactive spider and gain powers of his own. But that gets turned upside down as he sees Kingpin murder his universe's Peter Parker and open a portal that sends several different variations of Spider-Man into Mile's life.

Each one of these Spider-Man's has their own unique tone and style that works perfectly. Jake Johnson is an actor I usually find very irritating, but his voice work here as a more lazy and faded Spider-Man is equal parts pathetic and likeable. Then Nicolas Cage as "Noir Spider-Man" might just be the best version of the character available, a black and white coloured, private detective from the 1930's filled with lines that spoof the Noir genre cliches we know and love.

Hailee Steinfeld's Gwen Stacy is also infinitely more interesting than Emma Stone's take on the character from the Andrew Garfield films. She plays a great part in the dynamic and brings a lot of character to the role. The two more throwaway and sillier Spider-Men I possibly could have done without, but they were there for some serviceable comic-relief and it was fine.

From the trailers I was very excited by the unique animation style that Into the Spider-Verse takes on and it was even better as an actual film. It's hard to describe, it's sort of like cell-shaded, but stop-motion. It might be a bit off-putting for people who've never seen stuff like this, but it is absolutely gorgeous to look at. A bright, vibrant and colourful comic-book brought to life and being an animation makes it easier for some of the bigger and more cartoonish stuff that would be hard to do in live-action work. 

I was also taken back by how mature and emotional some of the character arcs and story could be at times. Morales arc of being who he wants to be was oddly touching and some of the big reveals towards the end actually worked and I didn't see coming, which is rare for a film like this. Some of the beats towards the end could actually Pixar a run for its money too, I'd even argue this is better than anything Disney or Pixar have released in years.

While going to some dark places and hitting emotional highs, they still manage to balance its comedy and self-aware tone very well. I'm sure there's a whole load of references to the comics that I didn't get, but there is an amazing jab at Spider-Man 3's emo/dance scene that I absolutely loved. 

Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse is an incredible achievement for the franchise and Spider-Man in general who has already had an insanely strong year already (Avengers: Infinity War and the PS4 game), but this incredible little animated film has managed to top them all and not only become the best Spider-Man film yet, but one of the best superhero films ever. A huge surprise and easily the best comic-book film of they year in an already very good year for the genre.


Who would have thought the future of Spider-Man was in animation? I know there's a sequel to this and several spin-offs in development, I just hope one of them is Nicolas Cage's Noir Spider-Man. 

9/10 Dans

Spider-Man: Into The Spider-Verse is out in cinemas in the UK on December 12th
Watch the trailer below:

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