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

Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse is one of the best movies I have ever seen. It's like it was made just for me. I'm finding it difficult to name something I didn't completely enjoy from this film. I'm serious, it blows every other Spider-Man film out of the water.

The film stars Miles Morales, pretty much as you know him, who gets bitten by a radioactive spider (or at least, it might be radioactive) and stumbles onto a multiverse portal project created by the Kingpin. What he also sees is Spider-Man get killed while trying to shut it down. Out of nowhere he meets what seems to be Spider-Man back from the dead, but is in fact a Peter Parker from one of these parallel universes, who just so happens to have a much worse time of it than the Spider-Man Miles is familiar with. From there we meet Spider-Woman (Spider-Gwen), Spider-Man Noir, Spider-Ham, and Peni Parker with her robot SP//dr. They go out to shut down Kingpin's experiment while Miles learns how to be the Spider-Man he has to be.

Visually, it's a feast for the eyes. It borrows comic book aesthetics and certain tropes, like narration boxes for internal monologues and onomatopoeia hanging in midair. It's one of the most inventive and interesting looking animated films I've seen in the last decade. It doesn't just try to copy panel structures without bothering to figure out what makes them work, (like some other directors coughSnydercough) it takes just enough to feel like reading your favorite comic but transforms it into something entirely new. The various Spider-People all look unique and fit their respective universes without being out of place with their fellows. Spider-Ham is Warner Bros. cartoony, Noir is eternally in black and white, but when they stand together it just works. The finale is an amazing spectacle, as they tend to do in these superhero films, but not once did I have trouble distinguishing the action or get bored from just too much stuff.

The writing is phenomenal. None of the Spider-Men is a one-for-one recreation of a Spider-Man you may know and love (save for maybe Spider-Gwen) but it doesn't matter. Phil Lord and Christopher Miller just get it. Sometimes it seemed like other filmmakers didn't get Spider-Man the same way I do, but these guys? They do. I can't stress this enough, when they look at Spider-Man they understand everything I think of and what makes the character so important to me. The main Peter Parker of the film, played by Jake Johnson, is washed up, depressed, divorced, fat, not financially solvent, and yet he's still a perfect Spider-Man. All the retcons in the world can't net you the true feeling of an authentic human Spider-Man. It's the polar opposite of Dan Slott's CEO Spider-Man, and gets right everything that portrayal got wrong. He doesn't have to be a super-smart successful owner of a Fortune 500 company, he just needs one trait. When Spider-Man is knocked down, he always gets back up.

Our main character, however, is Miles Morales, and I am so glad they went with him. For one, it's his first appearance in a film, so we don't have to see yet another Peter Parker origin story. He's a perfect newcomer, a breath of fresh air, so when other Peter Parkers show up, it's someone who knows about Spider-Man the same way the audience does. Finally we get an origin movie that is more than just an origin story. They don't just set Miles up so he can possibly do more interesting things later, this story is interesting and thrilling and new and also just so happens to contain an origin story as well. It doesn't contain some nobody uninteresting villain just because you have to have one of those in a superhero movie. It's everything I found wanting in every Marvel movie made so far. I can't believe the same company that made the goddamn Emoji Movie made this.

The film is peppered with little easter eggs and references to Spider-Man lore, so much that I'd have to watch the movie a few more times to get even half of them. (Don't worry, I absolutely will.) And what's so refreshing is that you don't need to know all of these trivial facts to enjoy the film, and they aren't the sole reason it was made. (Solo anyone?) It's genuine care and, dare I say it, love for the character, for his legacy and for all the cool ideas associated with him.

I was afraid, going in, that this would copy Dan Slott's Spider-Verse series in the comics, with some weird group of Spider-Man eating vampires and then they all just kinda show up to fight them and it doesn't make a lot of sense. Thankfully, they just took the base idea and the title. It's more akin to the finale of the Spider-Man Animated Series from the 90's where he meets a bunch of alternate selves. Just without Madame Web, THANK GOD. Comic-wise, it's a lot like Bendis' Spider-Men series, where Miles meets a more experienced adult Spider-Man and you get some real growth between the two. Truth be told it doesn't directly adapt any comic, which I'm thankful for, since a lot of times all you can do it draw comparisons between the two, which waters down the adapted work.

If I had to nitpick SOMETHING (and let's face it, I do.) it's really just one thing. Spider-Man Noir and Peni Parker don't get a lot of development in the movie, with Noir there mostly for jokes about Film Noir and whatnot. I get why they did that, giving each of these characters a full arc would've ruined the pacing, especially since we get so much character from our other Spider-People. In a way, it's actually a positive. It left me wanting more, I would love to see the Spider-Crew travel to the Noir of SP//dr Universes in a sequel.

Obviously I'm incredibly biased, seeing as half the point of this website is to talk about Spider-Man even when (ESPECIALLY when) nobody is even reading, but this movie is a 10/10. 100%. A slam dunk. Criterion collection. A masterpiece. I wish I could marry this movie. If I only had one piece of media to watch for the rest of my life, it would be this film. If you like Spider-Man AT ALL, I highly suggest you watch this movie. Even if you don't like Spider-Man. If life is a hopeless barren waste where all you can see is disappointment and regret, I recommend this film. And I hope to god they make a sequel, and put Lord and Miller in charge again. I would follow those men to the ends of the Earth.



Wait it didn't have the Spider-Signal in it, certified rotten, F grade, it's trash.

Spider-Man Redemption Parts 3 and 4

Oh hey, did somebody want more irrelevant Spider-Man comics from the 90's nobody cares about?

No? Oh.

Well. Here it is anyway.

Comic Review: Spider-Man: Redemption Parts 3 & 4

As we ended last issue, Ben Reilly's girlfriend Janine was being carted away by the police for the murder of her father, whom she killed in self defense. Maybe by now things have gotten better?

Looks like somebody's got a case of the mondays! Janine is being held in jail, awaiting trial. As she's being transported in a prison van, a mysterious man breaks into the van and frees her, under pretense of taking vigilante justice.

YES! There's the window breakage I need! Doors are for losers!

Anyway turns out it was Ben Reilly in disguise, come to bust her out of the joint so they can go on the run together. Kaine watches from afar, until he falls off a roof.

He's still mad that Ben could ever be happy while Kaine is still a mutated garbage pile of a man. I can relate. His needlessly convoluted plan, however, remains in motion.

We meet back with Ben and Janine, planning for their flight from justice. But Ben won't go on until Janine explains why she left all those years ago. Turns out, it was under threat from Kaine, who, as he does, broke into their house at night and kidnapped Janine. Then he takes her on top of the Golden Gate Bridge, because I guess they were in San Francisco. Oh hey, maybe they'll see Venom! So tell me, why did Kaine take her on this particular field trip?

C'mon Kaine! You don't gotta take nobody on top of a bridge for that! Just quietly resent and wish misfortune upon them until you collapse into a pile of your own spite and cynicism. Like the rest of us!

...But I'll keep the bridge in mind...

So yeah, Kaine makes Janine write a fake suicide note and somehow whips up a fake body for the authorities to fish out. Ben's understanding enough now that they've been reunited, but it doesn't last long!

Doors, Kaine! They're on every building! You just turn a knob! At least with a window you can see where you're going! No wonder you're not accepted by society. Well that and the fact that you put a bomb in the diner.

Wait, come again?

The last issue opens with Kaine saving the other patrons of the diner. See? He's not all bad, though I guess this is the part where he lets Ben and/or Janine perish in the flames. That's what this was all leading up to? He really could've killed either of them at any other point. Blowing up a diner doesn't really connect with the rest of what he's done thusfar, but whatever, at least it led up to something.

OR NOT.

So it looks like Kaine's thrown his whole giant, three issues worth of plan out the window. Man, that must be quite a disappointment. How's he taking it?

These millennials and their suicide jokes, right?

Ben refuses, of course, and urges Kaine to turn himself into the authorities. Instead, they fall back on old habits and start beating the crap out of each other. The police arrive, I'm assuming called because of the diner explosion, and try to break them up. Kaine grabs an officer and flees to a billboard, where cops are ready to shoot to kill. At the last minute Ben shoves Kaine out of the line of fire. Well, now that they both have a chance to calm down, I'm sure Kaine will see where he went wrong.

We've all been there, buddy.

But it turns out Ben's words have had an effect, as Kaine surrenders to the police. Unfortunately for Ben, Janine's come to the same decision, wanting to finally put her past behind her. You know, that's a nice little bow on top of this and all, but really we could've gotten here much earlier if Ben hadn't broken her free. As long as he's not planning anything this time.

WAIT BEN NO YOU'LL START IT ALL OVER AGAIN

Concept Corner: 01011001

There is a fine line between genius and insanity. Breaching the limits of our current paradigm can often be seen as lunacy before its time. On the other side, something lauded as revolutionary could be the product of madness. Unless we know the mind of the person creating it, this will always be a mystery to us. In fiction it becomes more nebulous. What happens if an author starts to believe the stories he is telling? What if he's believed them all along? Could we even tell?

That brings us to Ayreon.

Concept Corner: Ayreon - 01011001