PHENOMENALITY: *marvelous*
MYTHICITY: *fair*
FRYEAN MYTHOS: *adventure*
CAMPBELLIAN FUNCTION: *metaphysical, psychological*
Unlike the majority of moviegoers, I found INTO THE SPIDER-VERSE rather predictable, so I didn't bother to see the sequel in the theater. Ironically, aside from one giant demerit, ACROSS is a much more entertaining film than INTO. I notice that though there's one writer who worked on both scripts, there were two new scripters involved with ACROSS-- which has much funnier dialogue, for one thing. (An early scene, in which Spider-Gwen fights a variant Vulture, includes some humorous stuff about the subjectivity of art that may be intended to comment on the movie's own status.) There was still far too much of Miles' family, but at least even they had a few laugh-lines.
Though Miles Morales gets the lion's share of attention once again, there's more focus on his interaction with Spider-Gwen, while most of the other Spider-variants play subordinate roles, including the most virtue-signally one, "Jessica Drew as Black Pregnant Spider-Woman." The confusion of continuities from INTO continues here, but with a greater sense of consequence. Spider-Gwen, Miles learns, has been inducted into a dimension-spanning "Spider Society" oriented on preventing temporary abnormalities. Trouble is, to ride herd on the right running of time, they must sometimes let innocents die.
The whole "preservation of time" trope is nothing new, and ACROSS' script doesn't bring that much conviction to the theme. But the action is much better executed this time, once more supporting the dictum that animated superheroes will always be able to do things that their live-action "variants" cannot. And nothing proves this better than the villain. Whereas INTO was boring in its choice of providing variations of the most famous Spider-foes, ACROSS took a fairly minor rogue, The Spot (Jonathan Schwartzmann) and made him a visual delight.
Those who have seen the film will easily guess the "big demerit" I mentioned: it's a Part One without having advertised as much. I tend to doubt that there's enough of a story here to justify a Part Two, and I think it likely that the filmmakers just got intoxicated with all the neat things they could do with crazy-ass Spider-continuities. Or maybe they realized that in the last couple of years, the only superhero franchises that have remained strong have been those of Batman and Spider-Man-- and they want to reap what rewards they can from the Spider-franchise, lest even that one go the way of all celluloid.
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