The spoiler free review is I loved it. Some of the action scenes went on a tad too long but they were visually interesting so that helped. Also I will let you know that while there is a mid credits scene there is no end of the credits scene.
So, some spoiler thoughts
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I really liked how the first act dove into how being a hero hurts Spider-Man’s personal life with not one but two different stories.
I enjoyed all the Easter eggs (including the mention of Doctor Strange) that I caught and I probably missed dozens more.
A part of me was conflicted about them setting up Miguel O’Hara as the villain because I like Spider-Man 2099 but at least he was a villain with a point of view.
I liked how Miles was becoming his own man and how the story is pushing back on the trope that every hero needs a tragic origin.
Something weird in my theater is some of the dialogue was hard to hear. Not just some of them talking fast. The sound just seemed lower in some scenes. I am looking forward to seeing this at home again with CC and pausing to catch all the references.
While I knew they were making a third, I had no idea going in this would end with a cliffhanger but it was clear that was what was going to happen as the movie had much more story to go. It will be interesting to explore the world without a Spider-Man in the next one.
I’m probably going to be in the minority, but I didn’t like it very much. I liked a lot of parts of it and the overall intent, but I thought it was too long. And I didn’t know it was going to be a cliffhanger (but in retrospect I should have) and I didn’t like the abrupt ending. It just didn’t work as a movie for me, even if I had a few laughs or moments of emotional interest.
Also, I felt a lot of the same things for No Way Home and I was definitely lonely in that feeling. Both had a collection of awesome moments but didn’t make a whole piece of cohesive art for me.
But it’s not like I hated it and won’t rewatch it and watch pt 3. It might grow on me. The first one was instant love, however.
FWIW my wife who barely likes Superhero movies but enjoyed the first one quite a bit didn’t care for this one that much. I think it was too far down the rabbit hole for her, so I get people not liking it. I don’t think I liked it as much as the first but I loved that one.
I just came home from watching it with my son, we had to cross half the city (about 15 kilometers) to watch it in english, all the theaters near my house had it in spanish or in ridiculous time slots (ten pm, for example).
We really loved it, I’m not sure if it’s better than the first (my son think it is), but definitively a great movie, I cried a bit during the scene when Miles’ mother talks to him about him (the teenage Miles) having the small boy Miles inside (I think my son didn’t notice fortunately )
I saw it this afternoon. It was good, though somewhat confusing and perhaps a bit too long and complex. But the animation style (styles, really, because they varied) was interesting. There were a lot of kids at the showing I was at; I think some were getting bored.
I absolutely loved it. Every frame was beautiful. I loved how they layered the theme of defining ourselves by loss, by the holes in our soul, throughout,and connected it to the infinitely complex idea of parenthood and letting go.
According to Wikipedia it is the longest animated film produced by an American studio, so yes it is long.
For myself, I enjoyed it, but going into it essentially blind, I had no idea it was a part one. I realized toward the end of the film that there was too much to tie up, and I was wondering how they were going to do it, when the film ended.
I also agree that making Spider-Man 2099 the villain was a bit jarring, but although I read a lot of the 2099 comics, that was one that I did not follow, so it did not bother me in the same way it would have if another hero shown to turn villain would have.
Visually it was very nice. The first one, which I rank as one of my top movies, had done quite interesting things visually and you had to think of how they could do anything as well in the sequel. I think they managed to do so quite well in this one with the integration of all the different universes. I think this is something that is so much more difficult to do in live action since it ends up looking weird, but here, since you already accept that you are in a drawn universe, it isn’t as jarring to have different styles. I also liked that they added some of the live action movie scenes in it as well.
As far as the story goes, I did like it, and as some mentioned, part of the family moments had a big impact. There is a whole lot of things about being a dad, so maybe this would be good movie to watch on Father’s day? I do feel it did suffer from a little too much narration, which while it was nice in the first movie went on a little bit too long here.
I will certainly watch it again, and go see the next iteration in the theater next year.
I liked it fine (coming from some MCU movies/series exposure but zero familiarity with the comic books other than what the first Spiderverse movie provided), but cinematically speaking, wow was that ever wasted on me! I probably actually saw about 10% of the visible content.
Young people these days must have the sensory information processing speed of hummingbirds or something. No sooner did I start to look at a complex visual scene onscreen than zip, it was something entirely different. And that kept happening pretty much all through.
Maybe I am just really slow on the uptake visually. Like, an Iranian art film showing a guy on the beach staring out to sea for literally two and a half minutes is way more my speed, so to speak.
But yeah, overall Across the Spiderverse seemed original and engaging and captivating, what I could see of it. There definitely appeared to be a lot of outstanding quality cinematic craft whizzing over my head there.
I saw it today and thought it was phenomenal. The first section was maybe on the slow side, but later on it was great.
Definitely beautiful, and it’s definitely not meant to all be taken in on first viewing. I was picking up lots of little bits here and there, and I’m sure I missed more than I saw.
I started to realize as the movie passed the 2-hour mark that they had a lot to wrap up in a little time, but the “To Be Continued” nonetheless hit me like a ton of bricks and literally made my jaw drop. Biggest gut-puncb I’ve felt watching a film in the theater since Han Solo’s death.
I liked the use of editor’s notes and the other comic artifacts they threw in. If you were paying attention, they gave away early that Miles was going to the wrong universe - the scanner on the go-home machine read Earth-42, when the opening scenes remind you that Miles is from Earth-1910. The Citadel of Spider-People felt a little too Rick and Morty-ish for a film that isn’t meant to be a comedy, but not so much that it really bothered me.
I feelclike the setup for Miguel’s villain reveal is a little wonky, which is my main complaint with the plot. How can Miles’ dad dying be a canon event that holds the fabric of the multiverse together when Miles being Spider-Man is canon-breaking itself? If Miguel is right, then the Peter Parker of Earth-1910 should have been the one to fail to save a police captain close to him, since the spider that bit Miles was presumably meant to bite the Miles of Earth-42 (who instead became the Prowler). Really, it seems like Miguel screwed up by not noticing and preventing the canon deviation when it first started with Kingpin trying to get his wife back. The TVA would never have been this sloppy when it came to preventing variants. I guess that’s something of a plot hole that one has to handwave away as being due to some sort of wibbly-wobbly dimensiony-wimensiony stuff.
I enjoyed it and I’ll definitely be seeing part 3 whenever it comes out.
I remember when the first one came out, I was already overstimulated by the end of the opening credits. And this one was even more full-on, like two hours of a firehose to the face. But in a good way.
Young people aren’t going to pick up everything on the first viewing either. Instead, they’ll either watch it over and over a few times or, more likely, wait for someone else to watch it over and over in minute detail and then post an article or YouTube video showing all the stuff they missed.
Re: Miguel. I think hes an imposter. Possibly a Prowler. I also think he maybe invented cannon, or tied the Spiderman stories to it. Hes a complete and utter control freak, desperately trying to force everyone into the same story to keep them “safe”. He’s the ultimate Dad, in a story about the dangers of holding too tight to our kids, and that explores our motives for doing so.
Now that I type that, i think what I love about this movie is the way it explores its themes, visually, musically, and narratively. So layered.
Oooh. I didn’t catch that while watching, but it makes sense. The nature of Miles’ relationship with his parents, and of Gwen’s with her dad, is such an important part of the storyline, with the timeless theme of teenage rebellion and kids having to keep secrets from their parents out of fear and feeling like they’re living a double life because of it, and Miguel’s relationship with both of them echoes that well. I don’t think he’s an impostor - I just think he’s broken because of the trauma he’s been through, and he’s inflicting his PTSD on the rest of the Spider-Verse as a result.
Tangentially, I liked the way they incorporated Rio’s Spanish and Spainglish into the script and didn’t condescend to provide subtitles. I don’t know very much Spanish aside from what one casually picks up on from occasionally being around Spanish-speakers at work, but I understood enough of it to know what was being talked about, and it probably serves as an additional Easter egg for those who are bilingual.
By the way, as a random point of interest - we went to see it on Friday, the day it opened in our local cinema, and the audience skewed very heavily black (which has not been my experience with that cinema before, even for the Black Panther films).
I can see your POV, but he allows people to die for his view of the greater good (for an extreme MCU example, see Thanos) - that’s generally a villain move.
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