Spider-man: Into the Spider-Verse

At a time conceptually the Superhero movies are sort of facing a burnout scenario because of the abundance of it, something like Spider-man: Into the Spider-Verse is a really welcoming change one would want to see.  Spider-man: Into the Spider-Verse has everything you get in a typical Spider-man movie and plus it is pretty neo in its style and presentation. And more than all of that I think it is the excitement one gets to feel realizing that an interpretation like this can be made into a cinematic experience that makes Spider-man: Into the Spider-Verse a fun theater experience.

So in this Multi verse concept we are in the universe of Miles Morales who is an admirer of Spider-Man. The guy also gets bitten by a spider to get the superpowers. But soon after that, he happens to go through a series of unprecedented events which eventually takes him into a situation where he meets the Spider-Man versions from different multiple dimensions. The movie Spider-man: Into the Spider-Verse shows us how Miles evolves in terms of handling the responsibility and also how he helps the other spider folks to get back to their dimensions.

If you look at the structure of the film, Spider-man: Into the Spider-Verse is still very much a cut-out spider man movie. You have a guy getting bitten by a spider to get power, he is getting excited and overwhelmed by the newly gained power, faces a situation where he has to save people from a mighty villain, undergoes a test of character and eventually rises to the occasion and saves the world. But this movie written by Phil Lord and Rodney Rothman manages to give a breath of fresh air to that existing narrative. From mocking the clichés to having the witty conversation and exploring possibilities, Spider-man: Into the Spider-Verse is a fresh idea built on the same chassis. I don’t think many of us would have ever thought about a movie where we would think about what would have happened to the married relationship of Parker and MJ if this routine world saving thing went on.  It is such minimal yet influential perspectives on existing characters and their backdrops that give Spider-man: Into the Spider-Verse an identity of its own.

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It is an animated feature film and what is evident and appreciable is the way they have almost made it a literal translation of a comic book to film in terms of feel. Each frame of the movie has that comic style of splitting between scenes in weird flashy ways and sometimes they have deliberately inserted words too. Such a style has given the movie a tag of being unique and the humor and story arc is very much on the noticeable level. There is a moment when the tired old version of Peter Parker stops Miles from completing the classic responsibility-power dialogue and this kind of interpretation that sort of eliminates the cheesiness from the usualness was also a plus. The narrative style powered by quirky cuts and some breathtaking visuals enhances the quality here. Even the villain has an identity here as his need to build the particle accelerator makes him a human character.

We have Shameik Moore, Jake Johnson, Hailee Steinfeld, John Mulaney, Kimiko Glenn and Nicolas Cage voicing various versions of spider-man/woman. Mahershala Ali has given voice to Miles’ uncle and Bryan Tyree Henry to his father. Live Schreiber, even in the animated platform gets to voice the antagonist. Lily Tomlin is Aunt May and Kathryn Hahn is Doctor Octopus.

Spider-man: Into the Spider-Verse is fun, unique and a refreshing idea to present a genre of movies that are facing an issue of being similar. For it’s less than two-hour long runtime, Spider-man: Into the Spider-Verse offers zero boredom and a unique comic book like experience.

Rating: 4/5

Final Thoughts

Spider-man: Into the Spider-Verse is fun, unique and a refreshing idea to present a genre of movies that are facing an issue of being similar.

Signal

Green: Recommended Content

Orange: The In-Between Ones

Red: Not Recommended

Reaction

By Aswin Bharadwaj

Founder and editor of Lensmen Reviews.