Josh Reviews Spider-Man: Brand New Day

A lot of online ink has been spilled in recent years over the decline of the MCU, but then here comes Spider-Man: Brand New Day, which is not only a terrifically entertaining new installment, but also one that is crushing it at the box office, posting Endgame-like numbers.  Both of which make me happy!

The film addresses head-on the ending of Spider-Man: No Way Home.  To save the world, Peter Parker allowed Doctor Strange to cast a spell that would cause everyone to forget Peter Parker, including Peter’s best friend Ned and his true love MJ.  Ever since then, Peter has thrown himself into his life as Spider-Man.  As a super-hero, he’s been enormously successful.  He’s basically rid New York of crime (at least crime of the super-villain nature), and the people of the city love Spider-Man (which is not usually the case in Spider-Man’s status quo in the comics and movies).  But he’s been living a sad, solitary life, bereft of friends or family.  Peter thinks this is a sacrifice he’s willing to make, but a series of events disrupt this lonely life he’s set up for himself.  As Spider-Man, he’s challenged by a mysterious psychic entity that can jump from one mind to another.  And as Peter, his arachnid DNA seems to be surging, changing his body in unexpected ways.

Tom Holland was pretty much perfect right out of the gate as Peter Parker/Spider-Man in Captain America: Civil War, and by this point he has easily solidified himself as my favorite actor to play Spider-Man.  Mr. Holland has matured into a skilled actor, and I love the way he plays this character!  This is an older, wounded Peter Parker, one who has withdrawn inward.  But Mr. Holland (aided by the smart script written by Chris McKenna & Erik Sommers) wisely doesn’t overplay this or make the character too somber or dour. This is still Peter Parker, who is innately good and optimistic and always looking to see the best in others.  Mr. Holland has perfectly calibrated his performance.  I like that, as these MCU Spider-Man films have progressed, they’re allowing the character to age and grow more mature, without losing sight of the core of goodness that is central to Peter Parker.

Coming out of No Way Home, I wasn’t sure how much Zendaya and Jacob Batalon would be in the next movie as MJ and Ned.  I’m glad they were both back, and in a decently significant way.  I love these two so much as MJ and Ned that of course there’s part of me that would have loved to have seen more of them in the movie (especially in the third act climax), but I think they’re both in the movie the perfect amount for this story.  I am glad the movie didn’t rush to an easy solution to their memories having been wiped, but instead dug into the character drama that situation created.  I loved that this situation allowed us to really see the friendship between MJ and Ned.  That was always there (the two of them had some great scenes together in No Way Home), but with Peter out of the mix, it was lovely to see MJ and Ned’s deep friendship.  These two actors are terrific, and they have great chemistry with one another, and with Tom Holland as well!  (The scene in which Spidey and Ned are building legos together was one of my favorite moments in the film!  So sweet and fun.)

I loved Jon Bernthal as the Punisher in this film!!  (Even though, weirdly, I don’t think he’s ever actually referred to as the Punisher on screen!  Peter just calls him Frank the whole time – which, by the way, is great and exactly what Peter Parker would do, trying to connect to the man and not the violent vigilante.)  It’s strange; on the one hand, having the Punisher in the film really emphasizes the total discontinuity between this movie and the recent Disney+ shows.  Spidey cleaned up all crime in NYC… except for when the Kingpin and his thugs were in charge???  And this Punisher is almost a completely different character from the unhinged, mentally ill version we saw in the Punisher: One Last Kill special.  The continuity across the MCU shows and movies hasn’t been perfect, but this feels like one of the biggest foul-ups.

But I don’t care one whit, because this version of the Punisher is basically perfect!  This Frank is a violent loner, but we can see just the right glimpse of the good guy inside, the one who does care about this kid, Spider-Man, and who is willing to put himself in danger to help him.  I love the relationship between Spidey and Frank throughout the film.  I like their banter.  I like that we’re stepping into a pre-existing relationship, rather than seeing them meet for the first time.  (Speaking of which, I loved that this film took steps to flesh out the super-villain population of the MCU, showing us an entertaining array of classic Spidey villains — in shots mimicking classic Spider-Man comic book covers, which really made my heart sing!  Now that we’re this deep into the MCU, I am so happy to finally be seeing that this universe is populated with more classic Marvel characters than just the ones who have been the main heroes or villains of the movies/shows.)

I’ll discuss Sadie Sink’s character more in the spoilers section down below, but let me say that she as terrific; a great addition to the Spider-Man supporting cast and the MCU as a whole.

This film was directed by Destin Daniel Cretton, who directed Shang-Chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings and co-created Wonder Man.  Mr. Cretton is replacing Jon Watts, who directed the first three MCU Spider-Man films.  I think he did a fantastic job!!  The film looks great.  It feels very New York-centric to me, even though I think very little if any was actually filmed in NYC.  There’s a lot of super-hero action in the film, and I thought over-all the effects were great, without too obvious a CGI look.  The film is also strongly anchored in character and emotional storylines.  Mr Cretton and the screenwriters did a terrific job balancing the soap opera aspects of the story with the super hero action stuff.  This is critical, and something Marvel comics and movies have generally done very well.  I should also credit the editing team of Nat Sanders, Gina Sansom, & Harry Yoon, who did a great job making sure this two and a half hour movie moved along at a brisk clip.  There are a LOT of characters and situations in this film, something that has undone many previous superhero movie sequels.  (Cough Spider-Man 3 cough.)  But I thought this film did a great job in balancing all the characters ; it felt like everyone got the right amount of attention.

OK, I have so much more to say, but now we’re moving into the SPOILERS section of this review!  Hopefully most of you reading this have seen Spider-Man: Brand New Day by now, but if you haven’t, I strongly advise you to stop reading now and come back after you’ve seen the film.

Everybody got that??

OK, let’s dig in further!

Let me start by saying that I think it was the right choice to present a four-year time-jump in the early going of the film, as we quickly see highlights from Ned and MJ’s time at college and then catch up with everyone after they’ve graduated.  These actors are getting older, and it’s been a number of years since No Way Home came out.  So it’s smart to age up the characters so they’re now closer to the actors’ actual ages.  While I loved high school-aged Spidey, and I’d have loved to have seen some stories of college-aged Spidey, I think this was the right choice based on the reality of making these movies.

(Interestingly, while they obscured the dates on Aunt May’s tombstone in No Way Home — I suspect because the five-year time-jump in Endgame meant that movie was set in the future, and they didn’t want to confuse audiences — here they shows us that May died in 2024.  That seems right to me, because No Way Home took place five years after Infinity War/Endgame, which came out in 2018 & 2019.  But because Brand New Day has now also jumped ahead by 4 years, that means this film is set in 2028.  So does that mean that other upcoming MCU movies like Doomsday and Secret Wars are also set in 2028??  I’m a little confused by the current state of the MCU timeline…)

Let’s talk about Sadie Sink, who, as many fans had guessed, is playing Jean Grey.  Ms. Sink was fantastic in Stranger Things, and she’s a great choice to anchor the coming new MCU version of the X-Men, for which fans have been waiting for YEARS.  While some online fans have complained that it’s strange to introduce Jean Grey in a Spider-Man movie, I think this is exactly the kind of approach that Marvel has used previously, to great success.  See: Spider-Man himself being introduced into the MCU in Captain America: Civil War!  It is a surprising choice to introduce Jean into the MCU in what for most of the film is the role of the villain.  But for the most part I thought this worked.  I liked that Jean had a strong arc in this film, and I loved seeing her and Peter Parker interacting.  It reminded me of the great stories that Brian Michael Bendis wrote in Ultimate Spider-Man, in which he established a relationship between Spidey/Miles Morales and Kitty Pryde, albeit here it’s Peter and Jean.  I do wonder if they made Jean slightly too villainous at times — she’s absolutely awful to Peter when she’s possessing MJ, and she causes an innocent man to get run over by a truck!!  That’s murder, and that’s hard to walk back.  I don’t think the film wants us to remember that, by the time we get to Jean’s redemption at the end.  But overall, I liked this story of Peter Parker finding a way to help this troubled, traumatized young woman find her way back to the light.  That is a great Peter Parker story!  (I’m just bummed the film didn’t let Peter say to Jean: “with great power comes great responsibility”.  Why didn’t they do that??  It would have been a great connection to the central Spider-Man mantra, and also to May’s death in No Way Home.  That seems like a missed opportunity to me.)  I can’t wait to see more of Sadie Sink as Jean in the upcoming MCU X-Men film.

I was thrilled to see Mark Ruffalo back as Bruce Banner/the Hulk!  It’s always been fun seeing Peter get to bounce of these Avengers characters in these MCU films, and with Tony Stark dead, it’s a great choice to bring Bruce into the mix.  Mr. Ruffalo is great as always, playing Bruce’s kindness, his intelligence, and also the way he continues to be tortured by the curse of the Hulk.  The MCU Bruce has been in a pretty good place in recent movies/shows, so it’s interesting to get back to the more classic version of this character in which he hates when the Hulk bursts free and wreaks havoc.  (Actually, the film ends on a curiously tragic note for Bruce, being carted away to a mental institution!!  I wonder if his next appearance will pick up on that story thread.  Part of me wishes we’d gotten one more scene with Bruce at the end of this movie, to show us that he’s OK.)  There has been some dodgy CGI in Marvel movies of late, but I thought the CGI on the Hulk, and especially in the details of his face, was gorgeous.  I love how much Mark Ruffalo’s face shines through in this version of the Hulk.  And I loved seeing how much larger savage Hulk was than smart Hulk.  That was cool.  I loved the whole sequence of Spidey & Frank fighting the Hulk.  That was a lot of fun, with some great character beats and some cool action beats woven together.

It was a fun surprise to see Florence Pugh appear as Yelena Belova!!  I managed to not have that spoiled for me.  Ms. Pugh has been a true standout of the post-Endgame MCU, and she is an absolute pleasure to watch in all of her scenes here.  I love her banter with Peter; I love that she meets people in a Russian bath-house; I love the way she reacts to meeting Spider’s friends on the Zoom call.  Most of all, I thought her “small potatoes, big potatoes” line was not only funny, but also a very clever and efficient way to answer the question that i and other fans often ask in these super-hero movies: why doesn’t the hero call the other heroes for help??  Here we see that Peter did reach out for help, but Yelena and the New Avengers are busy with what they see as more significant super-powered problems.  That totally works for me.

I was thrilled to see Liza Colón-Zayas (who has been so fantastic on The Bear) as Jean DeWolff, a classic Spider-Man supporting characters from the early decades of the comic books.  (There are two important “Jeans” introduced in this movie!  Funny!)  Ms. De Wolff is now best known for her end in The Death of Jean DeWolff story, written by Peter David, but she was a great character before she died!  It’s very cool to see her brought into the MCU.  (And for comic book fans who know that she has a famous death, it really was painful to see her two adorable kids introduced in the movie!!  Oh no!!)

One of my favorite Star Trek movies is Star Trek IV: The Voyage Home.  One of the many things of note about that great movie is that, unlike most of these types of films, there’s no villain.  I thought about that when watching Brand New Day, because while for most of the movie we, and Spidey, think Jean is the villain, that doesn’t turn out to be the case.  The big bad of this movie is just a bureaucrat!  It’s Bill Metzger, the head of Damage Control, played wonderfully by Trammel Tillman.  Mr. Tillman has been amazing on Severance, and he’s perfect here as Metzger.  Mr. Tillman is wonderful at conveying menace and danger through smoothly-delivered, soft-spoken words of apparent kindness and friendliness.

My only problem with the whole Damage Control story is that it’s been clear for years now that Damage Control is bad.  We’ve seen that on various MCU Disney shows, such as Ms. Marvel, She-Hulk, and Wonder Man.  So it felt like a strange choice to me that this film tried to treat that as a surprising reveal in the last half-hour or so of the movie.  As soon as they mentioned Damage Control, and we saw Trammel Tillman, it was obvious to me that these guys were up to no good.  Damage Control was introduced into the MCU back in Spider-Man: Homecoming, so I like the continuity of seeing them again, and showing us Spidey finally coming into conflict with them.  I do wish there’d been more consistency in the leader of Damage Control across these different appearances.  We’ve gotten a bunch of different people playing the role of the leader of Damage Control, from Tyne Daly’s character in Homecoming to Arian Moayed’s character in Wonder Man to Trammel Tillman here.  It’d have been nice if we’d seen the same character connecting these different MCU stories.

I loved seeing The Hand, who were presented more accurately to their comic book appearances than they were in the second season of the Netflix Daredevil show.  I’ve always loved the Hand, mostly from how Frank Miller used them in his Daredevil run.  I wish we’d gotten to see a more classic version, rather than their being stooges for Damage Control.  Still, their costumes looked awesome, and I loved their big ninja fight with Spidey late in the film.  That made me happy.

The score by Michael Giacchino is great.  I liked hearing the interesting ways he played with the classic MCU Spider-Man theme. However, gosh darn it, I’d have loved to have gotten to hear more of the straight, full-throated version of that classic Spider-Man theme during some of the film’s key points.  This is often a complaint I have in franchise series’ sequel films; just give us the classic theme that we all want to hear!

More thoughts:

• I mentioned Star Trek IV above; I really do suspect this movie might have been on the minds of the filmmakers making this movie.  We know that Kevin Feige is a huge Star Trek fan, and don’t forget they had Kirk Thatcher reprise his classic role from Star Trek IV as “punk on the bus” in Spider-Man: Homecoming!!
• Let me emphasize again how much I loved the 4-year montage of Spider-Man fighting various super-villains, in scenes designed to mimic classic images from famous Spider-Man comic book covers.  That was pure joy.
• I particularly loved getting to see Tombstone!!!  I’ve always loved Tombstone, especially from the classic run on Spectacular Spider-Man in the eighties, written by Gerry Conway & illustrated by Sal Buscema.  (In that story, we get extensive backstory of the complicated relationship between Tombstone and Joe Robertson, the right-hand-man of J. Jonah Jameson at The Daily Bugle.  I’ve always LOVED that story; I’d be thrilled to see that someday adapted for a Marvel movie or TV show!)
• I was thrilled to see Michael Mando (Better Call Saul) reprising his character from Spider-Man: Homecoming as Mac Gargan/The Scorpion!!  If we’re not going to get to see Michael Keaton back, it’s great to get Mr. Mando!  I liked getting to see him in full Scorpion gear — I thought his outfit looked great.
• I loved that this movie gave us lots of scenes of Spidey in full costume, interacting with other people.  That made me so happy!!  Too many super-hero movies find ways to keep the hero out of costume; I love when movies embrace having the characters in their costume a lot, just like in the comics.  (The other recent film that did this well was The Batman.)  The Spider-Man costume in this film looked perfect.  They’re really found a great movie version of the classic Spider-Man costume!!
• I was happy they found a way to bring back Marissa Tomei as May, in a small but important way, without in any way undermining her death in No Way Home.
• I thought Zendaya and Jon Bernthal were both terrific when playing their characters possessed by Jean.
• Speaking of Zendaya and Mr. Bernthal, it’s pretty funny that the two of them and Tom Holland are also co-stars in The Odyssey, this summer’s other huge box office hit!!  They should keep making movies together!!
• I loved the joke about why Thanos didn’t just use his Infinity Gauntlet powers to make more food for everyone.
• The post-credits scene made me smile, but I will repeat the comment I have made about many recent MCU (and other) movies, which is they should give us something more substantial after making us sit through the entire end-credits.  This short jokey bit would have been a fantastic mid-credits scene.  I am somewhat stunned that they didn’t give us a post-credit scene that would more directly connect to Doomsday.  It seems to me that Marvel and Disney have a lot riding on Doomsday, to really prove the MCU still can pack a box-office punch.  Why they didn’t want to get all the Spider-Man fans more excited for Doomsday is a mystery to me.  (And in hindsight, seeing how Brand New Day is dominating the box office, this seems like even more of a missed opportunity!)

I loved Spider-Man: Brand New Day!  It’s great to once again get an unabashedly awesome Marvel movie.  I can’t wait to see this again!