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The Spidey-verse - have we reached critical Spidey for it's own thread?


The Anti-Targ

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11 hours ago, Kalbear said:

Well, part of the story's banality is intentional - it's an origin story for a character that is largely defined by an origin story that everyone knows like the back of their hand. How do you do that origin story in a different way while also passing the torch? So yeah, the plot is not particularly a big deal because it's not a big deal. It's much less about the plot, which basically is a MacGuffin (though at least the villain's motivations are actually entirely reasonable and sympathetic this time, unlike 95% of supervillains), and far more to do with the characters and developing them. 

Stories ARE important however. There are tons of elements in the movie that are very enjoyable, but if they all hang on a central story that seems completely inconsequential, just a device to get a new set of Spideys on screen, then there is an obvious weakness there. 
I don't think you can just hand wave away the awful MacGuffin, because its blandness means the final third of the movie is pretty dull, in the same way most Superhero final thirds are dull. 

I actually didn't like Aunt May in this either. I thought her being in on the Spiderman secret was a funny joke initially, but then they just made her into a cool Alfred for laughs. Aunt May is actually usually the heart of most Spidey stories, but here she is no more than a punchline.

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On 12/27/2018 at 9:06 PM, Heartofice said:

Aunt May is actually usually the heart of most Spidey stories, but here she is no more than a punchline.

She might be the heart of Peter Parker stories, but that role wouldn't make sense for a story where Miles is the protagonist. I liked what they did with her in this one.

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1 hour ago, felice said:

She might be the heart of Peter Parker stories, but that role wouldn't make sense for a story where Miles is the protagonist. I liked what they did with her in this one.

Well they did what they did with her. I didn't have a negative reaction to her as Alfred, but if I was going to pick a favourite version of Aunt May she would go bottom.  (Raimi version being the best so far IMO)

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On ‎1‎/‎9‎/‎2019 at 4:34 AM, Heartofice said:

Well they did what they did with her. I didn't have a negative reaction to her as Alfred, but if I was going to pick a favourite version of Aunt May she would go bottom.  (Raimi version being the best so far IMO)

I did like Sally Fields in the role in ASM as well.

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On ‎12‎/‎27‎/‎2018 at 8:06 AM, Heartofice said:

Stories ARE important however. There are tons of elements in the movie that are very enjoyable, but if they all hang on a central story that seems completely inconsequential, just a device to get a new set of Spideys on screen, then there is an obvious weakness there. 
I don't think you can just hand wave away the awful MacGuffin, because its blandness means the final third of the movie is pretty dull, in the same way most Superhero final thirds are dull. 

I actually didn't like Aunt May in this either. I thought her being in on the Spiderman secret was a funny joke initially, but then they just made her into a cool Alfred for laughs. Aunt May is actually usually the heart of most Spidey stories, but here she is no more than a punchline.

I don't agree with your assessment the story was inconsequential

stopping the multiverse from collapsing was inconsequential? Or giving Miles Morales an origin and training story - he starts the film useless and ends it as the new Spider-Man. Neither was older Parker's story who clearly got his mojo back and was willing to make another go of his marriage at the end. 

The other spider-characters -didn't really have as compelling a story or arc (I think the trailers oversold Spider-ham, manga-spider and Spider-Man noir - they'd have been better off as surprises) but I guess there's only so much room. Fisk could have done with more screen-time or interaction with the Spider-men as I thought his core motivation was actually quite interesting. I think the mis-step was that they actually had two villains and couldn't decide which one to focus on

Personally female Dr Octopus could have had the same tragic motivation as Fisk and create the technology. If they'd stuck with her as the sole villain then it may have been stronger

I also seem to think that having a MacGuffin means the story is bad - there are lots of excellent series with a macGuffin is the driver of the story. For me the multiverse angle was essential to them being able to have Parker as a mentor and teach Miles that he isn't alone. Yes they could have just had spider-woman and Peter be in the same universe as Miles but then you lose several important story beats

primarily that we need the death of Peter Parker Spider-man so that Miles knows the stakes and can have an uncle Ben moment (although his uncle's death was moreso Mile's uncle ben moment), but just as importantly we need that death so the older Parker can realise his own mortality and how he'd be missed.

. And lets not forget Sony needed to set things up so that this film (and arguably venom) in such a way that it is connected to MCU Spidey - at least in theory. The spider-verse lets them do that.

I can't defend the use of Aunt May in this film - it was stupid and made little sense. Nothing indicated that she or her Peter had the money to have a weird batcave. 

Generally I'm not a huge fan of Aunt Mays in film. I don't think I'm a fan of her in the comics - especially the "I'm so frail" take they keep returning to. In this sense the most recent version was good - I just didn't like the "your Aunt's so hot" flirting that Stark had going with her in the film. I think she was ok in the spectacular Spider-Man but I tend to prefer her when she's confident, able to look after herself (and peter) and not be a plot device for making Peter pathetic (this is mainly the case with the comics eg Peter selling his soul/marriage for his Aunt who's dying pretty much through old age)

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On 1/10/2019 at 2:28 PM, red snow said:

I can't defend the use of Aunt May in this film - it was stupid and made little sense. Nothing indicated that she or her Peter had the money to have a weird batcave. 

I mean this Peter seems to have Francised himself out. With him doing jingles, and people using his likeness to advertise their food, hell even comic-books about his supposed origin. I imagine it’s not out of the realm of possibility he was paid at least in part for all this. And he’s genius. Honestly, it makes just about much sense as the real bat cave.  Which isn’t very much honestly if one where to think of the logistics of what Batman would need in order to actually build his cave. It’s just one of those things that has to be accepted as possible in universe.

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1 minute ago, Varysblackfyre321 said:

I mean this Peter seems to have Francised himself out. With him doing jingles, and people using his likeness to advertise their food, hell even comic-books about his supposed origin. I imagine it’s not out of the realm of possibility he was paid at least in part for all this. And he’s genius. Honestly, it makes just about much sense as the real bat cave.  Which isn’t very much honestly if one where to think of the logistics of what Batman would need in order to actually build his cave. It’s just one of those things that has to be accepted as possible in universe.

Batman does have a huge mansion and is already a billionaire so i think that helps over someone who has a small house and back garden. The selling of his own IP regarding merchandise would make him incredibly rich especially considering in our world he is the number one character in terms of merchandise sales.https://www.hollywoodreporter.com/news/superhero-earns-13-billion-a-748281

If Spidey received even a slice of that pie he's probably making 10s of millions a year. The above link is also suspected to be the reason disney was cool with letting Sony keep the box office sales for spidey-homecoming as Disney still has the merchandise rights. It's also probably why they are cool with Sony doing their own spidey films as i guess they also get merch rights for the venom and spiderverse characters (or at least a share in the official film tie in toys etc)

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It may well be different in Miles' Universe (did they ever officially name it?) but Spider-Man is traditionally not very popular with authority, I feel that would make it harder to cash in on that fame so to speak.

Also I just love the idea of Peter and Aunt May trying to smuggle tonnes of earth out of their small suburban home.

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1 hour ago, red snow said:

Batman does have a huge mansion and is already a billionaire so i think that helps over someone who has a small house and back garden

Yeah money isn’t really the problem. It’s the fact this project would acquire a lot of people to actually set it up. Bruce unless he kills everyone involved in the construction, and everyone who knew them. Honestly Batman should have been found out. I just take it that he’s a super genuis so he could do this sort of thing somehow. Same with Framcise-Spider-Man(the spider man from Mile’s universe). 

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I thought it was great. I thought there was enough attention paid to Mile's most important support Spideys (old Peter and Gwen), the other 3 were the relief, and that's fine.

I loved the animation.

I like Incredibles 2 and into the Spiderverse about equally. But I prefer Into the Spiderverse to win the awards based on the animation.

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I’ll say it, my biggest issue with the movie is how all the spider-people were a dick towards Miles when he wanted to join them in their mission. It just felt absurd that’d they’d be so cross with him tagging along given as a Spider-man, he’s going to be doing tremendously dangerous things daily anyway, where his life would be even more at risk given he’d be doing it alone. It makes no sense they’d be so adment about him not coming along as if they all took baby steps getting into the business of crime fighting.  You can say it’s youth and inexperience but Penny Parker seems way younger than Miles yet no one raised worry over her or questioned her compentacy.

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1 hour ago, Varysblackfyre321 said:

Yeah money isn’t really the problem. It’s the fact this project would acquire a lot of people to actually set it up. Bruce unless he kills everyone involved in the construction, and everyone who knew them. Honestly Batman should have been found out. I just take it that he’s a super genuis so he could do this sort of thing somehow. Same with Framcise-Spider-Man(the spider man from Mile’s universe). 

We need a "better call Saul" style prequel film explaing in exhausting detail how the spidey cave was built

25 minutes ago, The Anti-Targ said:

I thought it was great. I thought there was enough attention paid to Mile's most important support Spideys (old Peter and Gwen), the other 3 were the relief, and that's fine.

I loved the animation.

I like Incredibles 2 and into the Spiderverse about equally. But I prefer Into the Spiderverse to win the awards based on the animation.

While i enjoyed the animation for the most part there were many points where it seemed "jerky" to me. Not sure if this was frame-rate related but it was distracting for me. The intentionally blurry backgrounds had a similar affect on me. I'm pretty sure it was all intentional rather than lacking in skill so put it down to taste.

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4 minutes ago, Varysblackfyre321 said:

I’ll say it, my biggest issue with the movie is how all the spider-people were a dick towards Miles when he wanted to join them in their mission. It just felt absurd that’d they’d be so cross with him tagging along given as a Spider-man, he’s going to be doing tremendously dangerous things daily anyway, where his life would be even more at risk given he’d be doing it alone. It makes no sense they’d be so adment about him not coming along as if they all took baby steps getting into the business of crime fighting.  You can say it’s youth and inexperience but Penny Parker seems way younger than Miles yet no one raised worry over her or questioned her compentacy.

It does make sense though. If he fucked up the multiverse would end. That's a lot to risk over a rookie who can't control his powers. He was at that point a liability. They weren't so much interested in mike's well-being but that of the multiverse. Their plan of doing it themselves made more sense at the time even if it meant them sacrificing one of their number.

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44 minutes ago, red snow said:

It does make sense though. If he fucked up the multiverse would end. That's a lot to risk over a rookie who can't control his powers. He was at that point a liability. They weren't so much interested in mike's well-being but that of the multiverse. Their plan of doing it themselves made more sense at the time even if it meant them sacrificing one of their number.

If he fucked up likely he would die. Not the multi-verse. All he would have to do is be there to close the portal. There isn’t really a way to fuck up that part. If he dies beforehand it won’t ruin the mission. Someone else could take his. Look, this type of world ending event is something that isn’t going to that abnormal a situation a spider-man would have to deal with, the villains Mile’s would have to go up against are the villains he will have to eventually face alone so this thing isn’t going to be especially dangerous for him. I really don’t see the need for them to be so hostile toward the thought of him tagging along to close the portal. 

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1 hour ago, Varysblackfyre321 said:

If he fucked up likely he would die. Not the multi-verse. All he would have to do is be there to close the portal. There isn’t really a way to fuck up that part. If he dies beforehand it won’t ruin the mission. Someone else could take his. Look, this type of world ending event is something that isn’t going to that abnormal a situation a spider-man would have to deal with, the villains Mile’s would have to go up against are the villains he will have to eventually face alone so this thing isn’t going to be especially dangerous for him. I really don’t see the need for them to be so hostile toward the thought of him tagging along to close the portal. 

I thought the point was the portal had to be closed to save the multiverse from collapse? If the others went through and miles failed to do so then there'd be no-one to prevent this as the others would have already returned to their home dinensions. 

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31 minutes ago, red snow said:

I thought the point was the portal had to be closed to save the multiverse from collapse? If the others went through and miles failed to do so then there'd be no-one to prevent this as the others would have already returned to their home dinensions. 

Yeah but the odds of him failing is absurdly low. It’s literally as easy as pushing a button. The only reason it really came close was because Peter was deaset on staying to protect Miles.

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4 minutes ago, Varysblackfyre321 said:

Yeah but the odds of him failing is absurdly low. It’s literally as easy as pushing a button. The only reason it really came close was because Peter was deaset on staying to protect Miles.

It's not that easy when you have several supervillains in the way and you are a rookie. If it was simply a case of pressing a button then spider-ham could have left a wind-up punching glove in a box to save the multiverse.

They were harsh on miles but they were also being fair and pragmatic

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22 minutes ago, red snow said:

It's not that easy when you have several supervillains in the way and you are a rookie. If it was simply a case of pressing a button then spider-ham could have left a wind-up punching glove in a box to save the multiverse.

They were harsh on miles but they were also being fair and pragmatic

Which is why they’d presumably take the villains out before leaving(they did with the exception of the Kingpin) or doing it in secret(as they initially attempted). Like really worse case scenario Mile’s dies before the process of returning begins. Then Peter could take his place. This whole exchange in my opinion is far safer than likely many of the usual gambits Miles will face as Spider-man. Like 7 or so supervillains  trying to kill him is likely a situation he’s going to find himself in while a rookie regardless. And may on time to time be called upon to save a world or two. Like with this Mile’s at least has back up. In most of other interactions with super villains he’s going to be operating alone. Outnumbered. It’s weird how they’re acting as though they all took baby steps in delving into crime fighting. Taking Mile’s along at the very least would be educational. Like he’s going to have to learn to deal with all this stuff at some point, him getting some experience in something this big couldn’t hurt. 

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8 hours ago, red snow said:

We need a "better call Saul" style prequel film explaing in exhausting detail how the spidey cave was built

I assume there was at least one other entrance, for the jeep and the plane to get in and out; much like the batmobile doesn't have to drive up the batpoles and through Wayne Manor.

The radioactive spider bothered me more; has it just been wandering around the subway for the last six years without biting anyone?

8 hours ago, red snow said:

While i enjoyed the animation for the most part there were many points where it seemed "jerky" to me. Not sure if this was frame-rate related but it was distracting for me.

Yeah, that bugged me early on, but I got used to it pretty quickly. The idea was to replicate the 12fps common to traditional hand-drawn animation, but I don't think it translated well to the more detailed CGI animation style.

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