<><><><>
The ending to 2019’s Spider-Man: Far from Home was the reveal that Peter Parker, Tom Holland, was Spider-Man. No Way Home picks up immediately in the wake of the reveal. MJ, Zendaya, and Ned, Jacob Batalon, are also dealing with the fall out of their association with Parker. It is wonderful to see Zendaya get dialog and not a recurring fever dream silhouette shot, Dune.
Dr. Strange, Benedict Cumberbatch, and Wong, Benedict Wong, are both featured as Spider-Man tried to turn back time and accidentally opens the multi-verse. This is just about the time that I got confused by the film. There is an upcoming Doctor Strange movie, Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness, coming out next year and the Loki Disney plus series unleashed the multiverse. I was thoroughly confused with how all three tie together and kept thinking this Spider-Man film would be more multiverse-focused or was the Dr. Strange film when I saw previews and trailers. This phase of the MCU is going to be more confusing than any previous phase.
Spoilers ahead
The greatest animated superhero movie of all time, Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse, first introduced us to the concept of parallel universes with various Spider-things; can’t say men or even people. There were two rousing rounds of applause when Andrew Garfield and Tobey Maguire were introduced in this film. Their inclusion along with their respective villains was a wonderful addition to the film. Plenty of jokes were leveled at the shortcomings of their stints as Spider-Man. It helped bring the comedy level up as we have come to expect from Spider-Man.
The central focus of the film is helping reform the bad guys from all the universes at the suggestion of Aunt May. It is a message of hope to change things for the better when given the opportunity. The alternative was to let all these people die. It is a level of compassion that we could all learn from. The right path is often the hard path. As you would expect with a Spider-Man film, this path also requires a sacrifice. Spider-Man can’t exist without the death of a loved one.
Spider-Man action sequences must be created in a specific way as they are constrained by his web-shooting abilities. The action choreographer did a great job here. They got to expand the spider fights sequences to leverage a team of spider-men and did it perfectly. You will not be disappointed with the fights as they are intimate, close-quarters combat with lots of web-slinging.
Tom Holland is a great Spider-Man and is shouldering a lot of the burden of the MCU after Iron Man’s death. The ending of the film is still perplexing after the universe is reset. The world and The Avengers are aware of Spider-Man but do not know his identity. Who remembers and who forgets Spider-Man seems to be a case-by-case basis and more questions are left unanswered than I would desire. This film also brings confidence back to the MCU after The Eternals had me questioning what was going on. Die-hard fans have already seen this film, but casual MCU fans should enjoy this film as we are back to broad market appeal, especially if you liked either previous spider-man trilogy.