Spider-Man: Into the Spiderverse (2018, Dir. Bob Persichetti, Peter Ramsey, & Rodney Rothman)
The Summary: Miles Morales, a young man just trying to get through his day-to-day life in New York, has to deal with both the development of his superpowers after being bitten by a radioactive spider and the realization that he isn’t the only Spider-Man as his dimension is invaded by a variety of spider-folks from across the multiverse.
The Good: Some of the most amazing animation ever to be conceived or executed by an animation studio. An excellent coming of age narrative about a modern kid. Astonishingly strong voice work across the board from a murderer’s row of voice talent. Surprisingly effective emotional and story beats throughout.
The Bad: It ends, eventually. Not really for little kids so much as teens, despite the cartoony aesthetic.
The Review: This is the best Spider-Man movie ever made. This is one of the best superhero movies ever made. This is the best animated feature of the year, and is better than anything from last year as well. Not since Kubo and the Two Strings has there been an animated film this amazing, this well-made, this brilliant. The story concerns a young Miles Morales (Shameik Moore) going through a superhero origin story that doubles as a coming of age story about a young man maturing into an adult and taking responsibility for his own life. This journey is complicated in traditional comic-book fashion by a potentially world-ending plot by the Kingpin (Liev Schreiber), who accidentally summons a crazy array of (surprisingly) canonical spider-individuals from across the multiverse to Miles’ version of New York. There’s Peter B. Parker (Jake Johnson), a washed-up 40 year old version of the hero most will know; there’s the Amazing Spider-Woman Gwen Stacy (Hailee Steinfeld); there’s Spider-Man Noir (a wonderfully over-the-top Nicolas Cage), a hard-hitting, two-fisted, Nazi-fighting 1930s Spider-Man; there’s Peni Parker (Kimiko Glenn), an Asian-American girl from the future with a psychic link to a mecha-driving spider; and there’s Peter Porker (John Mulaney), the Amazing Spider-Ham, who is for all intents and purposes a Looney Tunes version of the hero. Unlike the recently bitten Miles, most of these heroes are established crime-fighters, and Miles has to find his place among them and as a hero in his own right.
The first thing anyone will notice when watching this movie is the visuals, which are breathtakingly beautiful and evocative. Each of those incredibly diverse heroes above are presented in a totally unique art style in a way that’s really only possible in animation. Spider-Man Noir is monochromatic, with his trenchcoat always billowing in the wind. Peni Parker is straight out of an anime, and Peter Porker looks like a toon and doesn’t seem to follow any of the basic rules of physics. All of this is backed up by some of the most inventive visuals in recent memory. The movie looks like a comic book come to life. The movie is intentionally shown at fewer frames per second than most, giving the movement of the characters an almost stop-motion feel, and capturing the way that comic books look from panel to panel. When things kick into high gear, the animation shifts with it into even more stylized representations of the action, complete with visualized sound effects and thought bubbles for characters. The color work is impressive throughout, shifting from a more realistic palette to a bright neon one for emphasis. And, despite all hundred of these things going on at the same time, it all just works. Seeing realistic characters next to monochromatic ones next to anime ones against a backdrop of stop-motion-esque neon fantasia somehow all holds together in a way that would be absolutely impossible for a traditional film.
If the only thing this movie had going for it were the amazing visuals, it would still get a wholehearted recommendation for me. This movie manages to do even more than that, however. It provides a compelling, inventive story that pleases from start to finish. Before any of the superheroics get started, Miles is an instantly likable character, backed up by great performances by his dad Jefferson Davis (Bryan Tyree Henry, killing it again) and his Uncle Aaron (Mahershala Ali, amazing as always). These two men serve as a representation of the different ways Miles’ life might go, and the character really feels believably torn between the worlds that they represent. Once the action does kick off, it’s amazing. There are comic beats, although the film isn’t a comedy, and they land very consistently. There is drama and beauty and tragedy and noble sacrifice and all the things that a viewer wants from a superhero movie. This movie brought tears to my eyes, and although that’s not a super-high bar, I certainly wasn’t expecting to be emotionally moved by the most recent Spider-Man cartoon. It has a well-developed villain, excellent chemistry between its trio of lead characters, and a satisfying conclusion that brings everything full circle for the characters that you’ve gotten to know over the past couple of hours, topped off by a legitimately heart-warming theme about the hero in all of us.
If there’s anything negative to say about the movie, it would be that it’s not as kid-oriented as it appears. A lot of this movie will go over the head of most children, and the plot (involving multiple realities as it does) is surprisingly complicated. A younger kid would probably still be distracted by the bright colors and quick motion, but they aren’t going to get much out of this one. It’s significantly more advanced than your average Saturday morning cartoon. Even that’s not really a criticism, though. The movie is nearly perfect throughout its two hour runtime, and comes highly recommended to anyone who likes movies, superheros, coming-of-age stories, or any combination of the same. One of the best of the year hands down. Don’t miss it.
The Score: 