THIS REVIEW IS SPOILER-FREE.
by Jarrod Jones. Stan Lee famously said anyone could be Spider-Man; Spider-Man: Across the Spider-Verse takes that bet. Over its pixie-stix-fueled 140 minutes, this ferociously made sequel to 2018’s Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse throws 280 Spider-themed variants at your eyeballs. By way of comparison, its Oscar-winning predecessor had seven Spideys. Is less more? Not if you’re Across the Spider-Verse.
The logic behind all these Spider-People, or maybe just the reason, is a story response to the bombastic finale to Into the Spider-Verse. That’s where the Kingpin (Liev Schreiber) saw his plot to open a dimensional rift for dramatic purposes thwarted by Miles Morales (Shameik Moore) and his Spider-Team. Of course, there were consequences to Miles’ victory — aren’t there always? After all, Spidey isn’t Spidey without a radioactive twist of fate taking a bite out of him, too. So Across introduces the concept of a multiversal Spider-police headed by the darkly driven Spider-Man 2099 (Oscar Isaac). They bust villains, like a da Vinci-tinged Vulture, who pop up in universes where they don’t belong. That’s a lot of thwipping.
What were we talking about? Right, consequences. Following an extended, fuchsia-smeared opening sequence featuring Miles’ Spider-partner-but-maybe-also-paramour Gwen Stacy (Hailee Steinfeld), we discover that Dr. Jonathan Ohnn (Jason Schwartzman), a scientist who worked for the Kingpin, has been physically and cosmically altered by the last film’s space/time rule-breaking. Now dimensional portals dot his bleached skin, and he no longer has a face. The movie, thankfully, is gentle with the orifice jokes.
Ohnn, perhaps realizing he’s in a cartoon, declares himself The Spot, Spider-Man’s latest and greatest nemesis. Soon he disappears from the film to work out a fittingly convoluted plan to prove his dastardly bona fides. That’s a shame, too; this movie could have used a committed heavy for Spider-Man to fight. I felt the absence of Mahershala Ali’s Uncle Prowler character in this movie; he gave Miles a knotty emotional quagmire which imbued Into with dramatic complexity. Across is complicated, too, only in the way things can get complicated when you toss String Theory at hormonal teenagers.
That’s the rub about Across the Spider-Verse: it’s part one of a two-part movie event (Beyond the Spider-Verse drops next year), so a large chunk of Across is positioning Miles and all his Spider-Folks for what should be a thrilling finale next year. (I know: lots of Spider-hyphenates in this review; nothing can be done about that.) More, it knows it’s breaking Miles’ hero’s journey and the stale concept of the hero’s journey in general, so it (maybe defensively) tells us through decisions and theme that it’s doing this deliberately. “I’ma do it my own way,” Miles says.
Can great power and greater responsibility exist without tragedy instigating things? It’s an inspired question that offers much to chew on for a character with over 60 years of misery keeping him company. Beyond the Spider-Verse promises to give this idea more shape.
The movie’s directors, Kemp Powers, Justin K. Thompson, and Joaquim Dos Santos (who landed on my radar with his kinetic work on DC’s Justice League Unlimited), have compared this to The Empire Strikes Back. I’d say this cliffhanger, which comes after a series of emotional speeches set to a ceaselessly thundering score, is less elegant than Empire. When Luke fought Vader, it ended in catastrophe and left unfinished business for a future movie. But that fight had a structural purpose to it. Across — despite its rambunctious energy, despite its eye-melting visuals, despite its terrific extended chase sequence where Miles is besieged by a bellowing Oscar Isaac as a future-spider-vampire — sags in its second half like it’s purposely dragging its feet to hit epic length. Without giving the game away, I’ll say that this cliffhanger feels more aligned with The Matrix Reloaded.
So we have to wait a year for closure. That’s fine. In the meantime, the function of Across the Spider-Verse — if its stunning visual insanity is enough of an indicator — is to have a good time. People in my theater were squealing and clapping at all the cameos and surprise appearances in this movie. And since animation has a level of freedom that live-action is rarely afforded, this can actually make good on its promise of an expanded dimensional break dance across the multiverse. It actively, sometimes aggressively, experiments with creative signatures as new Spider-types make the scene: Gwen’s home looks like Easter bunny watercolors are weeping over the world, while Hobie Brown, aka The Spider-Punk (Daniel Kaluuya), is a Xeroxed underground music zine given anarchic life. This makes Doctor Strange’s Multiverse of Madness look like no-budget science dork community theater by comparison.
Is Across the Spider-Verse a good movie that could be made great by its part two? There’s a chance. But this comes packing its own sense of greatness, pushing the series’ already game-changing animation to an arena of nigh-abstraction, dazzling us with its candy chaos and dogmatic passion for all things Spider-Man. The film’s best Spider-cameo for me was Andy Samberg’s fittingly tortured take on Ben Reilly, the 90s Scarlet Spider. Now there’s something I never thought I’d write.
8 out of 10
Spider-Man: Across the Spider-Verse is in wide release now.
Directed by Joaquim Dos Santos, Kemp Powers, and Justin K. Thompson
Written by Phil Lord, Christopher Miller, and David Callaham.
Starring Shameik Moore, Hailee Steinfeld, Brian Tyree Henry, Luna Lauren Vélez, Jake Johnson, Jason Schwartzman, Issa Rae, Karan Soni, Daniel Kaluuya, and Oscar Isaac.
Produced by Avi Arad, Amy Pascal, Phil Lord, Christopher Miller, and Christina Steinberg.
Rated PG for visual havoc and thorny family troubles.
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