Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse **** (2018, voices Shameik Moore, Jake Johnson, Nicolas Cage, Kimiko Glenn, John Mulaney, Liev Schreiber, Hailee Steinfeld, Lily Tomlin) – Movie Review

The live-action Marvel movies have become so CGI dependent that the studio has finally done the logical thing and gone the whole hog and dispensed with actors and sets altogether, and turned them into an animated comic book. Hooray! Well, hooray if it works and if it is good, and Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse is, it really is.

The 2018 Marvel Comics animated adventure feature Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse is a total Spidey-headbanger. It is fast paced, lively, witty, amusing, inventive, dazzlingly designed in psychedelic colours – and fun! It takes about 10 minutes to get into gear, but then keeps going dynamically and never stops.

Peter Parker is killed – gasp! – but black teenager Miles Morales (voice of Shameik Moore) comes across another, slightly different looking Peter Parker (Jake Johnson) coming from somewhere else in the Spider-Verse. Under Parker’s guidance, Miles becomes superhero Spider-Man (he’s been bitten by a spider of course) and part of a gang that includes Spider-Man Noir (Nicolas Cage), Peni Parker (Kimiko Glenn) and Spider-Ham (John Mulaney) – and together they fight The Kingpin (Liev Schreiber). Hailee Steinfeld voices Miles’s new friend Gwen Stacy, and Lily Tomlin voices Aunt May. Stan Lee voices Stan.

I’m slightly baffled by exactly how the parallel dimensions thingy actually works, but it is probably best not to look into it too closely. The idea seems to be that there is some parallel universe somewhere, where we are all Spider-Man, and all our own superhero. Neat that, eh?, but then it could be important to remember that this is a fantasy film, guys. It is best not to chuck yourself off a tall building just in case it turns out that you cannot spin a spider’s web on the way down. Don’t try this at home!

There are many pleasures in the alternative universe world, but I really liked the noir Spider-man with Nicolas Cage – he must get his own movie! This multiverse idea is going to prove very fruitful and lucrative indeed.

It is directed by Bob Persichetti, Peter Ramsey and Rodney Rothman, from a screenplay by Phil Lord and Rodney Rothman.

Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse won the hat trick for Best Animated Feature Film at the Oscars, Golden Globes and BAFTA Film Awards.

Stan Lee (1922–2018).

RIP Stan Lee [Stanley Lieber], who died on 12 November 2018, aged 95. He co-created Spider-Man, the Hulk, Doctor Strange, the Fantastic Four, Iron Man, Daredevil, Thor, and the X-Men.

© Derek Winnert 2018 Movie Review

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