I’ve been reading this book series for children titled Wings of Fire by one of the authors who worked on the Warriors series? You know, the one about the cats that has a reputation for being really intense and having loads of characters? Yeah, so far these books fit the bill. It’s fun!
This essay includes spoilers for Spider-Man: Far From Home.
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Making A Spider-Man Movie About Spider-Man
So I saw Spider-Man: Far From Home recently and I liked it. I put up a pretty good review of Movie Munchies if you’re curious. But one thing I mentioned in the review that kind of bothers me is that there are ways it doesn’t really feel like it’s a Spider-Man movie.
SPOILER ALERT:
The villain of the movie is Mysterio, who is a disgruntled former employee of Tony Stark’s. Tony fired him because he was unstable, but he was the one who created the holographic tech that we see in Captain America: Civil War. He’s after the amazing AI-hidden-in-a-pair-of-sunglasses that Tony passed to Peter after his death and hopes to use that to do whatever he wants and run Stark’s memory the mud.
Here’s the thing: this is the second Spider-Man movie in the Marvel Cinematic Universe, and the villain’s motivation is centered on Tony Stark. Which kind of worked with Vulture in Homecoming, as that’s a beginner’s movie, and Tony Stark is actually around as a mentor figure for Peter. But here it’s more egregious. I get that Tony was Peter’s mentor, and that as an important figure in his life he feels like he’s in Tony’s shadow. But when the second movie in a row has a villain who is only after Spider-Man because he’s in the way of him getting revenge on Tony Stark… that’s not great. Because we’re centering the movie named after one hero around another hero altogether.
What makes this frustrating is that the past year has given us not one, but two incredible Spider-Man stories: Spider-Man: Into the Spiderverse and the PS4 exclusive Spider-Man, both of which told stories that centered around Spider-Man and didn’t feel as if the protagonist wasn’t the central character of the drama. I get that Far From Home is an installment of the Marvel Cinematic Universe and has to tie into the rest of it. And given that it’s the movie that comes immediately after Avengers: Endgame, it has a lot to talk about and it can’t exactly not deal with the fallout of that film.
But did we really need the villain to be a disgruntled former Stark employee? And that the entire conflict of the film to be centered around a bit of tech Stark developed? Again, this is the second Spider-Man movie in this cinematic universe, and it’s the second that heavily deals with Peter’s relationship with Tony.
And while I have seen some criticism in this vein, that’s not the majority reaction to this film? I’ve seen a lot of people insist that these last two movies are “Truer to the Text” versions of Spider-Man, that have a deeper understanding of the character and mythos than any live-action incarnation before, which, is, uh… I think a questionable claim at best. I’ve seen Far From Home listed as one of the greatest Spider-Man films of all time, and while it’s good, and it’s fun, I don’t know if I’d call it that either. Because again, it’s not really about Spider-Man. At least, it doesn’t feel like it. It feels more like it’s a continuation of the Marvel Cinematic Universe’s story arc, rather than being that along with being its own thing.
I’ve talked a little about making sure that the protagonist is in fact the main character of the story, and that a surprising amount of writers can’t seem to get this down, even in the most enjoyable stories. I just didn’t think this would happen to Spider-Man, one of the most iconic heroes in popular culture.
Spider-Man has a supporting cast! And a rogues gallery! And a family! It should not be difficult to create a story about Spider-Man, where the villain is tied specifically to the protagonist in a way that’s overt and matters, and the majority of his character development is not tied to the star of another franchise.
Make a movie about its title character. That’s not too much to ask, is it?
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