Review: Spider-Man: Homecoming (2017)
A Nicely Put Together Flick
by Kurnia Cahya Putra
Spider-Man: Homecoming (2017)
Directed by Jon Watts
Starring Tom Holland, Michael Keaton, Zendaya
Marvel Productions
I would love to do another review with a lot of references from academic journals and whatnot the way I did with Dunkirk, but I don't have the mood nor the time to do it now. Plus, I don't think this movie warrants to get an in depth review the way Dunkirk did. I mean, I'm sure there are going to be a lot of theories that could be applied to this movie, but Dunkirk was on a whole other level. This is the first solo movie of the second Spider-Man reboot in the span of 15 years. It's integrated to the Marvel Cinematic Universe for the first time and is not explaining the origins of the kid as he has been featured before in Captain America: Civil War. In fact, this movie picks up right after that. The scene after the opening is of Peter's vlogs, documenting his day when he was asked by Tony Stark to help his side in the fight with Steve Rogers, and the aftermath where Peter is constantly waiting for another mission and at the same time, juggling his high-school life and fighting the New York crime. Speaking of New York crime, a new baddie comes up and uses the leftover from the alien ships that crashed in the Avengers battle to design weapons.
Spider-Man: Homecoming succeeds in several aspects and fails at others. At its core, it is a fun and light-hearted coming-of-age movie masked by superhero shits. However, while the teen stuff is good, the superhero stuff is not. The Sam Raimi movies always have the perfect balance of quality between Peter's real-life struggles and Spider-Man's high-thrill spectacle. The villains are good (yes, even in Spider-Man 3, which was only bogged down because they all appeared at the same time), the emotional connection between them and Peter (as well as the audience) are good, and most importantly, Peter's character arc itself is good. In my opinion, Homecoming fails at all of them, some bigger than others and vice versa. First, it doesn't have a strong villain. It has a good actor behind it (Keaton), but not enough substance underneath it for that actor to deliver. He's intimidating all right, but very one-dimensional. We learned very little of him, and much that we learned just seemed very 'on-the-surface'. There's no interesting dynamic between him and Peter (Holland), and I consider that as one of the things that make the Spider-Man franchise unique, so this is really unfortunate. I mean, sure, the revelation at the end of the second act was really great and completely threw me off, but compared to Peter's connection with the Green Goblin or Doc Ock which is developed throughout their respective movie, theirs just doesn't even begin to live up. At least, the action sequences are good, I'll give them that. It's on par with Raimi's first Spider-Man, but nothing compared to the classic train scene, the robbery scene, and the car being thrown at MJ and Peter through a cafe scene in Spider-Man 2.
Furthermore, Karen is really, really unnecessary. This is a spoiler for those of you who haven't seen it, but Karen is sort of like the Siri of this Stark-designed Spider-Man costume. Peter accidentally activates her when he makes his best-friend Ned turn off the training wheel program, which is also installed in the costume. You see where I'm going with this? I like the physical look of the costume enough. I like the eyes, the fabric and all, and I consider this to be the best costume since Raimi's version (The Amazing Spider-Man costume with the yellow eyes was pretty cool, too, though, because it was so hand-made), but with all of this stuff that Tony Stark put in it, he's not allowing Peter to grow and learn on his own, which is very crucial in a superhero's path. Well, not just superhero's, all of us. This would be like The Dark Night trilogy skipping Batman Begins altogether, and those who know me know that Batman Begins is actually my favorite from the trilogy. I mean, sure, they didn't want to rehash the origin story, but doing that doesn't mean disregarding Peter's development altogether, which is what they're doing here. This was a way for them to get Peter to a certain point, but it was way too fast. Moreover, one of the things that I love about Spider-Man is his relatability. His growing up and learning on how to hone his skills on his own were much more relatable than his having everything sorted out by the voice in his costume. Guess what, Kevin Feige? None of us have a costume that has a mind of its own. I guess a friend of mine put it best, "Can't put the job of a kid with a motto 'with great power comes great responsibility' to Tony Stark, eh?"
On the other hand, Tom Holland is the best Peter out of all the three actors that have played him. Tobey Maguire nailed the nerd, but he was just way too sad that watching him sometimes required composure because it was so irritating. Andrew Garfield was just plain jerky. He was a good actor, probably the best out of all of them because when he was given heavy dramatic stuff to do, he knocked it out of the park. However, the writing for his Peter made him really, really unlikeable. He was just asking to be punched every time he opened his mouth. Tom Holland was pretty great on all accounts. He was extremely fun, he was the most believable kid (because he just barely passed his teen age, I guess), and he had great energy as well as chemistry with other characters. The rest of the teen actors were cool as well. Zendaya gave the movie a nice touch as the randomly popping-out, monotone Michelle, Ned is a great model that I wish I had when I was a kid who is just very confident and knew who he is, and Elizabeth is a good love-interest who has very adorable and realistic interactions with Peter. Garfield and Stone's Peter and Gwen are still the best couple out of the franchise, but they come close. How about the adults? Well, they did just enough. Although, I totally fell in love with May when she throws that expletive at the end of the movie.
Despite the problems, you gotta give credit to Jon Watts for being able to put together this good of a movie whilst still being under the directions and requests of the executives. The tone is just perfect: a light-hearted fun with the right dosage of campiness so that it's able to stand alongside the rest of the MCU movies (compared to Raimi's version which was all around camp, which was also perfect for them), and when it's funny, it's really funny (mainly because of Tom Holland's great comic timing). I particularly love the interrogation part that Spider-Man does with Childish Gambino, or Troy Barnes (I miss Troy so much). Moreover, Watts also created thrilling action sequences, and he brought out the best out of his cast. Out of all the Spider-Man movies, maybe I'll put it as my #3, oh, wait no, I think it's tied with Spider-Man 3. By the way, my rank of the Spider-Man movies is like this: Spider-Man 2, Spider-Man, Spider-Man 3/Spider-Man: Homecoming, The Amazing Spider-Man, The Amazing Spider-Man 2. 7.5/10.
On the other hand, Tom Holland is the best Peter out of all the three actors that have played him. Tobey Maguire nailed the nerd, but he was just way too sad that watching him sometimes required composure because it was so irritating. Andrew Garfield was just plain jerky. He was a good actor, probably the best out of all of them because when he was given heavy dramatic stuff to do, he knocked it out of the park. However, the writing for his Peter made him really, really unlikeable. He was just asking to be punched every time he opened his mouth. Tom Holland was pretty great on all accounts. He was extremely fun, he was the most believable kid (because he just barely passed his teen age, I guess), and he had great energy as well as chemistry with other characters. The rest of the teen actors were cool as well. Zendaya gave the movie a nice touch as the randomly popping-out, monotone Michelle, Ned is a great model that I wish I had when I was a kid who is just very confident and knew who he is, and Elizabeth is a good love-interest who has very adorable and realistic interactions with Peter. Garfield and Stone's Peter and Gwen are still the best couple out of the franchise, but they come close. How about the adults? Well, they did just enough. Although, I totally fell in love with May when she throws that expletive at the end of the movie.
Despite the problems, you gotta give credit to Jon Watts for being able to put together this good of a movie whilst still being under the directions and requests of the executives. The tone is just perfect: a light-hearted fun with the right dosage of campiness so that it's able to stand alongside the rest of the MCU movies (compared to Raimi's version which was all around camp, which was also perfect for them), and when it's funny, it's really funny (mainly because of Tom Holland's great comic timing). I particularly love the interrogation part that Spider-Man does with Childish Gambino, or Troy Barnes (I miss Troy so much). Moreover, Watts also created thrilling action sequences, and he brought out the best out of his cast. Out of all the Spider-Man movies, maybe I'll put it as my #3, oh, wait no, I think it's tied with Spider-Man 3. By the way, my rank of the Spider-Man movies is like this: Spider-Man 2, Spider-Man, Spider-Man 3/Spider-Man: Homecoming, The Amazing Spider-Man, The Amazing Spider-Man 2. 7.5/10.
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