Spider-Man: Across the Spider-Verse
In cinemas now
I’d like to preface this review by saying that I am a massive Spider-Man fan. So, I’ve tried to restrain any personal bias as best as I can.
That being said, my expectations for Across the Spider-Verse were very high. The first instalment proved that modern comic book fare be emotionally intelligent and pushed the medium of animation further than any other film I can recall from the past 20 years. It introduced us to an incredibly unique art style that takes influence from comic books of the silver and bronze ages and blends it with cutting-edge CG animation.
This movie blows all of that out of the water. The animation in Across the Spider-Verse is light years ahead of its predecessor. As the title suggests, Miles Morales (Jharrel Jerome) and the audience are flung to other far across regions of the Spider-Verse, where other styles of art are incorporated and blended seamlessly into something almost psychedelic. It is truly amazing to watch on the big screen. I have honestly never felt so immersed in the world of a film before, and that’s all thanks to the hours and hours of hard work the animators put in to bringing the Spider-Verse to life.
The storytelling at play here is also incredible. I’ve seen complaints about the fact that this is a ‘part one’ and thus has an unsatisfactory ending, but I didn’t mind that at all. I found that the cliffhanger really worked for me, making the movie feel more like a Shakespearean tragedy than anything else. All emotions are heightened to the max and the arcs of Miles and Gwen Stacy (Hailee Steinfeld) are incredibly compelling.
Daniel Pemberton and Metro Boomin respectively knock it out of the park with both the soundtrack and the score. The tracks used to bookend the film in particular were incredibly evocative.
So, is Across the Spider-Verse the best Spider-Man movie? I don’t think so. It does get slightly reference-heavy at times, so I think that crown still belongs to the first Spider-Verse, but I do think that it is a very satisfying instalment, a remarkable achievement and possibly the best movie of the year so far.
