As usual, I am embarrassingly late to media that most people know of. Finally, after over a year of its release and coming in as the fourth Marvel movie I’ve seen in its entirety, I have seen “Spider-Man: Homecoming” and I enjoyed it far more than I expected.
Now, I think I’ve stated this before in another article, but I’m not exactly a superhero person. “Thor: The Dark World” didn’t really do it for me and “Avengers” got me pumped to some extent but it didn’t interest me as much as I hoped.
I can really put my blame and the reason for my interest on “Avengers: Infinity War” for sparking my immediate love for this iteration of Peter Parker as well as the dynamic between Tony Stark and himself. Besides those main facts, it definitely made me want to watch several of the other movies (mostly “Guardians of the Galaxy”), so I can give my thanks to that film in that regard.
But onto the main topic!
“Spider-Man: Homecoming” was a movie I went into knowing I would love. I started it off already loving this incarnation of Peter Parker and… I came out loving him even more than before. I found the entire storyline fun; it gave enough basis for me to know what was happening throughout despite my horrid lack of knowledge on all things MCU and Marvel as a whole.
One of my favorite parts of the movie was Peter’s vlogging throughout his adventure to Germany to fight Captain America’s faction. The childlike wonder and excitement of having an opportunity like this is extremely palpable through Tom Holland’s stellar acting and it made me smile wide enough it almost hurt my face.
To showcase a character that has mostly been presented as 20+ for years, I personally think it’s fun that the MCU is showing off Spider-Man as a teenager that’s working up to be that hero that fans know and love. It gives a certain perspective and introduces the struggle again of being a teenager that has to juggle being a superhero in secret with every other part of life at that stage.
It’s an enjoyable film that I’m going to rewatch as soon as I can since I loved it so much and want to actually see it properly instead of having it buffer every 20 minutes.
I know there are people that don’t like or even hate Homecoming and, frankly, to each their own! However, that won’t stop me from giving a hard disagreement towards their dislike.
It might not be my place to talk on whether it’s a good movie in terms of following Spider-Man lore properly, but as someone just now getting into the MCU and Marvel in general, it certainly caught my interest.
From this experience, two things have been confirmed personally: Peter Parker falls perfectly in line with the character type I adore and the gut punch ending of “Avengers: Infinity War” hurts even more than it did when I saw it with nearly no context.
Overall, we only have one solo movie out right now: more character establishment is bound to follow in the coming movies, as “Spider-Man: Far From Home” comes out in the summer. Don’t lose hope yet, comic lovers; I’m sure Uncle Ben, J. Jonah Jameson and other parts of the Spider-Man mythos will be brought up soon!
Erika Brandenburg
Arts and Entertainment Editor