Spider-Man: Into the Spider-verse (a movie review post)

It's been a long time since I was actively collecting and reading comics -- the 90s, in fact -- so I missed out on Miles Morales and Spider-Gwen and all of that. I keep up enough with the comics world to have a vague idea of what's going on, so I knew of their existence, but I've never read any of their comics. Spider-Ham, on the other hand... Well, I'm sure I have some Spider-Ham issues around somewhere. All of that to say that I really had no special knowledge going into this movie. All you need is the basic Spider-Man origin of a teenager being bitten by a radioactive spider (and the movie will fill you in on that much) to be able to sit down and enjoy this movie.

And there's no good reason for you not to enjoy this movie. It's full of humor and warmth and action and danger and humor. It will touch your heart. Unless your heart is full of gristle and is three sizes too small.

This includes those of you out there saying, "Not another Spider-Man movie!" because this is not just another Spider-Man movie. Sure, "Spider-Man" is in this movie, but the movie is about Mile Morales, not just another Spider-Man. Which is not to say that Miles is not a Spider-Man, because he is, but this isn't just another movie about Peter Parker, though it's that, too.

The thing I find most curious about Spider-verse is the choice of the Kingpin as the main villain. He's not a character you see much around Spider-Man anymore, despite his origin in The Amazing Spider-Man #50. Well, okay, as I already said, I don't read comics much anymore, so what do I know? Well, what I know is that Kingpin made a major shift over to Daredevil in the late 80s/early 90s and has supposedly been tormenting Murdock since then. And maybe the Punisher.

None of which is to say that Kingpin is a bad choice. He works well as the villain here, for reasons I won't say because they're a bit spoilery.

In fact, the whole movie works well, so much so that I want to see it again. And so do my kids, so that was a triple win.

There are a lot of... I suppose people would call them Easter eggs, but I think they're more like "in-jokes." Whatever you call them, I did notice that there were things that I laughed at that my kids didn't because they don't have the Spider-history that I have. Also, they didn't notice that they missed anything, so it's not impactful on the movie watching experience if you don't know anything about Spider-Man.

All of which is to say that Spider-Man: Into the Spider-verse is a great film and a must-see for any Spider-Man fan. And, if you're not a Spider-Man fan, you should probably see it anyway, because it really is a very good movie. Touching and heartwarming and all of that.