A generic high school movie that works as a good Spidey movie

Rating: 6/10 (7 July 2017)

Spider-Man Homecoming was a solid, fun, and charming film. While it's nowhere near great I would say that it's one of the better Spidey movies. There's a lot that I like and not much I didn't enjoy. For one thing I thought Tom Holland was pretty great as both Peter Parker AND Spider-Man (which has never been done before in the movies). It's a different representation of the character since he's so young, but it works to the film's advantage since he screws up a lot as he should. There's even a few harsh moments with him that legitimately impressed me. The acting overall was very good. With my second favorite performance being Michael Keaton as Adrian Toomes. Michael Keaton is great in everything and here he really gets to shine, especially in the later parts of the movie. Only issue with him was how it sounded like he tried to have a thick NY accent early on but then just stopped after a bit. But I gotta say, he's without a shred of a doubt the best Marvel villain. Marisa Tomei as Hot Aunt May was also really enjoyable as there were quite a few funny moments around her being unnaturally attractive. The humor was also much better than I expected. It's a very light-hearted movie without feeling as tonally unbalanced as some other Marvel movies, and the quips from Spider-Man are always fun. Another thing is that the cinematography is surprisingly really good. There's a lot of great shots and a good color palette that suits the movie's tone. From a directing standpoint this movie is much better/more defined than most other Marvel films recently. Where my issues begin to emerge is mainly with the writing. This is every single high school movie you've ever seen, mixed with a generic superhero movie that happens to be about Spider-Man. It doesn't necessarily do this stuff poorly, but none of it is unique either. The romance subplot is especially mediocre. It goes through the same beats as every other one you've seen and is riddled with terribly clichéd dialogue. It's definitely the weakest out of all the films because at least in ASM Emma and Andrew's chemistry was fantastic. And in the Raimi movies Mary Jane was fairly developed as a character. Another thing I wasn't crazy for was the emphasis on the Avengers and the rest of the MCU. Even though there were a lot of clever and meta bits where it showed how a post Avengers world would operate, it seemed a little heavy-handed. Especially with Tony Stark. I'm glad that he's not in the movie as much as I thought he would be, and I like how he's trying to be a sort of father figure. But I felt like he was the executives' way of implanting all the sequel-baiting and setting-up-for-Infinity-War into the film. Which is a negative cuz I when I see a Spider-Man film I wanna see a Spider-Man film, not another Marvel movie. My last problem is that I felt like this film really lacked much of an emotional grit to it. For the most part the sequence of events just kinda feel like a sequence of events with no real consequences. There is a scene before the third act that really held some weight to it and brought a bit of that grit to the film. There's also a little moment in the final battle where Tom Holland does his best bit of acting as he truly felt vulnerable and hurt, that with some great imagery also brought some much needed drama to it. I get that it's ultimately a kids' movie, but a good sense of weight to situation could've really made the emotional moments even more powerful. Any other issues I have are minor like product-placement, stretches in logic that the movie itself set up, and a way characters react to Peter's final action that seems out of place. Overall, I really enjoyed Spider-Man Homecoming for what it was and accepted that it's not perfect by any means; I would gladly see it again. Enthusiastic 6/10.