Refreshingly low stakes and great performances make this the best Spider-Man film since 'Spider-Man 2'

Rating: 8/10 (15 July 2018)

Easily the best 'Spider-Man' film since Sam Raimi's 'Spider-Man 2', Jon Watts' 'Spider-Man: Homecoming' is a constantly entertaining boots on the ground story, with refreshingly small stakes and a good sense of humour. Tom Holland is great as a young Peter Parker, one that actually acts and feels like a teenager, and his performance really keeps the film webbed together. Michael Keaton also gives a fantastic performance as Adrian Toomes. While the villain is rather generic, it's Keaton's performance that makes him a memorable one. The most interesting aspects of the story are seeing Peter Parker get to grips with his powers and begin to discover more about the dangers of the world and himself. The worst aspects of the film are actually the high-flying CGI action sequences as they feel entirely synthetic. It's a shame that they decided to make almost all of the action CGI, especially considering that Tom Holland is capable of performing stunts. In fact, he actually did do the majority of stunts himself, only the studio decided to make him do these while wearing a mo-cap suit, so that they could mimic his movements onto a GCI model. I personally feel like this was a bad move and that the action would have felt more realistic if they used an actual stunt team with Holland at the forefront. Still, the great character moments outweigh the somewhat unremarkable action scenes and the film contains one of the best, most tense scenes in the entire MCU. It's a scene in which in which there is no CGI involved, just two actors and a car. 8/10