the main course is served, and the motto is let's go chipper!

Rating: 7/10 (15 August 2017)

Back to the drawing board after Sony opting for foreshortening THE AMAZING SPIDER-MAN franchise, and recruited into the ever-expanding Marvel Comic Universe, this Spider-Man re-redux features a new web-slinger Tom Holland, treads the same treacherous water of being repetitive (an aggregate of 6 stand-alone summer blockbusters in the past 15 years), but smartly angles for re- connecting with a sizably younger demography by coordinating Peter Parker as a high schooler and emphatically bowdlerizes his tragedy-laden original story (no mentioning of his parents, or the demise of uncle Ben, or how he acquire the superpower), after this new Spidey's scintillating debut in CAPTAIN America: CIVIL WAR (2016) as an amuse-bouche, now the main course is served, and the motto is let's go chipper!
The prologue concisely dwells on the movie's main villain Adrian Toomes aka, Vulture (Keaton), an arms trafficker who has no ambition to lay waste to the world and wisely chooses to stay under the radar for his profiteering business of forging mass destructive weapons graced with extraterrestrial substances. The film kick-starts with the caption of "a film made by Peter Parker", a fuzzy video shot by his phone which evinces his excitement of becoming an Avenger and he is all keyed up for the next big teamwork which seems to be indefinitely parked.
So, life goes on, after all the thrills and spills dissipate, Peter is back on his neighborhood watch escapades, has his first crush on a senior student Liz (Harrier), and inadvertently reveals his secret identity in front of his best friend, the computer-savvy Ned (Batalon), director Jon Watts and his writers make sure there are sufficient gags and jokes to cosset upbeat youngsters and it is a decisive move to reinvigorate a markedly fatigued franchise. After several skirmishes with Vulture and his cronies, including a heroic rescue in the Washington Monument of his academic decathlon teammates, and a ferry fracas nearly causes great casualties, Peter is reprimanded by Iron Man (Downey Jr.) and his bespoke intelligent suit is confiscated.
Becoming an Avenger seems hopeless at that point, but for a 15-year-older high schooler, there is something more imperative to do, for example, to invite Liz as his date in the homecoming dance. Only a twist will soon bring Peter face to face with Mr. Toomes, and an ensuing aerial-to-ground battle devised as the final showdown ultimately comes across as derivative and uninspiring, it is not such a compliment to the craftsmanship if one is constantly occupied with galling trivialities such as why Spidey's homemade suit is so durable or why the close-range combat is so inanely gore-less?
Pitifully, this reboot isn't a real trooper to give a completely absorbing makeover of one of our most beloved comic heroes, or to shatter the status quo of the comics adaptation formula, although one can see that it has the potential to do so, Tom Holland is a beneficent choice to wear the suit, utterly down-to-earth and charmingly spontaneous, let's only hope he will not be typecast in the future. The whole cast is meritoriously inclusive, each character is given their distinctive individuality, and Michael Keaton, after his self-referential come back in BIRDMAN (2014), looks pretty self-paradoxical taking a fat check in this winged about-face, haranguing his much junior opponent with his faux-family value which belies a thinly veiled egoism and callousness, as a villain, he has his matter-of-fact tack but nonetheless, slumps into an old chestnut when it comes to profit and confrontation.