The reasons why the new Spider-Man is a brilliant movie

To say that Spider-Man: Across the Spider-Verse is brilliant is not enough, since the film based on the Marvel Comics character, Miles Morales, does not settle for its technical perfection and delivers a veiled and devastating diagnosis of the current state of modernity, through the dilemma that is posed to the protagonist superhero.

Directed by Joaquim Dos Santos, Kemp Powers and Justin K. Thompson, and written by Phil Lord, Christopher Miller and Dave Callaham, this sequel to the equally magnificent Spider-Man: A New Universe (2018) engages with its frenetic pace and its ability to tell a story of more than two hours without allowing any element to be out of place, staging characters as magnetic as they are well designed, who move in the colorful multiverse of Spider-Man to Let Brooklyn’s Spider-Man, Miles (voice of Shameik Moore) stop his nemesis The Spot (voice of Jason Schwartzman) from wreaking havoc.

The plot

The story takes place a year and a half after the events of the previous film, and with a formidable introduction by Gwen Stacy (voice of Hailee Steinfeld), which is like turning the pages of a comic in a movie theater, presents us with the news of Miles, who has not yet told his parents that he is Spider-Man. Miles is still in love with Gwen and one fine day the young woman appears to him in her room and convinces him to complete a mission to save each universe from the evils of the inexperienced enemy.

The political side of animation rears its head when Miguel O’Hara (voice of Oscar Isaac), leader of the spider society, tells Miles that he shouldn’t break the canon of the Spider-Verse, because that would make him a anomaly, and that, therefore, he has to choose between saving people or his loved ones, reminding him that being a superhero is a sacrifice.

However, Miles’s position is firm: he wants to save his family and people, why not? Who prevents it? And that’s where the political element comes in, because O’Hara represents the rules of the Spider-Verse, while Miles proposes to break them by telling him that he can save everyone.

At one point, a character answers, ironically, “it’s a metaphor for capitalism” when another asks him what La Mancha does. In that joke, which he mocks those who decode everything as if it were a reference to the system, is the key to the movie.

Conscious or not, the scriptwriters put that phrase because the intention is to imply the opposite of what irony implies, that is, that indeed everything is about capitalism. And what confirms this reading is when Stacy says “so we (the Spider-Verse) are the bad guys?”. Of course they do, because they are the ones who respect the rules of the multiverse, while Miles proposes to break them, to be the anomaly.

Visually mesmerizing, with loads of information, and with an understanding of comic book history and characters like no other film has yet demonstrated, Spider-Man: Across the Spider-Verse It is a perfect combination of theoretical rigor and aesthetic quality, of entertainment and political subtext, a lesson in modern animation and comics brought to the big screen, a class in political philosophy and cultural criticism, a masterpiece for few that deserves to be for many.

To watch Spider-Man: Across the Spider-Verse

Spider-Man: Across the Spider-Verse, United States, 2023. Animation. Direction: Joaquim Dos Santos, Kemp Powers and Justin K. Thompson. Screenplay: Phil Lord, Christopher Miller and Dave Callaham. Voices (original version with subtitles): Shameik Moore, Hailee Steinfeld, Oscar Isaac, Jake Johnson, Issa Rae, Brian Tyree Henry, Luna Lauren Velez, Rachel Dratch, Daniel Kaluuya, Taran Killam, Andy Samberg and Jason Schwartzman. Music: Daniel Pemberton. Duration: 140 minutes. Suitable for people over 13 years of age. Complexity: moderate. Sex: null. Violence: moderate. In theaters.