Spider-Man: Homecoming: Review

I’ve never really been a big fan of the character of Spider-Man outside of Sam Raimi’s original run of movies. Now we’re here, two reboots later, with a brighter, more joke-oriented teen approach to the character and the world around him and this time he’s with Iron Man. With my lacking connection to the character and my more lukewarm feelings towards the overdone marketing, I have not been anticipating the day that I have to see this. Luckily, it was nowhere near as bad as I thought it was going to be, I actually quite enjoyed myself from time to time (mostly due to the outstanding cast of character actors).
If there’s one film that I feel I could easily compare Spider-Man: Homecoming to, it would probably be this year’s semi-divisive Power Rangers reboot. Both deal in equal portions with our character’s personal lives and their lives as up and coming superheroes, the only differences is that Rangers made a legitimate attempt at making us give a damn about our central characters, allowing the audience to identify with their struggles to trust each other and become better people. This really did none of that. Homecoming is a film that rides almost solely on the charisma and entertainment factor of its leads and that can only really take the film so far. I admittedly was entertained by the large majority of this film and almost every single bit of humor made me laugh (surprising, considering how much I loathed the humor in GOTG Vol.2) but I couldn’t help but feel that the movie needed a little bit more. None of the relationships that Peter has in the film are very fleshed out; Aunt May is reduced to useless punchline eye candy (never thought I'd say that), Ned is nothing but comic relief, Michelle is not in the movie nearly enough even though she’s frequently the one who steals the scene the best, and Tony Stark is nothing more than a parental deus ex machina who scolds Peter every time he does something that is recklessly over-the-top (which is a lot).
Which brings me to quite possibly my biggest negative, the actions of Peter Parker. I get that he's supposed to be a reckless teenager but most of the things he does are frankly stupid and misguided and he doesn’t seem to receive any type of consequence for any of his actions which is frustrating as hell when you're supposed to be watching someone act as a learning hero. Also, every set piece is rather boring and very poorly choreographed, they felt disappointingly clunky and weightless.
Spider-Man: Homecoming is really just two and a half hours of set up for what you really want to see. Many things feel undercooked and the narrative, in general, feels like it doesn't have much of a purpose but this is also one of the most harmless and breezy films that I’ve seen which is why I feel that I have to push this to a positive score. It’s a pretty heavily flawed film but luckily, I’m feeling in the mood to accept some simple summer entertainment for what it is. I hope that this crew can bring something a little more potent to the table for the sequel. (6/10)

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