More Spiders

Had enough of multiverses? Too bad, because there's still 2023's Spider-Man: Across the Spider-Verse for me to talk about. It's not a bad movie, though not quite as good as its predecessor, Into the Spider-Verse.

My favourite stuff was in the first third or so of the movie when it focused on Gwen Stacy (Hailee Steinfeld) (from whose point of view the movie mostly is), Miles Morales (Shameik Moore), their relationship, and their awkward teenage lives.

As for the bulk of the plot, though, I was surprised by just how much this movie resembled other multiverse stories. Like the recent Flash movie, it has the City on the Edge of Forever premise about the bad things that need to happen to preserve a better future. Like Loki in the recent season two of Loki, Miles finds himself periodically physically overcome by a jittery time anomaly. Like the Time Variance Authority, a society of interdimensional Spider-People police the multiverse (they even have a version of Miss Minutes). Their civilisation is also reminiscent of the civilisation of Ricks on Rick and Morty, the show that seems to be largely at fault for the multiverse trend.

At an hour and twenty minutes, Across the Spider-Verse is a long movie and the runtime really doesn't feel justified. There are a lot of repetitive scenes about Miles and Gwen agonising over their secret identities, and Miles getting into trouble because he's unreliable and always late, the same kind of stuff Tobey Maguire was doing twenty years ago.

The animation style has a lot of distracting noise but not so distracting that I didn't notice the characters seemed to have oddly limited expressiveness this time. Maybe I've just been watching too much hand-drawn animation lately.

Spider-Man: Across the Spider-Verse is available on Netflix in the US.

X Sonnet #1802

With oven eyes, invasive squirrels'll cook.
A mischief sold as moral right was taped.
Where critters change their vests, they'll steal a look.
On darker deeds, a clumsy joke is draped.
Alone, the cleaning man discovers song.
A quiet day would still console the lass.
Persistent chills recall a brittle wrong.
A frozen pipe was broke as banshees pass.
Offensive clouds condemn the very air.
Above, about, corruption rolls the mould.
Pervasive gunk betrays the coward's stare.
Acidic sap encased the captive's hold.
To make an even ground, the lives were cut.
But mem'ries yet torment the seer's gut.