I Wanna Be a Superhero Thanks to Spider-Man: Across the Spider-Verse

*Spoiler Warning*

When the first movie changes your life you kinda have to see the second one.

With Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse, I knew the second one had to be bigger and better and it didn’t disappoint.

The art feel of the first one, just gets expanded on. If the first movie was a singular painting, the second one is a whole art gallery. The film is visually stunning. A look that cannot be possibly achieved in live-action. This is only emphasized in the different look and feel of every universe that the movie took us to.

Gwen’s world is especially stunning. Of course her view of the world around her would be affected by her emotions. This adds to the mood ring vibe that the production team keeps talking about. Being a teenage girl is an emotional time and being Spider-Woman definitely adds some extra emotions.

I couldn’t realize it was over until the beautiful strings of “Am I Dreaming” made me realize what I just witnessed. A labour of love for animation and superhero movies.

A good soundtrack elevates a movie to the next level. My one gripe though is that the music felt more non-diegetic than diegetic this time around. Miles sang “Sunflower” in the Into The Spider-Verse, he doesn’t have a moment like that with any of the songs in this film. The music is good, don’t get me wrong I just wish it was incorporated better.

While Miles might now have his sunflower moment in this moment, there are great callbacks to the lessons he’s learned in the first movie that he puts to use in the second. My favourite is his leap of faith with the glass shards and everything off the train towards Miguel while fighting to prove his worth. The end when he’s faced with the Prowler (y’all should know who I’m talking about but I won’t say his real name just in case) is a good moment of “don’t watch the mouth, watch the hands.” It’s also probably going to be the starting point for Beyond The Spider-Verse.

The message of this movie comes across loud and clear that your self worth can only be defined by you. Miles realizes that by the end after fighting almost every Spider-Man known to man. (Shoutout to Hobie Brown and Margo Kess for being real ones though). The moment where he realizes he’s in power of his own “canon” makes for one of the great lines in the movie. “Everyone keeps telling me how my story is supposed to go. Nah, I’mma do my own thing” is a powerful statement that everyone who has ever been defined by anybody else needed to hear. There’s power in owning your story.

While they introduce a lot of new characters in this film, it’s very easy to root for the ones aligned with Miles. Any one that shows any disdain for him I found it harder for me to get into as a character like Miguel O’Hara and Jessica Drew. That being said I did find myself not liking Gwen and Peter B. Parker as much for betraying Miles. Miles is just that guy, you can’t help but not see him win. Which makes the ending excruciating as it doesn’t look like a situation he can win…yet.

Even though this is only the first part of the story and ends with to be continued, I could not help but feel powerful once the credits started to roll. It felt like I became a whole new person after seeing this movie. A feeling I want to hold onto for a long time.