Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse was one of the most surprising hits to come out of 2018. From the studio that abandoned Sam Raimi’s vision, carelessly revamped it just five years later with Andrew Garfield as the web-head and shook hands with Kevin Feige’s Marvel Studios to bring Spider-Man to the coveted structure of the MCU in 2015, Sony Pictures looked to Miles Morales to bolster their profits.
Amidst Sony’s mishandling of Peter Parker led Spider-Men, Miles Morales was conceived in 2011 by Brian Michael Bendis and Sara Pichelli. Sony had yet to realize that their next big hit was freshly awakened and waiting to blossom. In just seven years, Miles Morales evolved from a stint in Parker’s shoes to an animated mega-star. Never has a comic-book character gone from being a titular page turner to one of the most beloved characters in a movie as quickly as Miles Morales. By all measurements, he was a flash in the pan for a struggling studio and gave us the taste that audiences were salivating for with a coat of that on 2s magic.
That 2018 mega-hit that knocked the socks off of everyone who groaned at the idea of seeing a different uncle bite another bullet, could not have been prepared for how delicate, imaginative, emotional, and charming Into the Spider-Verse was. It buzzed every node and applied a meta-textual lens to a sub-genre that typically struggles with having its cake and eating it too because almost all of them want to be taken too seriously to realize that the strengths of superheroes come from sincerity. To recognize the inherent BAM, WHOOP, POWS of the foundational texts, is the first step in creating something as magically moving as Into the Spider-Verse. With the right mindset and infinite potential of animation, Miles’ story was just beginning to scratch the surface of a story that wanted to plunge into the web of the Spider-Verse headfirst.
The follow-up, Spider-Man: Across the Spider-Verse, leaps into realms that every cape and cowl feature wish it could. The cost of that leap comes in the form of an unfulfilling part one of two, and the emotional accents that compliment one of the greatest visual efforts ever put to film exchanges succinct narrative embellishments for serialized storytelling designed to force a transaction rather than individually satisfy.
When we talk about trilogies, part twos, “the middle part”, or any descriptor of the connective tissue between the beginning and end, our minds wander to the one-thirds that best exemplify the strengths of a middle chapter. The Two Towers, The Empire Strikes Back, The Dark Knight, Terminator 2, Spider-Man 2, so on and so forth - are all prime examples of an arc’s pivot point. The films are generally in the same spot as the first, but the filmmakers have shifted to a new angle that reconfigures the conflict of an evolving metaphor to interfere with the protagonist. Across the Spider-Verse has no issue doing this, but it is hardly a “middle-part” as the aforementioned examples are.
Across the Spider-Verse has all of the makings of a true sequel. It broadens the scope, expands the conflict, and establishes the repercussions that are born from the consequences of the choices made in the predecessor’s conclusion. The best nuggets of Across the Spider-Verse come from the team using the aftermath of the Super Collider event as the launchpad for introducing The Spot as Miles’ mischievous nemesis, developing the relationship between Miles and his parents, Spider-Man and the city, and creating this larger event beyond the parameters of his Earth. This set-up is fascinating and incredibly patient for a movie that has been sold as an action-packed chase sequence within the claws of Spider-Man 2099. This team loves spending time with Miles and planting the seeds that’ll grow into the stalks of an emotional threshold that’ll support the whiz and pop of the art style. Where this film makes its mistake is falling in love with planting seeds and letting the plates spin into the credits.
The events of Across the Spider-Verse have universe altering, seismic potential. This Spider-Verse team brings forth plenty of interesting points of action, reference, and emotion, but those plates continue their gyroscopic motion that result in an awe-inspiring observation with a rather underwhelming conclusion to all of it. You can hear all of the bells and whistles whining behind the tapestry of shades, dimensions, and palettes that uniquely define the hundreds of Spider-people within the architecture of a canonized event, but the misfire comes from being a flurry of first act jolts that hardly reaches any stage of storytelling development that isn’t just table setting exposition.
There are painterly mirages of unbelievable sights and sounds that will be foundational for the future of animation, but as a story it deprives the protagonists of reaching a point that is rightly owed to them. In turn, it is a disservice to the audience because we are as equally unfulfilled as they are. No cliffhanger or rug pull justifies this, because the movie has forced our hands to reach into our pockets as the only form of catharsis we can afford. As thrilling as the collective gasps or cheers might be, the totality of the experience is largely nullified by the choice to serialize the story as an echo of an origin story we thought the previous entry was. An entry that ironically understood the cycle of new beginnings within the boundaries of preordained canon.
As Miles discovers his place in the Spider-Man canon, the potential for him to exist outside of that is the backbone of countless science-fiction stories where our hero forges their own path. This film has drawn comparisons to The Matrix Reloaded, and you see fingerprints of Wachowski D.N.A all over it. In style, character, action - all of it. Where Neo is faced with the burdens of being special from the beginning, that level of specialty in Miles isn’t cued in until the movie is nearly over. As creative as the writing is to issue that to Miles, this anomaly within the scope of the Spider-Verse feels too late as it is the first in an enclave of twists.
This revelation recontextualizes every relationship that Miles made in the previous entry, but as this is reaching the physical and emotional apex, it stumbles into a few too many endings. Right when you think it’s going to strand us as it does Miles, it keeps going and going into sequences that continue to set the table for Beyond the Spider-Verse. At this point the movie hardly feels fulfilling, because the limits of its storytelling vices have been stretched so thin in trying their hardest to make you care about what’s next that all of the emotional nuggets get lost in the late-stage entanglement. Leaving a lasting impression that imprisons us in the, “I want more”, cell. Not because we got enough, but because this segment is in desperate need of finality.
As much as Miles faces hardships, not a single one is resolved. The way in which we’ll talk about his conflict in this film is only ever going to be in relation to Beyond the Spider-Verse. This does Across the Spider-Verse no service as an individual film. As a movie it hardly feels like one, but as an episode of serialized television it excels. It clogs every narrative pipe with so much vital information on a technical and emotional front, plants easter eggs (more seeds), develops the characters as much as one can within a single act, because the actual catharsis is another year away. Great middle chapters have their own catharsis, and Across the Spider-Verse doesn’t because the sequel has it. Which is a shame because there are a few opportunities for this movie to end on a note, and it actively chooses not to. A baffling choice in a film with a staggering amount of passion, ambition, and craft worth every minute of the wait and dollar in your pocket.
Across the Spider-Verse is disappointing. No matter how much Beyond the Spider-Verse fills in the cavities left unattended by Across, it won’t tie up or button down a movie that can’t sustain itself within the grander scheme of the story it’s chosen to tell. This is the difference between a sequel that harnesses its own power, and one that diffuses all of its matter for the sake of serializing a story in a form of storytelling that wasn’t built for it. It’s possible to be an individual “part” that works in unison with the machinations of filmic boundaries - many films have done it (as recently as DUNE), but it’ll only ever work if you’re searching for a reason to tie a knot rather than find an excuse to never stop and leaving your piece of work deflated of meaning. Left to be refilled by the air of something that doesn’t exist… yet.