Into the Spider-Verse Dives Into the Comic World

You know what we are used to these days? Adaptations. As much as Marvel tells us they are trying to create a world as expansive as the comics on which they are based, it doesn’t change the fact that no matter how good the movies are, they are adapted for an art form that is very different from the original material. All superhero movies do it – Christopher Nolan’s Batman trilogy turned Batman’s villains into more modern and authentic threats; DC’s cinematic universe has been playing with the consequences of superheros’ actions in the real world; the MCU has taken many plotlines and combined them for maximum effect in the theater. While these movies are usually enjoyable, sometimes they don’t have quite the same magic as a comic book because they’re different media. However, Sony’s animated Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse not only uses a comic book story, it is inspired by the elements that make comic books fun to read. It’s more than an adaptation – it is a fully immersive comic book experience.

Miles Morales (Shameik Moore) isn’t at the top of his game – he has just begun attending a private school where he feels out of place, his police officer father (Brian Tyree Henry) doesn’t always approve of his extracurricular activities (tagging and graffiti artwork), and after a trip into the sewers with his uncle Aaron (Mahershala Ali), he’s starting to notice some weird things going on in his life, like sticking to everything he touches and hearing his voice loudly in his head. It isn’t until he runs into Spider-Man (Chris Pine) in the sewers facing off against Wilson Fisk (Liev Schreiber) that he realizes he has gained the same powers as Spider-Man. Fisk manages to turn on a dimension-crossing Super Collider before killing Spider-Man, who left the key to the Collider in Miles’ possession. The Super Collider opens Miles up to a whole new world, introducing him to the Spider-Verse where many versions of Spider-Man exist, including Peter B. Parker (Jake Johnson), who’s basically the same as Miles’ Peter Parker but down on his luck, and Gwen Stacy (Hailee Steinfeld), aka Spider-Gwen. As Miles tries to learn how to effectively use his new powers, he and the rest of the Spider-Men need to figure out a way to get home before the Super Collider destroys all of their universes.

I know that there was a warning released about the beginning of Into the Spider-Verse being a bit of a seizure risk at the beginning, but I would also be cautious with the final battle scene. Because this is a movie that uses the artwork and style of a comic book, there are moments that just EXPLODE with color and movement, and the final battle scene is plenty trippy because of that. It’s fantastic, don’t get me wrong, but it’s a lot to process all at once (especially in the middle of a climatic battle) and could easily create a little bit of a headache. If you can be okay with that, though, it is a wonderful addition to a superhero story. It brings the scenery to life in a way that the characters can react to, enhancing the story as well as making sure that the audience is completely enveloped in the world being created for them. The animation also brought a sense of texture to the story, which is a key element in reading a comic book and really sets the story apart onscreen. The text boxes, the shading, the reaction drawings for characters, and the pop art style feel as though you could reach out and touch the screen, and that’s an experience that I always love having. If I can be physically in tune with any movie, it’s doing something extremely well.

Of course any good story needs to have the characters to back it up, and this story has them in abundance – from the leads to the extras, everyone absolutely kills it. Some of my favorite things come from the extras, actually. There is literally no one better to play Spider-Ham than John Mulaney, bringing a great humor break when things get too serious (apparently they told him to “have fun with it”, and then had to remind him that this was a PG rated film) but also adding in a serious note when the need requires. The fact that Chris Pine is now technically a Marvel hero is a great joy to me, no matter how short a time it was because that means Marvel has used all four of the big Hollywood Chris’, and I love that. Nicholas Cage also was a fun surprise as Spider-Noir, a character I know very little about but was a way to get out of the usual Spider-Man imagery we’ve come to know from the live action films. And that’s just the side characters – the main cast hasn’t been forgotten. Miles Morales is both fun and emotional, and Moore was able to reach deep for the role and really drag those tears out of you when he needed to. The same can be said of Johnson, whose version of Peter Parker could invoke sympathy, laughter, and even some annoyance at the drop of a hat, rounding out his Peter Parker to be separate from any Peter Parker you can conjure from other films (including the other Peter Parker in this one). Really if there was any weak link in the Spider-Men, for me, it was Peni Parker (Kimiko Glenn), and that’s less because of her performance and more because in the large charismatic cast, it just wasn’t as easy for her to stand out. And this doesn’t even cover all of the characters – the side villains, this world’s version of Mary Jane and Aunt May, Ali’s second role in a Marvel story – but I could go one about all of them all night long. There is very little negative commentary I can make about these performances, because even at two hours, I was happy to keep watching as long as they kept talking.

One of the reasons this movie is fantastic is because even though Spider-Man is one of the most popular comic book characters in history, has been rebooted three times in live action film, and had his story told over and over and over again, this movie makes all of the Spider-Men feel fresh. We get a rushed version of each backstory (helpful for those who really only know the Peter Parker version), but it comes in a way that is both fun and informative. The story unfolds creatively, giving each character a chance to highlight themselves but never loses sight of Miles, who is the hero we both want and need. These characters inhabit a very comical world and it functions because they kind of understand how weird and wacky it is, but it still captures the essence of the real world. You get a feel for New York City through Miles and his exploits, through his father and his work, and through the way the animators chose to draw their scenes. This is an animated film with real life breathed into it, and a story we know that is given the chemistry to make it feel like something we don’t.

5 / 5

I know that technically we are getting at least two more Stan Lee cameos in upcoming movies (I believe Captain Marvel and Avengers: Endgame both have one?), but there is no way they can top the one in this movie. It was the perfect way to say goodbye to an icon.