Spider-Man: Brand New Day

 

After causing his girlfriend MJ (Zendaya) and best friend Ned (Jacob Batalon) to forget all about him in order to keep them safe, Peter Parker (Tom Holland) dedicates himself to protecting New York City as Spider-Man. He earns admiration and respect but also feels the pain of loneliness. It isn’t long before a pair of new challenges find him. First, his body begins to mutate in response to stress, granting him new abilities that he can’t fully control. Next, a powerful telepath (Sadie Sink) is determined to break into the Department of Damage Control, no matter how many minds she has to hijack to do it.

 

Despite the success of Tom Holland’s previous three Spider-Man films, a fourth was still a risky proposition. 2021’s No Way Home is a tough act to follow, and the actor had previously talked about stepping away from the role. Other Marvel movies to get a fourth installment – Thor: Love and Thunder and Captain America: Brave New World failed to impress. While occasionally burdened with story and pacing problems, Brand New Day does more than enough to justify its existence.

Destin Daniel Cretton, who previously helmed Shang-Chi and the Ten Rings, takes over for Jon Watts behind the camera and generally shows a good feel for the material. Early scenes of Spider-Man swinging past buildings feel plucked from the hero’s popular Playstation game. While there is a paucity of dazzling moments (a battle involving Hand ninjas notwithstanding), the film’s action still feels fluid.

Holland does some of his best work yet in the title role. He delivers a more somber take on Peter, who is grappling with literal and figurative growing pains. However, he avoids the angsty excesses of Tobey Maguire and Andrew Garfield at their worst, and still musters the occasional wisecrack. Zendaya and Holland married shortly before the film’s release, and she imbues MJ with everything from bewilderment to scorn to empathy as she learns the truth of what happens to her and Peter. Their Odessey co-star Jon Bernthal brings the Punisher to the big screen, and while the character feels a bit softened for this go-around, Bernthal plays Frank well enough for it to not seem like a betrayal. Sink, to the surprise of no one, plays Jean Grey, in one of the darker versions of the character that isn’t possessed by an alien entity. Though positioned as an adversary, her motives render her sympathetic and complex.

Unfortunately, Brand New Day suffers from attempting to accommodate so many different characters and flattens quite a few of them in the process. Trammell Tillman is largely forgettable as Damage Control’s new director despite having a sizeable role. And though Michael Mando waited nearly a decade to don the Scorpion suit – he debuted as criminal Mac Gargan in 2017’s Spider-Man: Homecoming – he gets little in the way of screen time or characterization here. This, sadly, recalls the way that Homecoming squandered Bokeem Woodbine, another actor acclaimed for his television work, in an underdeveloped role as the Shocker.

Narratively, Brand New Day is inconsistent. The emotional stakes are high, and the presence of a threat that Peter, at first, cannot seem to find adds a refreshing new dimension. However, the conflict’s resolution feels overly reminiscent of Thunderbolts, and the film plays fast and loose with its own mythology (namely, relative to its depiction of the Hulk). Whereas previous Spider-Man movies also clocked in over two hours, Brand New Day, unlike its predecessors, felt as if it could have been a good fifteen minutes shorter.

Though buoyed by Holland’s performance and a mature look at the toll of heroism, Brand New Day is still more episodic than transcendent. However, it points to a franchise that is trying to regain its bearings rather than one that is creatively dead.