Spider-Man: No Way Home: A Raucous Joy

I know the omicron variant is spreading through the world and the last thing I should be advocating for is that people pack themselves into a crowded movie theatre to watch Spider-Man: No Way Home. But man. That is how I watched this movie, and I regret nothing. No other movie I have watched this year has been more of a boisterous crowd pleaser with a ton of surprises all the way into the third act that kept us endlessly cheering. In fact, I might need to re-watch this movie at home when we're all in lockdown again because I missed so much dialogue when the crowd was whooping away. 

The movie picks up right after the last one where Peter Parker's identity as Spider-Man has been broadcast to the whole world. So naturally, Peter and his friends are thrown into a bit of turmoil. Spider-Man is having a PR crisis, and Peter and his associates face a barrage of abuse - apparently no one in NYC believes he is their friendly neighborhood Spider-Man; instead, they think he destroys everything he touches. In a fit of despair, Peter visits Dr. Strange to see if he can cast a spell to turn back time. Obviously Strange puts the kibosh on that (can't mess with the space-time continuum dontcha know!) but they hit upon a loophole where he could just make the world forget they know Spider-Man's identity. Unfortunately, magic is a tricky thing, and he ends up causing various rifts in the multiverse that lead to people who knew Peter in other universes now showing up in this one.

What this means is that this movie is a string of cameos of villains from every iteration of Spider-Man you've seen before. There have been so many Spider-Man reboots in my lifetime, and it is has become quite the running gag about how Hollywood keeps restarting this franchise, but in a bizarre way, it feels like all those reboots were part of a cosmic plan to eventually give us this movie where all the universes unite and Tom Holland has to fight two decades' worth of villains. It's such amazing fan service, but also hilariously well-written and plotted (this script is written by Erik Sommers and Chris McKenna, and I just discovered McKenna wrote the best episode of Community, Remedial Chaos Theory...which makes a lot of sense). I've never rewatched any of the Spider-Man movies and I'm sure there are a lot of references and nuances I missed, but who cares? I was still ready to cheer with the rest of the crowd when another surprise guest would pop in from some other universe and cause some mayhem.

I'm deliberately not spoiling the best part of this film; you'll have to discover that for yourself. But in general, this movie is firing on all cylinders. Tom Holland continues to be a fabulous Spider-Man who can worry in one scene about how to save the world and then in another scene be preoccupied about his MIT college applications. Zendaya and Jacob Batalon are reliably wonderful as MJ and Ned, his girlfriend and best friend who will help him sort out this mess, while Marisa Tomei gets a LOT to do as his stalwart Aunt May. And all the surprise guest appearances are pitch perfect, a plethora of actors who are simply happy to be a part of the Marvel juggernaut and ready to ham it up and have a good time in a weird costume. 

Spider-Man: No Way Home is the epitome of a Marvel superhero movie. It is bursting with jokes, surprises, and some hefty emotional moments that will tug at your heartstrings until the next stunning action sequence. It deftly synthesizes two decades of Spider-Man movies and lore, and ropes in Dr. Strange to set up his 2022 movie that will feature even more mind-bending hijinks. The visual effects are superb, the stunt choreography is epic, the NYC settings are great (now that I'm dating a man from Queens, my movie excitement extends to recognizing streets and subway stations outside of Manhattan), and overall, I have no notes. This was quite simply a great time at the movie theatre that delivered exactly what it said it would and then a little bit extra. Inject it all into my veins.