spiderman | Dr. Grob's Animation Review

Directors: Bob Persichetti, Peter Ramsey & Rodney Rothman
Release date: December 14, 2018
Rating: ★★★½
Review:

For American feature animation 2018 was mostly a rather uneventful year. True, the year started off well with the release of ‘Isle of Dogs’, and it was also the year of Nina Paley’s second animation feature, ‘Seder-Masochism’, but for the rest it was a year of uninventive sequels (Pixar’s ‘Incredibles 2’, Disney’s ‘Ralph Breaks the Internet, Sony’s ‘Hotel Transylvania 3: Summer Vacation’) and mediocre stand-alones (Warner Bros.’ ‘Smallfoot’ and Illumination’s ‘The Grinch’).

But then, at the closing of the year suddenly a complete game-changer entered the scene: ‘Spider-Man into the Spider-Verse’. The film was brought by Sony Animation, the most evasive from all major animation studios, releasing both gruesomely bad movies like ‘The Smurfs’ (2013) and ‘The Emoji Movie’ (2017), as well as more interesting experiments, like ‘Surf’s Up’ (2007). This animated Spider-Man feature certainly falls into the latter category, bringing the animation world a totally new aesthetic.

Like all other films mentioned (sans ‘Seder-Machochism’) ‘Spider-Man into the Spider-Verse’ is a 3D computer-animated film, but unlike all others this feature has a distinct comic book style, complete with clearly visible halftone dots, and even color-shifts that look like misprinting of color layers when the ‘camera’ gets out of focus. The film even adds other stylistic elements from comic books, like page-turning effects, text panels and panel-like split screens to enhance the comic book feel. Even though traditional texturing and rendering is completely in place, never does the art aspire to be realistic, but always to keep the comic book feel intact.

‘Spider-Man into the Spider-Verse’ thus is a delight to watch, and a welcome fresh take on traditional 3D computer animation. In fact, the excitement the film stirred in the animation world is comparable to that of ‘The Matrix’ (1999) in the live action film industry. That its stylistic innovation was not an isolated event was proved by subsequent films like ‘Puss in Boots: The Last Wish’ (Dreamworks, 2022) and ‘Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Mutant Mayhem’ (Paramount, 2023). Certainly the latter took heed of the lessons from ‘Spider-Man’.

The story of ‘Spider-Man into the Spider-Verse’ is another reboot of the then 56 years old comic. This time we follow a black teenager from Brooklyn called Miles, who is a son from an over-protective cop, but who leans more towards his less well-behaved uncle Aaron. The most remarkable event in the film is that the original Spider-Man, Peter Parker, actually dies, and Miles, who due to unexplained events is bitten by a radio-active spider, too, must take his place.

In fact, the plot is much more complicated, and involves villain Kingpin trying to get his deceased wife and son back from a parallel universe opened by a portal devised by Doctor Olivia “Liv” Octavius, another villain who apparently is the successor to Doc Ock (I’m hardly familiar with the Spider-Man world, so these villains are unknown to me).

The portal also imports five spider-men from alternate universes (and I guess, the Alchemax spider that bit Miles), most importantly a less successful middle-aged Peter Parker and a young Spider-Woman called Gwen, but also a manga girl-spider-man, a black and white film-noir Spider-man and even a looney tune-like spider-man-pig called ‘Spider-Ham’. Part of the fun is the play with these alternate universe characters, some of which are gleefully silly, but I must say the main story is told pretty heavy-handedly.

In fact, the film’s story is hardly as good as the visuals: it’s hard to follow, it’s full of plot-holes, it has some rather forced scenes (most notably the utterly improbable scene in May Parker’s basement, and a believe-in-yourself-like scene in which Miles really becomes a Spider-Man), and a large dose of melodrama that I could hardly stand. Moreover, the finale is taking place in such a messy setting, I had no idea what was going on.

No, did ‘Spider-Man into the Spider-Verse’ not have the astonishing looks it has, I wouldn’t have been entertained so much, the fun parallel world plot notwithstanding. But as it is, ‘Spider-Man into the Spider-Verse’ is one of the most important animated features from the 2010s, a status corroborated by its equally praised sequel, ‘Spider-Man: Across the Spider-Verse’ from 2023.

Watch the trailer for ‘Spider-Man into the Spider-Verse’ yourself and tell me what you think: