Despite being arguably the most beloved superhero of our era, once again proven by its vaunted box-office performance, it sure does seem like it sucks to be Spider-Man. The fourth film with Tom Holland as your friendly neighborhood Spider-Man examines the fallout from 2021’s No Way Home, with the whole world having forgotten about poor Peter Parker. He’s lost his friends, he’s lost his love, and he’s lost his Avengers allies, but he keeps on plugging along, working alongside the police and the Department of Damage Control, tasked with housing super threats that prisons cannot contain. There’s a mysterious new threat, a person with the powers to control minds through proximity but has to leap from person to person like psychic tag. The movie excels at the action-adventure shenanigans, with new director Destin Daniel Cretton (Shang-Chi) providing the visual fireworks, including slow-mo splash page imagery taken from the pages of Spider-Man’s famous comic covers. There’s fun to be had as Hulk and the Punisher (Jon Bernthal) are mixed into the story, especially when they have to battle each other. You don’t introduce a ninja clan in Act One without knowing there will be a ninja fight in Act Three (I think Chekhov said that once). The best parts of this movie are not the Spider-Man heroics and action but the Peter Parker moments, which are somber, sincere, and nicely felt by the young cast that has grown into their characters over a decade. There’s a rich emotional investment built up, and Brand New Day takes its time to dwell in Peter’s downturn before setting him on a better path. There’s one moment with Mary Jane (Zendaya) that caused me to gasp out loud. I really enjoyed how there isn’t a sleight-of-hand secondary antagonist; it’s who we follow, and they have an interesting connection/parallel to Peter, and I especially liked that the climax of the movie is about a division over mercy and forgiveness rather than punching an army of faceless robots or stopping a giant sky beam of world annihilation. These modern Spider-Man movies are consistently very entertaining but also emotionally engrossing, and they do something unique with their villains, providing more surprises and nuance and perspective-shifts than just about any other superhero franchise. Spider-Man: Brand New Day is not so much a reinvention of the character or the series but further confirmation that we have the right people making these movies matter.

Nate’s Grade: A-