PEL Presents PMP#229: What's Spider-Man Up To?

The Partially Examined Life Philosophy Podcast

The hosts of The Partially Examined Life Philosophy Podcast dive into the latest Spider-Man film, 'Brand New Day,' reflecting on its emotion

Key takeaways

• The film succeeds by focusing intensely on Peter Parker's emotional journey and relationships, making it feel more human than previous entries.

Main topics

• Analysis of 'Spider-Man: Brand New Day'
• Character development in modern superhero films

Notable quotes

"This is a Spider-Man movie that is all about Spider-Man. It trusts you to be interested in Spider-Man."

Conclusion

The episode concludes with praise for 'Brand New Day' as a standout in the Spider-Man

Transcript preview

Speaker 6 (0:08) This is Pretty Much Pop, a culture podcast. We used to be your favorite podcast. You listen to us all the time. I promise you just don't remember. Today, we're getting ourselves up to date with the Spider-Man franchise in light of the new one, a brand new day. This is Mark Linsenmeier, equally unsuccessful at chemical or biological web extrusion. This is your friendly neighbor, the doll baker. Speaker 3 (0:27) I'm Sarah Lynn Breck, and with a great podcast comes great responsibility. Speaker 4 (0:32) This is Lawrence Ware, and I thought that being Spider-Man sounded really cool until I realized that it basically means I'm a neighborhood's unpaid security guard. Speaker 6 (0:41) Do you have a take? Speaker 4 (0:42) Okay, so a take on the new movie. Is that what you're asking about? Speaker 6 (0:45) That's what's sweeping the world right now. It's the reason we're doing another Spider-Man episode. There was a Spider-Man episode on this podcast some time ago, but there have been two in this series since then, plus an animated one. Plus, I use the opportunity to sort of think about the whole Sony angle on this. Speaker 4 (1:00) I mean, I'm not going to get into the business side of it unless you guys want me to get into the business side of it. Full disclosure, I'm quite friendly with the Sony people because they've invited me to screenings for the very first animated Spider-Man film. They were very kind because my son still is a huge Spider-Man fan. So they gave me advanced screening, brought me to the premiere, all that kind of stuff. So like full disclosure, I have a very friendly relationship with those people. But that doesn't keep me from being critical of the films. Now... This most recent film, I was really worried about it because for me, any superhero film is really dependent on the villain for it to work. I was really worried about this film because I didn't know who the villain was going to be. Having seen it, I'm not going to spoil it yet, but having seen it, my concerns were validated because I don't think the villain is great because of the baggage that I know that comes along with this particular villain. But the film itself, I thought was really good. It was outside of the villain issue. I thought it was the most human Spider-Man film live action. I thought that the acting was quite good. I thought it did a really good job of kind of really honing in on the repercussions of what happened at the end of the last film. So this is probably my second favorite live action Spider-Man film behind Spider-Man 2. Like I really enjoyed it a great deal. I think it's definitely the best of the Tom Holland ones. So I have some criticisms. I think that the villain doesn't quite work, although I thought it was cool. But I really enjoyed the film on a human level. Like I got teary eyed Speaker 3 (2:32) at Speaker 4 (2:32) many points of the film with his relationship with MJ and his relationship with Ned and seeing the repercussions and seeing how lonely he was, even though he wasn't willing to admit that he was lonely for a bit there. So I really enjoyed the film, but I have criticisms. I Speaker 3 (2:47) think we're all kind of familiar with how much I watch. and pay attention to superhero stuff. So I'm truly kind of the normie out of the four of us, I'm guessing. I had seen the previous Spider-Man with Tom Holland only because the entire world was going to see it. I had not seen the previous two Tom Holland ones. I just finished the first one, and that was cute. A lot of the MCU universe stuff, I just find... confusing and baffling sometimes. And I don't understand. So Speaker 6 (3:22) the Punisher coming in was not a positive thing. You had no idea who this was and didn't. I Speaker 3 (3:27) didn't know who that guy was. I didn't know. You know, it was the actor first. I was like, oh, yeah, he's from the Odyssey and the bear. I know that guy. He's Speaker 4 (3:35) from The Walking Dead. I Speaker 6 (3:36) mean, it was a bear crossover that will spoil that much. Speaker 1 (3:39) I mean, a little bit. He didn't. Speaker 6 (3:42) Mikey didn't really die. He just went underground and became a vigilante and moved to New York. A vigilante who kills people for fun. Speaker 3 (3:49) A lot of the references and Easter eggs and stuff completely go over my head. My mind is not blown by probably most of the things that the people who are really into this stuff, their minds are blown. However, I enjoyed this film. I went to see it with my daughter and we had a really good time. I agree with Lawrence. I thought the performances were great. My favorite parts, I think, of this particular movie and also the first one too was seeing his relationship. with Ned and MJ, but he and Ned, that chemistry that they have is just so fun to watch. And I think for movies like this, what I think what kind of eludes me is they're superheroes. They can't really die. They're hard to relate to. And what I really like is in this movie, what felt like the biggest stakes were the stakes that were with his humans at home. And that's what really stuck with me. Speaker 5 (4:47) I really, really loved this movie. And I went in with, I was ready to be a real refusenik on it because it's the fourth Tom Holland Spider-Man movie. And we know that everyone is sick of Marvel films. Everyone is sick of superheroes. We just had, you know, a Superman movie, which was really good, but, you know, very quickly left the popular conversation. I knew that people liked this movie, but I wasn't quite ready to believe it. But I had such a good time. I think this movie is incredibly impressive. Firstly, because of the effort and the energy involved. Lawrence is absolutely right. The villain is not like when I think probably the same as Lawrence, when I think of a great Spider-Man film, I default to the first two Sam Raimi movies. And the villains are the centerpieces of those movies. And the problem with one of the problems with the Andrew Garfield series of Spider-Man is that they kept trying to have that formula, but they'd already run out of all the best. Spider-Man villains. So you end up having to make the rhino or the lizard guy super exciting and they're just not. So this movie does not try and do that. As Sarah said, and this is my favorite thing about it, it brings the stakes down to a really, really personal level. This is a Spider-Man movie that is all about Spider-Man. This is why I was thinking about Superman because the Superman movie we just had was barely about Superman at all. This Spider-Man movie is the fourth in a series. of Spider-Man movies and we are learning new stuff about Spider-Man as a character. It is all about Spider-Man doing Spider-Man things. In the Marvel Cinematic Universe, there is this tendency towards Lily Kilding. You've got these incredible characters who have survived for decades at this point. But Marvel... movies often they you know they default to having universe ending stakes this is something we've talked about a lot they default to having universe ending stakes because for some reason they don't trust us to be interested in these characters that we've been interested in for decades spider-man brand new day is all about spider-man it trusts you to be interested in spider-man is confident enough to tell a story just about spider-man and peter parker all of the other characters are like peripheral at best They're all really, really good and serve a really cool story, but that story is all about Spider-Man, and I love it for that. I think it's incredibly confident, pulls it off. The movie itself is paced brilliantly. The acting, I think everyone turns in a great performance. Something that's true about every single series of Spider-Man films is that they all feature the best talent available at the time, and this movie is no exception. I hope Sadie Sink plays Jean Grey for... Years and years and years to come. Whoa, spoiler, spoiler. Speaker 4 (7:30) Is it a spoiler that she's Speaker 5 (7:31) in it? Yeah, it's a Speaker 4 (7:33) spoiler. It's a spoiler now. Speaker 5 (7:34) Okay, there you go. There's Speaker 6 (7:36) your Speaker 5 (7:36) one spoiler. So I'll back away before I do anything else. But I love it. Not perfect. And I will talk about many of the reasons why. But a really terrific movie, I thought. Speaker 6 (7:44) So we're going into this. I did not review the other three movies. In fact, until you just reminded me, I was thinking there were only two of them. That's how much we did on this podcast. It was after the first of those four movies came out. That's when we did it. And I think that's when the first Spider-Verse one had also just come out at that point. So that's been a long freaking series. I was really hoping that the third one would be out by the time we were talking about Spider-Man again. I just watched the second one two days ago because I hadn't gotten around to it because I was waiting because I knew it ended in a cliffhanger. But to this movie, I really enjoyed it. I watched it in the theater in 3D. And was it going to make me queasy? What was that like? It was wonderful. It did not make me queasy at all. And I didn't have clearly in mind when I got the tickets, like, oh, because you're going to be swinging from building to building. And you're going to have this vertigo. This is exactly the kind of movie you want to see in 3D. Did you see it in IMAX, Lawrence, or anybody? Speaker 4 (8:42) No, I don't think it's in IMAX yet. Because the Odyssey still owns the screens right now. Oh, OK. Speaker 6 (8:48) I mean, I was reading on the internet, like, should I see it in IMAX or 3D or something? You know, actually, there were, no, there were IMAX Spider-Man showings near me. And supposedly some of the action scenes, they broadened it. So I guess that, you know, the screen just gets longer for parts of it. It's like that, there was one Harry Potter movie where like part of it was in 3D and like, okay, get your glasses. But I saw that in the IMAX theater, I recall. And part of what they were saying, per our last discussion, the IMAX gives you louder sound. Like, I don't want louder sound. I want a comfortable. So I saw the regular screen, but 3D. And it was just a nice, you know, very well balanced, even though I don't. It's the same theater that I don't generally like the way that they run things. And the previews were pounding my ears. The actual movie was fine. So I recommend the, you know, while it's in the theaters, if you haven't seen it yet. Yeah. Check out the 3D thing. I feel like the last one before this. you know, which brought in all the other way home. Yeah. All the other Spider-Men from the other series Speaker 4 (9:47) is Speaker 6 (9:47) was Speaker 4 (9:48) gimmicky. Hard disagree. We're Speaker 6 (9:50) playing with this multiverse thing. And I'm surprised that I liked it as much as I did. Right. Because it seems totally cheesy. How long can you milk this at the end of the last movie? You had to forget me. And now I'm, you know, we're, I'm trying to think of other examples that we've seen in film where like there is a Farscape deep spoiler. There's the main character clones for a while. And one of the clones has a romantic relationship with the lead and then dies. Speaker 4 (10:18) Anyone listening to this know what the hell Farscape is? Yeah, I don't know why Farscape is Speaker 6 (10:22) the most relatable Speaker 5 (10:23) reference that you can. The Speaker 6 (10:24) point is, you know, maybe the notebook. I don't know. I don't freaking remember. I don't have them ready to mind. But like you're dealing with someone who you love, but who doesn't remember, does not remember all the wonderful experiences you had together. That's Speaker 3 (10:38) a, Speaker 6 (10:38) that's Speaker 5 (10:38) a. Speaker 6 (10:38) you know, a trope that I've seen before, but for some reason it worked well enough here. And we've also seen in movies before the, I can speak out of many bodies, right? We just saw that in pluribus and Speaker 2 (10:50) I Speaker 6 (10:51) fall for it every time. I think it's the creepiest effect where somebody continues somebody else's sentence. Do you have any other movies come to mind? I know we've seen this multiple other times where there's some. otherworldly force or a ghost or whatever shit that's like speaking through so so you don't even have to have like the villain is not a particular actor it's just like the the borg whoever the i Speaker 4 (11:13) mean invasion of body snatcher comes to mind but yeah it doesn't exactly kind of capture what is going on it's not Speaker 6 (11:19) body jumping right pluribus is not body jumping either but yeah Speaker 4 (11:22) Am I the only comic book person here? I mean, because this is just straight up comic book storytelling. Like, this is what they do in comics. I think that it was just translated to the screen very well. Like, this is the stuff that they do in comics. And I'm really kind of impressed that Tom Holland is the longest running Spider-Man. Because typically, like, Tobey Maguire got three movies. Andrew Garfield got two. Although I think Andrew Garfield was a really good Spider-Man. It's just the films around him weren't very good. This is the longest running one, and I'm really impressed with it. Because going to something that Al said, the previous Spider-Man movies in this series have kind of not been about Spider-Man. Like, not really. Because the Spider-Man that I grew up on and grew up reading, it was a very local thing. It was about his neighborhood. It was about what he was going through. How am I going to pay my bills? It was a very... And the previous Spider-Man films, like he had... a benefactor in the name of Tony Stark who was able to kind of give him this cool spider suit and he didn't have to worry about the things and this is the first film I think in this series where it's very boiled down to the neighborhood right but as Black Widow said you're dealing with small potatoes we do with big things and