Hey everybody, we are back with a brand new review of the latest MCU picture. They have had quite the good year in terms of good critical, and financial success with Captain Marvel being surprisingly really good, and Avengers Endgame being just as epic a conclusion as many would have hoped. Now they are back with another collaboration with Sony, and a sequel to one of their biggest hits, Spider-Man Far From Home. To be honest out of all of the comic book movies coming out this year, this is not really among the ones I was super duper excited for, and that’s mainly because I didn’t really love Spider-Man Homecoming. Don’t get me wrong its a really fun movie with a lot of stuff to love, but its far from my favorite MCU flick, and I find it a little bit overrated. Still I was pretty excited mainly because the trailers looked decent, I love the cast they have in hand, I was curious how it was going to work as a sequel to Endgame, and I was pretty confidant that this was going to be better than Homecoming. And while that is certainly the case, how much better it turned out to be was pleasantly surprising. Warning: there will be spoilers for Endgame, and maybe a couple for this movie so read at your own risk.
Taking place a couple of months after the monumental events of Endgame, where people who came back after they were dusted away by Thano’s snap are trying to get used to life after the event which people call “the Blip”, especially since everyone else who did not get “blipped” aged five years more. Everyone is also still mourning the loss of some of Earth’s Mightiest heroes, especially the death of Tony Stark AKA Iron Man. One person who is naturally still taking this very hard is Peter Parker, who is just trying to enjoy a nice life as a teenager hanging out with his friends, and living with his Aunt May while still fighting crime as the hero known as Spider-Man. This summer, Peter cannot wait to go on a school trip to Europe with his fellow classmates, and friends like Ned, to take some time off of hero duty, and hopefully tell finally tell MJ how he really feels about her, which turns out to be a lot harder for him than expected. Things start to get strange however when a strange elemental monster attacks them, and they are saved by a mysterious figure whom everyone later dubs “Mysterio”. As if things couldn’t get any weirder for Peter, Nick Fury comes in, needing him for top secret mission that involves not only those Elementals, but also Mysterio is actually a man named Quentin Beck, who turns out to be from another Earth in the Multiverse, who is here to stop these monsters from wreaking more havoc. While Peter does take a liking to this new ally, he refuses the offer since he doesn’t want to bear the weight of these responsibilities, he essentially has no choice when Fury hi jacks his Summer vacation forcing him to go on the mission. Now that the fate of the world is in his hands, can Peter Parker step up to be the hero Iron Man once was, and can he be able to save his own Summer Vacation at the same time? And that’s about all I can tell you in terms of plot because man does this movie take some surprising turns.
I am just loving how non spoilery marketing campaigns for comic book movies have become recently. What with not only Avengers Endgame, but also Shazam, and this movie as well saving all of their biggest twists, turns, and best scenes for the movie itself, and I must applaud that (especially since Sony is infamous for giving away the whole movie in their Spider-Man movie trailers). In terms of story I found Far From Home to be much more interesting than Homecoming as not only are some of the story turns quite surprising, but I found both of the stuff with Peter Parker, and the stuff with Spider-Man to both be equally investing whereas in Homecoming I was much more interested in the Peter Parker high school stuff than the aggressively fine I guess Spidey plot. I found Peter’s journey of trying to tackle all of these responsibilities, stepping up to the task, and learning to become his own self, was really satisfying, and gave Peter a little more layers than just trying to impress Tony Stark like in the last one. Yes his arc does rely on Iron Man quite a bit, but for here it works better since this film is serving as a sequel to Endgame, and it helps develop Peter into becoming a better, and more confidant hero. The pacing is also much smoother here as It always feels like there is something happening at every moment, and how Peter never really had any moment to breath, and was always involved with something. While the pacing in the first act is a little inconsistent, it becomes much more streamlined for the rest of the movie. Not only did this film improve upon Homecoming, but it also kept the best elements of that film, and just turned it up even more. This includes the hilarious high school like comedy that makes this one of the funniest MCU flicks I have seen in a while (the opening that sets up the post Endgame status quo alone is just comedy gold) , and the John Hughes esque tone present throughout just like Homecoming. Another thing that’s rather unique about this movie is how it is the first time a standalone Spider-Man movie does not take place in New York, and it was pretty interesting seeing the iconic super hero out of his element, and its one of the things makes this film stand out from the rest. Oh, and vague spoiler, but for those of you who were excited about this film exploring the multiverse, and what it means for future MCU pictures, well get ready to feel very cheated as this film kind of lies about that, though I kind of liked how it plays into the twist, and I am kind of glad because this just isn’t really the type of film to introduce stuff like that, and I loved how even serving as a sequel to Endgame, this film was still satisfyingly stand-alone, and focused on Peter’s story more than anything (don’t worry there are still plenty of clever franchise connections that I won’t spoil here).
In terms of Jon Watt’s directing, I felt he handled this film a lot more confidently than in Homecoming as it felt he was trying to find his footing in terms of big budget movies like this. Here it shows how vastly he improved his skills, okay I’m not saying this film is not made like any other Marvel film because it feels like one (which is not a bad thing), but again thanks to the John Hughes high school comedy tone, this and Homecoming stand out from the MCU pack. The action sequences I felt were a huge step up from Homecoming which had fine if disappointingly forgettable sequences which is pretty insane considering its a Spider-Man movie. Here the action is much more inventive, and creative this time around, managing to be something we haven’t really seen in Marvel movies past, particularly the big 3rd act smack-down which has mostly been hidden by the marketing. Speaking of that third act I will say that it is very CGI heavy, but I have a feeling it was intentional (thanks to the big second act twist), as a slight jab at big CGI battles with world ending threats in superhero movies nowadays, which if that was what the writing team was going for, then I found to be very cleverly done. The CGI in question is pretty good even if again the movie rely on it a bit too much, though there were some sequences that were both visually, thematically, and geek inducingly awesome (spoilers: yes I am talking about the Mysterio dream sequences which were just pulled straight from the comics, and even reminded me of the Spider-Man PS4 video-game in a good way). The production team also took great advantage of the European setting crafting some beautiful sets, that almost looked like the places they were supposed to be in (this applies to Venice, and Prague the most), and couple that in with some striking shots of the vistas, that give the film a nice European flavor. That flavor also applies to the soundtrack which is mostly comprised of songs produced in Europe which I really dug and it does make up for the fact that Michael Giacchino’s score is serviceable if unfortunately not anything too memorable.
Another element this film carried over from Homecoming is the game cast, and they all shine about as well as you would expect. Tom Holland is of course perfect as Peter Parker, I mean what else is there to say that hasn’t already been said about his interpretation of the character. He just is Peter Parker, he captures that hero who deals with grounded relatable problems just like us, which is one of the biggest aspects that make Spider-Man, well you know, Spider-Man and he just nails it. His friendship with Jacob Batalon’s Ned is just as funny, and charming as it was in Homecoming, and as a bonus we get to see Ned form a new relationship with Angourie Rice’s Betty who gets much more to do her, and their interactions are pretty adorable in a high school sit com kind of way. Zendaya also gets significantly more to do here as MJ equipped with her enjoyably dead pan humor, and dry sarcasm, and her romantic relationship with Peter was far more investing, and interesting than than the one in Homecoming (one of the things the Amazing Spider-Man films did better than that film), and I really enjoyed their interactions with one another. Tony revolori is also just as funny as he was in the previous film as a much different interpretation of Flash Thompson, and fellow young newcomer to the cast Remy Hii does a good job as Brad, Peter’s rival in terms of falling in love with MJ, and he is involved in some of the movie’s funniest jokes (the drone strike being the best one). As for the adult cast, the major returning players like Marisa Tomei as Peter’s loving Aunt May, and Jon Favreau as his friend/mentor type figure, Happy Hogan are both very comfortable in their small but important roles here, with Favreau having one of the best scenes in the movie, and they both do what they can to the fullest to help Peter out. Oh, and I almost forgot to mention that Martin Starr, and JB Smoove are both a lot of fun as Peter’s teachers/chaperones on the trip even if they also don’t have too much screen-time, but they certainly make the most of it. Adult Newcomers to this franchise like Samuel L. Jackson as Nick Fury, and Cobie Smulders as Maria Hill give some good performances here, with Jackson being that sassy bad*** we all know, and love, and (vague spoilers), but the very last after credits scene is very funny, surprising, and it does explain why these two act a little out of character in this movie. But the thing I think most everyone was most excited to see was Jake Gyllenhaal as the iconic supervillian himself, Mysterio. Unsurprisingly he does an excellent job, especially as the movie goes on as he truly relishes this role, and has a blast with the material. Okay what I will be saying for the rest of this paragraph will contain major spoilers so, just skip to the conclusion now if you haven’t seen the film. Yes it is revealed that Beck is the one behind these fake elemental attacks, and while I was sort of expecting something like that, but the way it was handled and how the film builds up the character made the reveal quite surprising, and I really liked it. I will say though that next time I would like to see a Spider-Man villain in this universe that is not related to Tony Stark because its becoming kind of redundant at this point, even if it does work for this film. While Michael Keaton’s Vulture is probably a more compelling villain, I still really like what was done with Mysterio here.
Well this was probably the biggest surprise of the year so far! Spider Far From Home is a huge improvement over its predecessor that works just as well as a Parker story as it does a Spider-Man story, and it might be my favorite MCU flick this year, and probably among my favorites overall. To be honest I was shocked at just how good this movie turned out to be, being a more confidant, interesting, and overall better Spidey flick in the process while also serving as a nice epilogue to phase 3 of the MCU. Now is it as groundbreaking or visually stunning as something like Spider-Verse? No, but why do we have to compare movies like that when we will enjoy them more if we look at them on their own, especially since their both great movies. Since 2017 Sony is 3 for 4 when it comes to making quality Spider-Man based movies (Spider-Verse>Far From Home>>Homecoming>>>>>Venom), and after that mid credits tease, I am officially a hell of a lot more excited for the next MCU Spidey outing than I was after Homecoming. Congratulations, Jon Watts, and team, I wanted you guys to do better, and you most certainly did!
Rating: A-
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