"That person who helps others simply because it should or must be done, and because it is the right thing to do, is indeed without a doubt, a real superhero."

YES! YES!! YEEESSSS!!! I FINALLY MADE IT!! I FINALLY MADE IT TO PEAK CINEMA!! WHOOOO!! 🔥 🥳 🎉 🎊 Bravo, Sony! I've reached your redemption arc, beginning with the animated comic book movie masterpiece, Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse.

Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse is an animated superhero film produced by Sony Pictures Animation and Marvel Entertainment that is based on the Marvel comic book characters featured here. It released in late 2018, and it was a surprise critical and commercial success! It grossed a total of $384.3 million worldwide against a $90 million budget, and received widely positive reviews from critics and audiences, with many claiming it as one of the best animated movies and superhero movies of the 21st century. It won a ton of accolades, including Best Animated Feature at the Oscars. A sequel, Spider-Man: Across the Spider-Verse, released in 2023 to similar success, and a third installment, Spider-Man: Beyond the Spider-Verse, has yet to come out.

Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse follows the Marvel Comics character Miles Morales (Shameik Moore) as his origin story of becoming the new Spider-Man after witnessing the death of Peter Parker (Chris Pine) at the hands of the menacing Wilson Fisk, or the Kingpen (Liev Schreiber). After these events, and as a result of an explosion of a collider built by Kingpen, Miles comes across other Spider-People from various alternate universes: Peter B. Parker / Spider-Man (Jake Johnson), Gwen Stacy / Spider-Woman (Hailee Steinfeld), Peni Parker / SP//dr (Kimiko Glenn), Peter Porker / Spider-Ham (John Mulaney), and Peter Parker / Spider-Man Noir (Nicolas Cage). Together, the other Spider-People all team up with Miles to help him defeat Kingpen and save New York City.

I love Spider-Man! I've been a fan of the character since I first saw the Sam Raimi trilogy with Tobey Maguire as a kid. That's not to say I'm a die-hard fan. I've never read any of his comic books (or any comic books for that matter, lol), but I love seeing him in the movies! Later on, I watched the Webb duology with Andrew Garfield and Spider-Man: Homecoming with Tom Holland, and I got quite a bit enjoyment out of all of them (yes, even the admittingly not-so-good Amazing Spider-Man 2). As for this movie, I was skeptical because I was pretty satisfied with what I had with the other films. That, of course, changed when I decided to watch the movie myself on Blu-ray after seeing it receiving universal praise.

On first viewing, I thought this was a great movie, but even then I wasn't giving it enough credit. I think I gave it a 9/10, and looking back, I was on drugs. This is an easy 10/10 film in my eyes. It just took me some time to fully see Into the Spider-Verse for the masterpiece it truly is! Even as a huge fan of the Sam Raimi Spider-Man trilogy and the Marvel Cinematic Universe, I agree that this, along with its sequel Across the Spider-Verse, is the best movie to come from Marvel. What else could really be said about it that hasn't already been said? But everyone's offered their two cents already, so now it's time I share my perspective!

The animation is SPECTACULAR!! I am in awe at the impact Into the Spider-Verse left on the medium of animation, inspiring subsequent films like The Mitchells vs. the Machines, Puss in Boots: The Last Wish, and Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Mutant Mayhem with its striking visual style of mixing 2D animation with CGI animation! Every single frame of this movie is a comic book brought to life! All of the characters are designed amazingly, the colors are beautiful, the different environments are well-realized, and the action sequences are so frantically well-animated and well-shot. The single most visually stunning shot in the whole movie for me is definitely the Leap of Faith scene with Miles Morales in his new Spider-Man suit! OH, SO AWESOME!!! 🔥

The story takes a very interesting turn on the character of Spider-Man with instead of focusing on Peter Parker for the tenth or so time, we are given the origin story of Miles Morales. I've only vaguely heard of the character before when I played Lego Marvel Superheroes as a kid. This movie basically introduced me to him, and his story here is so well-written and engaging! I applaud Phil Lord and Christopher Miller for their involvement with the production and writing for this film, because their filmmaking talent, along with the directors and other story and script writers, made this an outstanding work of art!

Miles Morales is very well-written in his characterization and his development. He's given his own personality (intelligent and rebellious) and conflict of having big shoes to fill as the next Spider-Man after the death of Peter Parker. He struggles with having to come to terms with that, as a superhero, he's not going to be able to save everyone he loves, which in his case is his uncle Aaron (Mahershala Ali). He also has to make the decision of if he's ready or not to become Spider-Man by taking a leap of faith, which he does in a very profound and compelling way! Shameik Moore captured the character of Miles perfectly with his voice performance and brought so much life into him to the point where I see Moore as Miles, period!

Despite his short amount of screentime, Chris Pine did NOT phone in his voice performance as Peter Parker! Every line that came out of him was genuine charm and wit as the webslinging superhero! It really helps that he and Jake Johnson's Peter B. Parker don't sound a whole lot different from each other. JJ as Peter was a superb casting choice, and he balances his hilarious charm with his dramatic "past his prime" backstory impeccably. He provides many laughs with his comedic line deliveries as well as saying some of the most important lines of dialogue in the film!

Miles Morales: How will I know I'm ready?

Peter B. Parker: You won't. It's a leap of faith. That's all it is, Miles. A leap of faith.

Gwen Stacy / Spider-Woman is another awesome character! Hailee Steinfeld gives one of my all-time favorite performances of her's, period, with Gwen, giving her so much more prominence here with the character than she normally gets in other Spider-Man media. She really shines with her snarky sense of humor and her emotional backstory that gets expanded upon in the sequel, which I'm really glad the writers did with Gwen Stacy! I loved her friendship with Miles and how it progressed throughout the movie, to the point where she's just as concerned as Peter is for him not being ready.

The other Spider-People are loveable characters, too! Peni Parker / SP//dr is both adorable and badass, thanks to Kimiko Glenn's voice performance, and she has a very distinct design: like an anime character from Sailor Moon in her movements. Her biomechanical suit with a radioactive spider operating it is cool, too! John Mulaney is hilarious as Peter Porker / Spider-Ham, providing many funny lines and cartoony fight moves here (he even got his own short film included on the Blu-ray for this movie). Nicolas Cage as Spider-Man Noir is the perfect casting choice and is probably my favorite supporting character in this movie. Everything he says is just badass and funny, like this line:

"Sometimes I let matches burn down to my fingertips just to feel something, anything."

All of the voice performances of the other supporting characters are great, too, like Brian Tee Henry as Jefferson Morales, Luna Lauren Veléz as Rio Morales, Lily Tomlin as Aunt May. That said, the villains are the real stars in this area! Liev Schreiber is amazing as the evil threat that is Kingpen, even putting raw emotion into his sympathetic backstory of wanting to bring back his late wife and child with the collider. Kathryn Hahn is badass as Doc Ock, and Mahershala Ali is excellent as Uncle Aaron / the Prowler, who might have been the standout to me of all the villains here. His conflicting feelings of having to be the Prowler and loving his nephew Miles really resonated with me, making his death scene pretty sad, despite being a villain.

The action sequences are all well-animated, well-shot, and exciting to watch! Not only are they so frantically filmed to appear intense, but every single punch and kick was felt with the sound design! The beginning fight between Peter Parker and Green Goblin was brief but exciting, the fight between Miles & Peter B. and Doc Ock was really fun, the house attack and fight with the Spider-People was intense, and the final fight Miles has against Kingpen is simply epic! There's a really neat payoff of the move Uncle Aaron taught Miles to do that's used here to defeat Kingpen.

(lays hand on Kingpen's shoulder) "Hey."

The comedy of Into the Spider-Verse is next level brilliance from a film made by Marvel. Whereas most Marvel films have the same type of quippy humor (that I generally get a kick out of, don't @ me), here there's a lot of visual comedy put into Miles' changes after being bit by the radioactive spider that just slays me! Also, many of the lines that Peter B. Parker, Spider-Ham, and Spider-Man Noir say make me laugh, and even Gwen's snark manages to work for me! Sometimes even the simplest of gags like Miles chucking a bagel at one of the scientists while escaping from the lab with Peter just kills me! 😆 😂

As I've said before, there's quite a bit of emotional depth put into this film that really works. Miles' troubled relationship with his father, the death of Peter Parker, the death of Uncle Aaron, the break-up between Miles and the other Spider-People, and Kingpen's backstory were all very strong! By the time, Miles took that leap of faith by becoming the next Spider-Man, it was both visually striking and emotionally satisfying to watch! How did SONY of all animation companies make a film with this much emotional power?!

One last thing I'd like to mention is the music! Daniel Pemberton's score for Spider-Verse sells EVERYTHING that's spectacular about it! The inventive sound design, exciting action sequences, thematically heavy moments, and comedic gags are all accompanied by this awesome electronic-sounding score! Also, the soundtrack is a banger! The highlights for me are "Sunflower" and "What's Up Danger," both for obvious reasons. It's amazing how high that former song ranked on the music charts and becoming so popular!

Overall, Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse is a masterpiece of both the medium of animation and superhero cinema! It's visually striking animation style, brilliant story, tightly-written script, strong voice acting, engaging characters, great comedy, profound themes and emotional core, and killer score/soundtrack all make it one of the most unique films I've ever watched. It's not just my favorite Sony Animation film, but one of my all-time favorite animated movies, superhero movies, and movies period!

Rating: 10/10

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