Swinging into theatres on the 2nd of June, 2023 was Spiderman – Across the Spiderverse. Directed by Joaquim Dos Santos, Kemp Powers and Justin K. Thompson, and produced by Phil Lord and Christopher Miller, the movie’s popularity blew through the roof, as it was the long-awaited sequel to the equally popular Spiderman – Into the Spiderverse. The movie made a whopping 1.05 billion dollars (AUD).
It has been over a year since the first movie, and things are going great for our protagonist, Miles Morales (Shameik Moore). His best friend, and love interest, Gwen Stacy (Hailee Steinfeld), has returned. Miles and Gwen go on a mission across the Spiderverse to stop a multiversal threat, and along the way, Miles must redefine what it means to be Spiderman.
The first thing I’ll review is the animation. It is a huge step-up from its predecessor, and for a good reason too. While yes, the animation for the first movie was amazing, it was amazing by the animation standards of 2018, when it came out. ATSV was a massive improvement, becoming extraordinary by 2023’s animation standards, not just amazing. However, this level of detail is understandable, when there were literally over 1000 animators working in the movie…. Yes, that’s right. 1000 animators. This isn’t a joke. And if you think I’m joking, there are six different animation styles shown throughout the movie, which might not sound like much, but it’s roughly equivalent to 167 people working on each style, which in itself, is slightly more than ITSV’s 140 animators. One of those animators was 14-year-old Preston Mutanga, who animated the Lego Spiderman scenes. The varied animation styles are well animated and show a clear contrast between each of the characters. Not only that, but even the background characters are well detailed, such as a female pirate variant of Doc Ock. References to the overall Spiderman franchise are strewn throughout the movie, such as Amazing Fantasy #15, the first ever Spiderman comic. Other details are made sure to have plot relevance, such as the heart-shape Miles has on the back of his suit, signifying his love for Gwen, and how the components of the Spider Society’s base that Hobie Brown (Spider-Punk) steals are present on the Internationalism Travel Watch that he makes. This shows that the animators are devoted to making sure any details are still plot relevant. Also, just like ITSV, it displays sound effects in a comic book style, by making
the words appear capitalized in a large font. When we are taken to Earth-50101, the sound effect language is changed to Devanagari script, a script commonly used in India.
Now, we’ll move onto reviewing the plot. I won’t go into too much detail, so that I don’t spoil the movie. The plot is very interesting, and filled with action as the characters traverse the multiverse. The ending raises a lot of suspense, which I think is also a good marketing strategy, because it will build up hype for the final Spiderverse movie, Spiderman – Beyond the Spiderverse.
Finally, I will review the music. Metro Boomin made almost all of the songs in ATSV’s soundtrack, to an extent where he even appeared as a Spiderman variant of himself in the movie. All the songs are amazing; however, I think that the best one is Am I Dreaming, because of the bagpipe-like music in it. The score was composed by Daniel Pemberton, who also composed the score for the first movie. Here are some interesting details I noticed:
1. When Miles approaches a variant of the Prowler captured by the Spider- Society, the Prowler theme from the first movie can be faintly heard in the background. Also, when approaches another Prowler variant at the end of the movie, a high-pitched version of the same theme can be heard.
2. When the Spot returns to Earth-1610, a combination of his theme, the Prowler theme, and the Destiny theme (Miles’) can be heard, in conjunction with what was happening at those moments.
3. The guitar riffs in Spider-Gwen’s theme are the beginning of the classic 1967 Spiderman theme, but sped up.
Now, I’ll talk about my favourite themes. They are:
1. Spiderman India (Pavitr Prabhakar) theme. The theme is very lively, with high amounts of energy, and is like real Indian music.
2. Spiderwoman (Gwen Stacy) theme. The theme starts off with calm, somber music, but after the first minute, becomes highly energetic. The guitar riffs sound good, and the song gives me goosebumps.
3. Spot Holes 2. Spot’s second theme is absolutely terrifying and sounds like it should be in a horror movie. However, I think it is one of the best villain themes of all time.
I would recommend this movie to anyone who is over the age of 9, purely because there is flashing lights in it, which could give younger children headaches and hurt their eyes. I would not recommend this movie to anybody with epilepsy, also because the movie has flashing lights. This movie can be enjoyed by any Spiderman/Marvel fan, or any superhero fan in general. This movie is family-friendly, meaning your whole family can watch it together.