Adrian Toomes (Michael Keaton) has finally gotten a break with the contract to clean up the mess after the Avengers/Chitauri battle in New York, a break that is stripped away by the government and Tony Stark (Robert Downey Jr.). Searching for a new way to support his family, he and his team find they can take the alien tech they’d already picked up, and create weapons, allowing them to acquire more high tech and create a black market. Elsewhere in the city, Peter Parker (Tom Holland), living with his Aunt May (Marisa Momei), is waiting for a call from Stark to bring him back into the Avengers—a call that doesn’t come. Peter stumbles upon Toomes’s weapons and decides to deal with the problem on his own, with a little help from his high school friend, Ned (Jacob Batalon), which displeases Stark.
After Captain America: Civil War, it seemed that Marvel had a better idea of what to do with Spider-Man than anyone had had before. With Homecoming, they prove it. This first solo outing for Spider-Man in the MCU is exciting, funny, and captivating. It introduces new characters I’ll want to see more of and brings back a few old ones I can’t get enough of. The web-slinger has never been treated better.
It took six solo outings and three actors to correctly tell the story of a teenage Peter Parker. Tom Holland is too old, but he could pass for a high schooler, particularly compared to the twenty-seven-year-old Tobey Maguire and the twenty-nine-year-old Andrew Garfield, both of whom gave off a vibe somewhere between condescension and pedophilia. Not only did they get Peter Parker right, but the MCU team does a great job of revealing the high school experience and playing at the edges of teenage life. They apparently were inspired by John Hughes films. And in doing it so well, it brought up a problem for me: I don’t actually like teen movies. Not really. Ferris Bueller’s Day Off is good, but for the most part, I just don’t care about teenage issues, and didn’t when I was a teenager. And that brought Spider-Man’s story down for me. He’s treated poorly by the school bullies, he has a crush on the school hottie and doesn’t know how to tell her, he gets in trouble with his teachers, and he has to sneak in at home—and I don’t care.
Luckily, Peter is funny. Was that so hard, people? Spider-Man has always been funny in the comics but five previous movies missed that, instead going for whiny. This time they nailed it. And they also nailed all his toys, with great web-shooting action scenes (helped by having Tony Stark supply his tech—Peter making his own costume was always a bridge too far for me).
And to make up for the youth of our hero, they gave me a villain I could love. Adrian Toomes is the opposite of Peter. He’s slipped out of middle age and has adult problems I understood and real world angers. He just wants to take care of his family, which is a more moving motivation than Peter’s naive view of good and evil. Toomes thinks he has been cheated and there is corruption at high levels by those who just don’t give a damn about the average guy. And he’s right, which makes this movie better than it could have been. Tommes isn’t reacting to unreal slights. He’s not only Spider-Man’s opposite, he’s rich, asshole Tony Stark’s opposite. He’s the villain, but one not only to respect, but one that most people could become—if alien tech happened to be around. Michael Keaton may have just become THE actor of superhero films as no one has created both a hero (Batman) and a villain and done them so well. Keaton has that everyman feeling. He’s a regular Joe. But he’s also got something darker inside, something that makes him a little crazy and a lot dangerous. It’s a great performance and it is nice to have a good villain in the MCU again (villains tend to be a weak spot).
The ads were misleading, implying it was almost a Spider-Man/Iron Man buddy picture. Downey Jr. and Jon Favreau (as his assistant Happy Hogan) have extended cameos and Gwyneth Paltrow has a sneeze-and-you’ll-miss-it part. But to make up for that, another Avenger shows up in three hysterical (if brief) scenes.
Spider-Man: Homecoming is another solid entry in the MCU franchise that can do no wrong. After the failures of The Amazing Spider-Man (2012) and The Amazing Spider-Man 2 (2014), and the poorly-aged and repetitive Spider-Man (2002), Spider-Man 2 (2004), and Spider-Man 3 (2007), we finally have a worthwhile film for Spidey. He’ll return with a horde of others in Avengers: Infinity War and I can’t wait.
FYI: Tom Holland and director Jon Watts have both stated that this is actually Peter Parker’s third MCU film. He appeared first as a child wearing an Iron Man mask in Iron Man 2.