Genre: Superhero
Premise: When Peter Parker’s spider DNA starts to mutate, limiting his abilities, he’s forced to call in The Hulk and The Punisher to help him stop a new villain who can hop between bodies.
About: This movie has made more money than anything ever in the history of ever. Well, maybe not that much. But a lot! Possibly the most money in a weekend ever. It’s a huge boon to the business, reminding us that people still love movies when you give them something irresistible. Because screenwriters are the last people looked at in a film like this, I’m going to give them some screen time! Chris McKenna and Eric Sommers met while writing on American Dad! They later wrote on Community together, where they were responsible for two of the most iconic episodes (“Remedial Chaos Theory” and “Conspiracy Theories and Interior Design”). But they launched themselves into the feature world with two gigantic, and some might say, unexpected, hits: Jumanji: Welcome to the Jungle and The Lego Batman Movie. But all is not glitter and gold. As often happens on these giant projects, the major stars of the film fight back when scenes or sections of the movie aren’t working to their expectations, and it appears that Tom and Zendaya felt that way here, resulting in Zendaya calling in her Challengers screenwriter, Justin Kuritzkes, to rewrite some of the script. It’s never as cozy as they make it seem, guys!
Writers: Chris McKenna and Eric Sommers
Details: 2 hours and 25 minutes long
I was trying to figure out why Spider-Man is the king of superhero movies. How does he have no rival? How does he rise above a genre that everyone with a mature movie IQ knows is heading the way of the Western? It took me one long afternoon sitting up amongst the La Cienega oil rigs to figure it out. But I finally did.
I’ll share what I realized later. In the meantime, there are so many other interesting things to talk about. Spider-Man: Brand New Day might as well be called Spider-Man: Screenwriting Topic Smorgasbord.
If you haven’t seen the film, here’s a spoiler-filled rundown.
Peter Parker, aka Spider-Man, is consumed with his work. Remember, nobody remembers who he is anymore, including MJ (Zendaya) and Ned. So he’s thrown himself into his work. That’s made his life very singular. Spider-Man is going it alone.
But then Spidey’s spider mutation starts amping up. His senses become overloaded, making it hard for him to do his job. So he goes to the one guy who knows the most about keeping your senses in check, Bruce Banner, aka The Hulk.
Bruce helps him come up with an “inhibitor” device that keeps his more aggressive spider mutations quiet. But no sooner has he figured that problem out than he encounters a strange new villain that can hop between bodies.
This signifies the “goal” (“G” in GSU) for our hero in the story, and it doesn’t come until 45 pages into the script! Normally, in a screenplay, you want this coming between pages 12 and 20. But Spider-Man can get away with this because he’s the most likable superhero ever. So don’t think you can start pulling this crap in your own screenplays!
After a side quest where Spider-Man finally reveals to MJ that he’s Peter Parker and they had a whole past together (a side-quest the writers only barely connect to the main plot), it’s revealed that our big main villain is, in fact, Jean Grey.
Don’t know who that is? Well, if you saw Spider-Man this weekend, you would’ve been alerted to the fact that that’s a very big deal by the resounding “Oooooooh” you heard from everyone around you. Jean Grey is a major player in The X-Men.
So finally – FINALLY – our full plot has emerged. And we’re now a good 100 pages into the script. We gotta stop Jean Grey and whatever she’s up to. Well, apparently, she was trying to free her sister from an evil corporation.
Instead, though, she gets caught by that organization. And when she takes control of it from within, it’ll be up to Spider-Man and The Punisher (forgot to tell you, he’s in the film too) to take Jean Grey out. Or, you know, help her realize that she’s wrong so she can have a massive character arc and turn into a good guy. I’m not going to share which of those two possibilities happens (it’s the second).
Carson pondering Spider-Man success in the L.A. oil fields
The reason I went deeper on today’s plot summary is because I find it fascinating that these gigantic studio properties can do things in screenwriting that the average Joe screenwriter isn’t allowed anywhere near.
We don’t reveal the goal… until 45 minutes into the film! We don’t reveal the bad guy… until 100 minutes into the film! It’s crazy. You can’t even dream of doing that in a spec script. And you really shouldn’t be doing it in a studio comic book movie either because it creates problems.
The number one problem is, this movie is designed to arc Jean Grey. They’re trying to make a complex villain here. And they’re trying to do it after us not meeting the villain until 100 minutes into the movie. Which means you have to really scrunch together this arc.
Do they achieve it?
I actually think they pulled it off by the skin of their teeth. It was just believable enough that it worked. But could it have been better? Without question. There was so much in this movie that didn’t need to be here. You didn’t need MJ and Ned. That was all subplotty stuff. You didn’t need The Punisher. He did not need to be in this movie. You didn’t even really need Hulk.
If you would’ve stripped all of that out, we could’ve met Jean Grey at a traditional midpoint (55-60 minutes into the film) and really focused on her storyline and helped us get to know her better so that we would’ve really been on board with her arc at the end.
Cause there’s this really nice late-story scene where Peter Parker and Jean Grey are in his mind, back in his old apartment talking about the similar issues they’re going through in life. And it’s really the culmination of both their arcs. It works surprisingly well. But if this movie didn’t have all these ridiculous unnecessary distractions, it could’ve been iconic. Cause it would’ve been culminating the ONLY THING the story was about.
I think when people look back at this movie, it’s hard to figure out what it’s about because so much stuff was in there.
But the truth is, this is how professional screenwriting works. You don’t get to write what you want. Tom Holland comes to you and says, “I want The Punisher to be in this movie because he’s my favorite comic book character. And I want my wife in this movie. And even though she’s pointless, I want to give her some scenes that actually matter.” Now it’s your job to figure out how to do all that even though it’s turning your screenplay into a bloated mess.
But I will say this. Spider-Man movies are a clear cut above the other comic book movies out there outside of maybe Batman. And I believe the people involved in this franchise genuinely feel a responsibility to the fans. Which is something that’s rare in this business. A lot of people involved in big franchises SAY they care about the fans. But the truth is, they don’t. They care about money. Which is why so many bad Marvel movies have been made this decade. They were not thinking about the fans.
With this movie though, the first thing you see is Tom Holland thanking you for coming to the theater and telling you how much he knows this character means to people and how he takes that responsibility very seriously. And you can tell it’s not lip service. I get the sense that Tom Holland can’t sleep at night until he knows that he’s done everything in his power to make his latest Spider-Man movie as good as it can possibly be.
Even if you don’t like this movie (and I would understand that by the way. As a screenwriting enthusiast, this script is problematic for the reasons I brought up above), I don’t think you can argue that anybody who was a part of this movie didn’t care. I believe they did everything they could to make this movie work.
Even Bruce Banner. You don’t need The Hulk in this movie. So when you see him in the trailers, your first thought is, “Studio trying to get more money!” But when you watch the film, you realize that they didn’t pick him arbitrarily. He went through such a similar thing as Peter Parker is going through now, that it makes sense that he be the superhero that Peter goes to for help.
Getting back to my original question, why is Spider-Man a cut above all these other superhero wannabes who less and less people are showing up to see?
It actually took me seeing Supergirl a month ago to be able to compare the two in a way that gave me the answer. Spider-Man is the purest example of a character with superpowers being placed in AN ORDINARY WORLD. He’s someone with spider powers operating in New York City. Simple and to the point.
That is the foundation for why superheroes work. CONTRAST. The contrast between their extraordinary-ness and the world’s ordinary-ness. The second you fuck with that contrast, the whole superhero formula starts falling apart.
Supergirl had several problems. But at the heart of its issues was an extraordinary person being placed in extraordinary environments (space, alien planets, etc). No contrast at all.
I’m not saying it’s impossible to make extraordinary on extraordinary work. But it’s a lot harder. Because the contrast is the biggest bang-for-your-buck element that makes superheroes work. Get rid of it, and you have to be perfect with all the other elements to make up for it.
I will die on this hill that the multiverse was the worst thing that could’ve possibly happened to superhero movies because it created an endless string of extraordinary on extraordinary films.
Back to Spider-Man.
Consider the fact that, for the first time in I can’t remember how long, we got a superhero movie where our superhero looked like he was walking through real environments. I guess Thunderbolts did that too but that movie had issues for other reasons. But seriously! Psychologically, it makes a difference when I feel like we’re in a real place! These stupid ass studios have lost the plot with green screen on top of green screen on top of AI. We’re not looking at ANYTHING on the screen that’s real and they put their heads in the sand on this stuff. They still think it’s okay to do but between Obsession and Odyssey and now this, maybe they’ll wake up. We’ll see. They better. Because this movie may be bigger than Doomsday. Which would be nuts. One simple superhero being bigger than all the superheroes.
Spider-Man: Brand New Day was a good movie. And it did about as good of a job as a studio movie can do creating a character-focused film. For that reason, I definitely think it’s worth checking out in theaters.
[ ] What the hell did I just watch?
[ ] wasn’t for me
[xx] worth the price of admission
[ ] impressive
[ ] genius
What I learned: In order to drive a theme home, it helps if multiple characters in the movie are exhibiting flaws tied back to that theme. The big theme of this movie is this: you can’t do it alone. We all need people in our lives in order to live a fruitful life. This “trying to do it alone” flaw is reflected in Peter Parker, The Punisher, and Jean Grey. The overcoming of that flaw (by all three characters) is a big part of what makes the climax so satisfying.
