Dead Retconning
Spider-Man Brand New Day
Directed by Destin Daniel Cretton
USA/Canada/UK/Germany 2026
Columbia Studios
UK Cinema Release Print
Warning: A whole webful of spoilers in this one. You were warned!
Well I was fully expecting Spider-Man: Brand New Day to be absolutely terrible but, instead, I found myself pleasantly surprised by this movie. If a little confused about the direction it takes. Or make that very confused.
Okay, so all that stuff in Spider-Man: No Way Home where the whole world forgot who Peter Parker was, surely must have been to give Columbia Pictures, who wanted Spider-Man back for their own films, a brand new start and, presumably, to not have them have to pick up the cheques for certain regular actors in the current Spider-Man continuity but... nope. I suspect that was the idea when that film was released... to allow Columbia to sever all ties with the Disney owned Marvel but, I dunno, something must have happened. Maybe a studio or department head left or, heck, given the failure of most of their other Spider-Man spin offs such as Morbius (reviewed here), Madame Web (reviewed here) and Kraven The Hunter (reviewed here), perhaps they finally realised they can’t make a profitable Spider-Man movie without Marvel’s involvement.
Good move because I’m already hearing this latest one is breaking all box office expectations and, the way this film plays out, it looks like Marvel and Columbia have made a truce and are ready to loan all their toys out to each other and let each other play in their backyards for a while. And from here on in I’m going into spoiler territory folks so... again... you were warned.
So we have Tom Holland, Zendaya and Jacob Batalon back as Peter Parker, MJ and Ned Leeds respectively. And the long game on the story beats seems to be to somehow reset this small unit back to what it was in the MCU films. I mean, it doesn’t completely reset to the status quo but you can certainly see how it can only be a matter of time.
And, also joining them from the Marvel Cinematic Universe are Florence Pugh as... well, I guess she’s Black Widow now, Mark Ruffalo as Bruce Banner/Hulk and Jon Bernthal as Frank Castle (aka The Punisher). However, here’s the big spoiler, people... making her MCU/Columbia character debut in this film we have Sadie Sink as... Jean Grey. Yup... Marvel Girl herself is in this after having previously been played by both Famke Janssen and Sophie Turner in a number of different X-Men films each. And not only that, she’s kind of set up as the main villain in this movie... two things wrong with that, as far as I’m concerned.
Firstly, the character is mostly portrayed as dark and damaged in exactly the same kind of way that Lewis Pullman’s character in Thunderbolts* was. Which means that it could be very easy for Marvel to... for the third time in the cinema and when they deem fit... do a more convincing version of the Dark Phoenix storyline. Which means, if they do that, another character which will very much be needed in the MCU’s new X-Men line up just made her debut here.
Secondly, we all know that for many years (decades) before that storyline which has her become a danger and threat to the entire universe, resulting in her death (if memory serves, before the inevitable comic book style resurrection some time later), she was actually one of the good guys... er gals... as one of the original The Uncanny X-Men. So, yeah, once the audience realise who she is playing... well it’s then that most of them will surely realise that the villain is a huge red herring and that the real villain is, of course, Damage Control. Alas, once again in MCU continuity, this organisation is not being headed up by Tyne Daley as it was in Spider-Man: Homecoming (reviewed here). So yeah, bad things are afoot with Damage Control but, effectively, the main villainess of the movie is Jean Grey, as a kind of surrogate villain.
But, it’s a nice film and has a good warm heart at its centre. Oh... and if people were upset by Spider-Man: No Way Home (reviewed here) in that it killed off Aunt May... well she’s still dead but Marisa Tomei is back to play out a flashback sequence which actually has a big impact to the resolution of the story arc here, actually.
And there are some other politics at play too, I think. I don’t like where they’ve left Bruce Banner’s conclusion here and I am hoping they’ve put him in this place because it makes sense to have him there when needed a few years down the line. Probably a political move on the part of the two studios, I would think.
But, Spider-Man: Brand New Day is a pretty good film, all told... having some heart breakingly good performances and completely destroying my expectations, I’m glad to say. They’ve even brought back composer Michael Giacchino to score it but, he does a strange thing here. I think the four years which have passed in loneliness for Peter Parker must be the reason why he’s adjusted the leitmotif for the character. He’s stripped his main, six note theme down to just four notes. simplifying it for the whole of the movie until, with certain resolutions down the line, he returns to the old six note theme in the end credits sequence. Nice.
As always with the Marvel movies this one has a post-credits sequence and, it’s non-commital enough to have an ending which tells you one specific thing without giving anything away. And that’s to show that Spider-Man has gone into space and is on another planet. Which could be a hint to the next stand alone movie or... well... it could mean that we’ll be seeing Tom Holland again in either Avengers: Doomsday this December or, more likely, Avengers: Secret Wars in December 2027. And that’s it. I was expecting Columbia to fumble the ball big time with the Spider-Man franchise but Spider-Man: Brand New Day really does deliver the goods (and is still a lot better than Spider-Man: Far From Home (reviewed here). ‘Nuff Said!
*No, sorry, that asterisk wasn’t for the reader, it’s just part of the title of the movie. Relax.
