No Osborns In Sight
Oh, thank goodness. Much like the origin shtick, I’m sick to death of the Osborns appearing in every Spider-Man film and taking over. Of course we know the importance of the family in Peter’s life, but there’s no reason to ensure they’re the central point of every plot. I mean, does anyone even know what was the point of Norman Osborn in The Amazing Spider-Man 2?
In the latest film, there’s not a sniff of them in sight. Instead, it allows bad guys like Mac Gargan (Scorpion), Herman Schultz (Shocker), Phineas Mason (Tinkerer) and Adrian Toomes (Vulture) to take center stage. We all know that Spidey has one helluva rogues’ gallery, yet it’s those stupid Osborns who’ve always been the main attractions up until now.
It’s more than likely they’ll appear in a sequel down the line, but we’ve been spared an Osfest here. The longer we go without the treacherous family, the better it’ll be for the franchise moving forward.
Lust Versus Love
No Web-Crawler film is complete without a love interest for Pete – and the same holds true for Spider-Man: Homecoming. However, one could argue that this film’s love interest, Liz, is more lust than love for the young hero.
I’m not going to get into the dynamics of love here because that’s a slippery slope. All I’ll say is the previous films have shown the teenage Peter in deep, Shakespearean-like love with Gwen Stacy and Mary Jane Watson. At the age of 15, I doubt very much that he’s head-over-heels in love with all these girls and it’s probably just lust. Jon Watts nails this perfectly in his film by Peter revealing to Liz that he likes her – that’s it.
In a way, Watts has preserved Spidey’s innocence for further films without having to capitalize on the whole “I can’t be with her because I’m a superhero” trope. Sure, Peter does look upset when Liz leaves the school, but he isn’t moping around about it and carries on with his life immediately. That sounds authentically like something a 15-year-old teenage boy would do.
Published: Jul 9, 2017 09:20 am