As I sit here writing this, I'm wearing a Spider-Man t-shirt and Spider-Man Under Armour socks. It goes without saying I am a fan of Spider-Man.
I started reading Spidey comics in my mid teens. I've seen every one of his movies opening weekend. I've written articles about Spidey, seen his Broadway musical, played his video games, collected toys, posters, and statues of him, and I have a web tattoo on my left bicep devoted to my favorite superhero.
People may be bigger supporters of Marvel's arachnid adventurer, and I'm not one to argue. I just want you to get a clear picture of how much I adore the character.
Seeing Spider-Man in "Captain America: Civil War" was a true geek dream come true for me. Getting Peter Parker going toe to toe with Giant Man, Cap, and helping out Iron Man was unreal. His involvement helped push Civil War to the top of my favorite Marvel Cinematic Universe movies, and I was excited for what would come next.
This past Friday (December 9th, 2016) I woke up to see the first glimpse of "what would come next." The first trailer for his initial solo movie, titled "Spider-Man: Homecoming" showed Tom Holland's Peter Parker trading lines with Tony Stark, high school classmates, and also bad guys.
We get a quick look at Michael Keaton's Vulture, and I won't lie when I say I'm incredibly amped to see what Keaton brings to the table. We see Aunt May, Spidey saving the day, and not too much more.
It sounds very generic, the way I'm describing it. As a huge advocate of anything Spider-Man, it sucks to say that besides the Tony Stark angle, which still is glee-inducing to me, we've sadly had five movies before this one where they've shown Spider-Man doing a lot of the things he was doing in the trailer
The first look also is very poorly cut, which doesn't help. It's light and airy for a minute, with jokes/silly dialogue being edited into place, and then all of a sudden, it gets super serious. It's such a jarring switch.
I did learn that an international trailer also was released on the same day, which I watched 24 hours later. It's a far better cut of put together scenes, with a tonal shift that flows way better.
That being said, here are my thoughts. I will go see this movie opening weekend. Let's get that out of the way. I've been anticipating this movie since its announcement and I have faith that it could be better than what I got out of the trailers.
It's a rough feeling, however, knowing that my hype for this just isn't there. I'm being cautiously optimistic about this. As someone who has been let down by Spider-Man movies in the past, I trust that Marvel won't fail me as they finally have control over the character in the movies, but it sucks to truthfully say that they really aren't breaking new ground here.
The problem with the Peter/Tony angle is that it's been done. That element has already peaked, especially in "Civil War." It's hard to give us a set of crucial, wonderful Spidey moments in that movie and kind of work backward a slight bit.
Maybe I'm spoiled. I mean, what more could I be looking for? This is Spidey finally getting a movie in his home camp. Is it because we've had so much Spidey over the past 14 years in terms of movies that I'm just worried about overexposure?
The real test is going to be in the characters, the dialogue. This is where the movie can really stand apart from the others, aside from the Peter/Tony element. If they can truly mirror the comics, and give us the true essence of what makes Peter/Spider-Man tick, then they will have succeeded. We got a taste of that in "Captain America: Civil War," so let's see if we can keep that element in check for a full two hours.
My excitement for this movie is still there, I'm just not totally feeling what I've seen, even though that international trailer was better all around. However, maybe a trailer that helps lower my expectations will be good for when the movie finally hits, as I'll internally keep myself in check and allow myself to finally cut loose when my boy Spidey is doing his thing up on the big screen.
I still await July 7th, 2017 with a high degree of fanboy joy.
