He's back! In Marvel Studios' third series installment try for audience favorite, Spider-Man, production efforts clearly spent more time on developing their villain, the "Vulture's" back story and motivations - and it paid off.

I'm speaking here as a loyal fan to Tobey Maguire's Spider-Man franchise, and truthfully, Spider-Man: Homecoming was a fun and engaging reboot of the beloved Marvel hero series.

But in my (Spider-Man obsessive) opinion, Michael's Keaton's portrayal of the Vulture is a huge reason that Homecoming succeeds. A hero is only as good as their villain, as noted by many writers, and it had been a long time since we'd gotten a Spider-Man villain with a meaty back story, and convincing motivation other than just wanting to fight Spider-Man.

The Daily Beast uses Maguire's franchise's Doc Oc in Spider-Man 2 as a prime example of the ideal villain-hero dynamic. The best superhero films, as Daily Beast notes, "are the ones that pay equal weight to its villains, which is why the stylized Batman Returns and Spider-Man 2 have remained top-tier in the genre." Doctor Otto Octavius' introduction, through his relationship with his wife and similarity to Peter Parker in terms of their genius knacks for science, truly drew audiences to appreciate him before he became Parker's enemy.

Spoilers ahead!!** In Spider-Man: Homecoming, the Vulture follows a similar introduction. Michael Keaton plays Adrian Toomes, founder of Toomes Salvage Company, which cleans up the extensive wreckage left behind by the Avengers in their battles with intergalactic forces. However, "higher ups" headed by Stark Industries take control of Toomes' business, leaving him with a sense of betrayal and as a portrayer of the "little guy" left to clean up the messes of the rich with little to no recognition or respect. In his face off with Spider-Man, the Vulture even mentions that no one looks out for "us," for the people who are tossed the table scraps of people like Tony Stark, multimillionaire (and Avenger, which would probably piss the Vulture off even more). Toomes explains early on that he does his work for his family, and that running from the law "isn't an option" because of them.

The Vulture makes a compelling argument, and after witnessing his business being sold out from under him, audiences can definitely understand his motive. And there it is! A key factor that had been missing from Garfield's The Amazing Spider-Man 2. Keaton's performance is excellent, and truly delivered the drive this new franchise's premiere needed to hit the ground running.

In the halted The Amazing Spider-Man franchise, Andrew Garfield indeed matched the description and jokey demeanor of Peter Parker, yet the film seemed to spend more time on tense romantic nuances and moments overdrawn for the purpose of comedy, that by the time moments came for **spoilers, again** the whopping amount of 3 villains to be barely explored, and the mourning of Gwen Stacy, which was a sort of band-aid, it became difficult to feel for the issues at hand because the film, at that point, was ten minutes from ending. Thankfully, Spider-Man: Homecoming spent time cultivating the Vulture, and it paid off, without feeling like he was added in just for the sake of the necessity of a villain (looking at you, Rhino). Electro, played by Jamie Foxx, started out decently strong and was beginning to look like a prospective villain you could feel for in The Amazing Spider-Man 2, until the convolution of the OsCorp workings haphazardly thrown in, coupled with an unsympathetic Harry Osbourne (miss u James Franco) and more overdrawn romantic drama muddled it up.

It was refreshing to see that these same mistakes were not made through the writing dedicated to the Vulture, and the performance afforded by Michael Keaton made him all the more worthwhile. Much like Doc Oc, Adrian Toomes easily became a villain worthy of his hero, which says a lot about Holland's Spider-Man. Toomes also left a significant impact on Peter Parker by the end of the film, making him not only essential to the plot, but necessary to Parker's much needed growth as a hero.

I'll always be a defender of the original Spider-Man franchise, but I was of course happy to finally see a reboot of the series pay homage to what makes Peter Parker a friendly neighborhood hero.

Tom Holland has also floated his idea of having Tobey Maguire play Uncle Ben, and honestly (apart from Ben's sad fate), my hopes are already high for a cameo. Although, I was thinking he'd make the perfect Dr. Parker - Peter's dad, if not Dr. Connors. (Can you tell I'm a fan?)

Here's to more successful Spider-Man films. Until then, here are some excellent moments.