I’ve been wrestling with various thoughts about Spider-Man: Brand New Day since I left the theater after seeing it last night, and as I try to articulate what I’m feeling about Tom Holland’s fourth Spider-Man movie, the spread of feelings I have about it is enough to make me feel like I’m Peter Parker, with his human and arachnid sides fighting for dominance. Early reviews and trailers had me expecting Brand New Day to feel like a mini-Avengers crossover movie, with some criticizing it for falling victim to the Marvel Cinematic Universe’s bloat and cloying need to use films as stepping stones that set up the next big crossover event. What I got was something that didn’t feel like it needed to expand the world but rather was content to live in the one that’s already been created.
Okay, that’s not entirely true. The addition of Sadie Sink’s Jean Grey has plenty of implications for a future X-Men movie and a proper introduction of the Mutants into the MCU that isn’t tied to bringing back actors from old movies. But Jean’s introduction here is handled elegantly, and avoids feeling like a heavy-handed setup for a future expansion of the franchise. Jean and her sister Sara are presented as telepaths who, once their powers were discovered, were abandoned by their mother and left to fend for themselves. This gestures at the prejudice and lack of acceptance mutants experience in the Marvel world, but you’ll find no mention of Charles Xavier’s school or the X-Men that Jean may one day join in Brand New Day. Sink’s role in the film only sets off fandom-activating, Leonardo DiCaprio pointing–alarm bells if you already know who she is.
Brand New Day is similarly smart in the way it handles the several existing characters from other MCU projects who make an appearance. Yelena, the new Black Widow, helps Peter find leads on strange psychic attacks happening in New York City; the Hulk consults with Spidey on an inhibitor that helps him suppress his growing powers; and half the movie feels like a Spider-Man and Punisher team-up story. But Brand New Day’s use of these characters feels organic, less like it’s eagerly pointing to the next movie and more like it’s treating Peter’s New York as the shared world that it is. Sure, each of these heroes have their own shit to deal with, but it’s also only natural that their paths would cross, if just for a few scenes.
It’s easy to be cynical about the MCU because it’s given very little reason for anyone to feel anything else. But when you look at the actual ways Brand New Day uses old characters—as people who happen to also inhabit this world alongside Spider-Man and are living their own heroic (or debatably heroic, in Frank’s case) lives—it doesn’t feel cynical at all. It just feels like a world that expands beyond the trials and tribulations of Peter Parker alone.