Derided as Marvel’s Cinematic Universe might be now, we’ve all fallen prey to the franchise’s most manipulative tactic: the surprise reveal designed to make us scream for joy. In professional wrestling, they call it “the pop,” and Marvel has spent the past half-decade chasing it. It’s not a trivial pursuit — if there’s a reason why Avengers: Endgame is so remembered, it’s because it’s a film filled to the brim with scream-inducing reveals. That makes for a great experience in a crowded theater, but a film can totally lose its punch once removed from that environment.
Think Andrew Garfield’s return to the Spider-Man world in No Way Home. When that reveal played in theaters, crowds understandably went wild. But when the movie premiered on demand, it was impossible to ignore the seconds of silence built into the film to accommodate applause, gasps, and shouts of recognition. It made No Way Home feel much more stilted and cloying in hindsight, and it’s a shame that Marvel hasn’t learned a lesson from that. Tom Holland’s fourth solo outing as Spider-Man, in this year’s Brand New Day, even takes it all a step further, borrowing another tactic from the 2010s to introduce its villain, played by Sadie Sink.
