If Spider-Man: Brand New Day understands anything about its titular hero, it’s that a Spidey-centric adventure doesn’t work unless the man behind the mask is miserable. After three solo films and 10 years of other team-ups, director Destin Daniel Cretton delivers exactly what fans have been waiting for from Tom Holland’s webslinger. His Peter Parker is appropriately depressed, and for good reason: he’s living in a world that now has no memory of his existence, and he’s made no effort to reestablish the connections that were severed by a spell.
When we catch up with Peter again, four years after No Way Home, he’s become more “spider” than “man” in more ways than one. Not only has he retreated into solitude, all but building a nest for his superhero activities, but he’s also in the throes of a second metamorphosis. The arachnid hormones that first altered his body when he was bitten by a radioactive spider are flaring once more, overloading his senses, supercharging his powers, and making him one cranky crimefighter. The stress of this transition is also the least of Peter’s worries: there’s also the matter of a telepathic villain (Sadie Sink) possessing the bodies and minds of unassuming New Yorkers.
