Culture

This mini review contains spoilers.

I’m a sucker for a good plotline centred on characters with mental powers like telepathy and mind control through telepathic coercion. The Julian May Pliocene Exiles & Galactic Milieu novels are the epitome of this type of story for me. Especially her novel called Intervention.

That preamble is here so you’ll understand when I say that Spider-Man: Brand New Day went up a gear for me when the Jean Grey character moved to the centre of the plot. She has the said mental powers. Her backstory and role in the film’s final act were worth the wait.

The rest of the film is okay. It’s built around the pathos Peter Parker still feels four years after Dr Strange wiped everyone’s memory of Peter Parker being Spider-Man. The character building is more interesting than the action sequences for me. But the Jean Grey arc is the cream on the cake. I’m now looking forward to the forthcoming X-Men film(s). Not something I thought I’d write.

The music by Michael Giacchino is superb. Unsurprisingly. He’s the best film score composer by miles in my opinion. There is one part of the score that fired my memory pathways that encode the score for The Incredibles. Which Giacchino also wrote. I’ll be listening to the Spider-Man: Brand New Day score a lot, I reckon.

Anyway, I’m glad I finally went to see it on the big MAXX screen before it leaves cinemas. It’s a solid 8⭐️ film, but the Jean Grey arc in the last act elevated it to a 9⭐️ rating for me.