‘Spider-Man: Brand New Day’ Review: Always Forget, Always Remember

July 28, 2026

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…Started up a Brand New Day! (CREDIT: Marvel/Sony Pictures Entertainment)

Starring: Tom Holland, Zendaya, Sadie Sink, Jacob Batalon, Jon Bernthal, Tramell Tillman, Michael Mando, Mark Ruffalo, Florence Pugh, Liza Colón-Zayas, Marvin Jones III, Zabryna Guevara

Director: Destin Daniel Cretton

Running Time: 145 Minutes

Rating: PG-13 for Occasionally Gnarly Action Violence, and a Little Bit of Language

Release Date: July 31, 2026 (Theaters)

What’s It About?: It’s been a lonely life for the Tom Holland version of Peter Parker ever since his last big screen adventure. He’s still Spider-Man, and New Yorkers still love their arachnid guardian, but a spell has been cast that has made everyone forget the entire existence of the human being behind the mask. He’s inching towards re-introducing himself to his former girlfriend MJ (Zendaya) and his best friend Ned (Jacob Batalon), but he’s got to be careful, since there are always new threats lurking around the corner. This time around, the primary threat is a mysterious newcomer (Sadie Sink) with the ability to jump her consciousness into other people who’s trying to expose a secret at the suspiciously friendly Department of Damage Control. Meanwhile, Peter seems to be going through a sort of second adolescence, as he develops new powers and then consults a relatively Hulk-free Dr. Bruce Banner (Mark Ruffalo) to help him get a grip on these emerging abilities.

What Made an Impression?: The Day After When?: To rewatch or not to rewatch? That’s always one of the big questions at the heart of the latest MCU release. With Brand New Day, I wondered if I ought to revisit 2021’s No Way Home to remind myself how we got to the point where nobody remembered Peter Parker anymore. But ultimately, I decided I would prefer not to and instead see how this chapter stands on its own (which is typically my prerogative in general). And I believe I made the right decision. While things started off feeling a little vague, I appreciated that this movie didn’t feel the need to recap itself to death and instead give off at least a hint of mystery.
Criss-Cross: Brand New Day reaches towards the platonic ideal of a true low-key comic book crossover sensibility. We’ve seen Peter team up with all the major Avengers already, but what about the other rando Marvel heroes and villains we’ve yet to see him interact with before? Several of them are in this movie! But not all of them, as that would be too overwhelming. Sometimes superhero flicks have multiple antagonists combined with a whole host of friendly cameos, and it ends up feeling like three or four (or a thousand) different movies smashed together. But in this case, it feels natural enough that all these folks would be interacting with each other in this series of scenarios.
They Had an Effect on Me: My biggest bummer with BND is that the visual effects are too slick in the way that our digitized and sanitized CGI era so often is. There’s just not much tactility as Spidey swings around the Big Apple. Nevertheless, there is a decent amount of emotional heft to the big set pieces. It helps when there are some close-up shots interspersed within those sequences, as Tom Holland’s eternally youthful visage immediately conveys plenty of vulnerability.
Brand New Enough Indeed: Ultimately, I’m pleased to report that I was satisfied by Brand New Day because it didn’t feel like just more of the same once again in the way that so many Marvel movies have. While it didn’t quite blow me away like the most transcendent examples of this genre, I never quite knew where we headed. The reveals are clever, the ideas are sincere, and the enthusiasm is still real.

Spider-Man: Brand New Day is Recommended If You Like: A mix of the old and the new

Grade: 3.5 out of 5 Lattice Quanta

I’m Not Entirely Sure What to Say About ‘The Whale,’ But I’ll Do My Best

December 6, 2022

jmunney Cinema, Movie Reviews , , , , , , 2 Comments

CREDIT: A24

Starring: Brendan Fraser, Hong Chau, Sadie Sink, Ty Simpkins, Samantha Morton

Director: Darren Aronofsky

Running Time: 117 Minutes

Rating: R for Profanity Borne of Anger and Frustration

Release Date: December 9, 2022 (Theaters)

What’s It About?: Charlie (Brendan Fraser) spends all of his days sitting on his couch, teaching an online English class and ordering delivery. Hardly anyone ever sees him, including his students, as he keeps his laptop camera disabled. He tells them it’s broken, but really, he just doesn’t want to have to deal with their reactions to the fact that he weighs 600 pounds. This may just be the last week of his life, as he’s enduring congestive heart failure and refusing to go to a hospital. So instead he’s looked after by his no-nonsense friend Liz (Hong Chau), who’s also a nurse. They’re occasionally interrupted by door-to-door missionary Thomas (Ty Simpkins), who becomes obsessed with counseling Charlie through what he believes is the impending apocalypse. And in the meantime, Charlie also does his damnedest to reconnect with his estranged teenage daughter, the disaffected and manipulative Ellie (Sadie Sink).

What Made an Impression?: I’m really not quite sure how to react to The Whale. And I’m not even talking about the controversy that tends to always surround fat suit prosthetics. As far as I can tell, the physical demands of playing someone this big actually demand an actor who’s fit and hardy. So if you are going to make a movie with a character who weighs as much as Charlie, the only way to do it is with someone who doesn’t weigh anywhere near as much as he does. This is all to say: I certainly get the criticism around this sort of casting, but I also understand why it was made the way it was made.

But that doesn’t mean I understand everything about this movie. It’s based on a play by the film’s screenwriter, Samuel D. Hunter, and that theatrical pedigree is present every which way. The action is limited to one location, and the emotion is delivered all the way to Pluto. That overwrought style can be fine, you just have to convince the audience to buy into it. And on that point of whether or not I’m convinced? I’m confounded.

Charlie is a supremely frustrating character. He likes to see the good in everybody, especially Ellie, who he insists is just wonderful, despite pretty much all evidence to the contrary. Part of that is just what a long-absent dad would typically say when trying to reconnect to his kid. But at a certain point, you think he ought to admit that she’s not exactly what we call friendly. To anybody. At all. He does value honesty above just about everything else, though, even when it’s brutal. But to that point, we viewers might want him to confront the brutality in his own life, particularly the loss of a boyfriend that led to his reclusiveness and disordered eating. Fraser undoubtedly gives it all, as he wrings just about every note he can out of what he’s asked to do. But while I recognized the ambition, I was also left ultimately responding, “Well, gee… Hmm.”

The Whale is Recommended If You Like: Distorted optimism

Grade: 3 out of 5 Moby Dicks