I end 2018 with yet another movie review. Now that the work at the day-job has slowed back to a more normal pacing I am finally able to catch up on a lot of the movies from the Christmas season including this gem Spider-Man: Into the Spider Verse.

Though a Marvel logo appears along with other production logos before the opening scene of the film this movie is not part of the Marvel Cinematic Universe. The film rights to Spiderman and a number of the associated characters are still held by Sony Studios and, after their last two Spiderman  movies were poorly received by critics and disappointing at the box office, they entered into a joint custody arrangement with Marvel Studios allowing the wall crawler to enter into the MCU they retained the right for other Spiderman properties of which this is one.

Animated in a bold kinetic style that draws inspiration from the Ben-Day dots of classic comic-books of the 50s and 60s, Spider-Man: Into the Spider Verse  follows the life of Miles Morales as he becomes entangled not only with Peter Parker, that universe’s Spider-Man, as Parker attempts to defeat the machinations of The Kingpin whose obsessions threaten the fabric of reality but also with a squad of spider-persons drawn from alternate realities where the fateful spider bit imbued various people with strange and wondrous abilities. Together they learn about each other and face an array of classic Spiderman though many have been given an unexpected twist befitting the narrative’s  multi-verse nature. I particularly like the twist given to Doc Ock. Early in the film there are a number of hat-tips to earlier Sony version of the franchise including a laugh out loud reference to something according the Peter Parker we ‘do not talk about.’ At its core the story is about Miles coming into his own on a larger thematic level it is about the heroism in all us and anyone could be under that mask.

I have heard some people are uneasy with the animation style, the film does utilize a number of flashing and contrasting colors, they animators in a deep homage to the color printing processes of by gone decades even print some tone ‘off-registration’ which I am sure confused at least a few people at both the 2D and 3D screenings but over all the effect works quite well.

Spider-Man: Into the Spider Verse  is a film with story, plot, hart, and soul that provides an exciting and thoughtful excursion on variations on what it means to be a hero. It is one not to be missed.