Back in 1999, Sony Pictures took a risk that would change its future forever — it bought the film rights to popular comic book character Spider-Man from a floundering Marvel Comics teetering on bankruptcy. After a successful trilogy, a failed one, and an animated masterpiece, Sony found itself scrambling for a new approach to its popular franchise.
Eventually, rescue came in the form of Disney and Marvel Studios, when a deal was struck to introduce Peter Parker to the Marvel Cinematic Universe. It’s been eight years since Spidey’s MCU debut in Captain America: Civil War, and now Sony finds itself in an awkward position. In order to retain the film rights, they have to produce a Spider-Man film every six years… except with no Spider-Man.
Madame Web is Sony’s latest addition to its Spider-Man cinematic universe after Venom and Morbius. Where Marvel and DC are winding down in the face of successive box office disappointments, Sony charges full steam ahead with three movies this year.
Madame Web is the first of these, and it differs from the other two in that the titular character is more hero than villain. It’s a decent popcorn comic book movie that focuses on its emotional beats over action sequences, but generally fails to stick the landing on either.
Cassandra Web
The story takes place in 2003 and centers around New York City paramedic Cassandra Web. She is a loner with her only friends being her colleague Ben Parker, and a stray cat. Cassandra’s mother was a biologist and researcher who discovered a mystical spider in the Peruvian Amazon that was said to give a certain group of tribesmen enhanced spider-like abilities. When her research partner Ezekiel Sims betrays and murders her, he steals the spider and runs. Fortunately for Cassandra, in his absence, the tribesmen help deliver Cassandra and expose her to a bite from the mystical spider. It’s never explained how a group of Amazonian tribesmen manage to get an American baby back to the USA.
The movie also gives us no hint of Cassie’s background in the US and no mention of foster parents or siblings. Outside of the occasional melancholy, Cassie seems rather well-adjusted for someone who’s been orphaned and raised in the foster care system all her life, and whose support system consists of a single person and a cat.
Cassie’s growth in the film seems to be tied to her finding a sense of belonging. So when she finds it among the teenage girls by the end, it feels unsatisfying because the loss of her mother never seemed to negatively affect her life that drastically to begin with.
Madame Web’s superpower can be frustrating to wrap your head around. Is she seeing a future that hasn’t happened yet, or is she seeing a different timeline altogether? A few times in the movie, Sims and Webb see visions of the three Spider-Women in action. So, if that doesn’t happen at the end of the movie, does that mean they were seeing alternate versions of the girls in a different timeline? Or is it still yet to happen in future movies? Who knows.
As someone whose ability is mainly precognition, the passiveness of her superpower can also be problematic. Multiple times in her battles with Sims, she escapes by jumping into some hurtling debris — maybe her ‘superpower’ is plot armour.
Ezekiel Sims
Ezekiel Sims begins his journey in the Amazon forest with Constance Webb. After finding the mystical spider with Webb’s help, Sims decides to steal the research for himself, murdering his research partners before returning to the US.
For years, Sims used the spider’s power to give himself superhuman abilities, including a limited amount of clairvoyance, which causes Sims to be haunted by a recurring dream wherein he is murdered by the three Spider-Women. He has dedicated his life to finding and killing these women before they grow into their abilities.
Tahar Rahim does his best to make lemonade with his performance but isn’t given much to work with emotionally and spends much of his time brooding. He is slightly more successful in trying to be menacing. The idea of a villain who can’t stop dreaming of his death and sets out to prevent it is really interesting. Yet, the story doesn’t do much with this except to justify his murder quest. We don’t learn anything of his backstory and know nothing of his motivations outside of surviving a hypothetical murder.
If Cassie’s superpower is luck, the biggest loser in this is Ezekiel who could’ve avoided a lot of trouble if he just took the time to watch for flying objects around him.
The would-be Spider-Women
Cassandra first meets Mattie Franklin, a Bantu-knotted skateboarder who is the daughter of wealthy, politically connected parents. She later comes across Julie Cornwall, who lives with her stepmother and a father who is more interested in his new family. Anya Corazon lives in Cassie’s apartment building, her mother is dead and her father was recently deported, making her conveniently self-dependent.
Fate entangles these four women’s destinies as Cass has a vision of them being murdered by Sims on a train. She makes a scene and gets them out, beginning their journey together. Mattie is snarky and impatient, Julie is reserved and tentative, and Anya is an overthinker and science lover. Though they have distinct personalities, they don’t have much to do in the story emotionally and thus don’t experience any kind of character arc or progression.
Our initial thoughts were that the movie would end as Ezekiel saw it, with the three girls as fully-developed Spider-Women taking on Sims together. A missed opportunity, we feel. Instead, by the end they are the same as they started. They’re the McGuffin by which Cassie and Ezekiel are defined.
The action
The main characters don’t have conventional superpowers so spend much of the movie running which diminishes the ‘action’ element somewhat. Madame Web has a distinct lack of epic hero-versus-villain matchups, which leads to a lack of memorable comic book-esque moments. Apart from an unintentionally funny moment when Cassandra drives an ambulance through a billboard. She manages to aim the vehicle enough to crash into a suited Sims and gets out of the car without a scratch.
The CGI, though sparingly used, was still underwhelming. Sims’s Spider Suit looks cheap and uncomfortable. The activation of Cassie’s powers could’ve been made more visually interesting, and the fireworks in the final confrontation were visibly fake.
Then there’s the hallmark of underwhelming CGI – an overabundance of nighttime action scenes. Director S. J. Clarkson does her best to inject some kind of directorial style with her use of Dutch angles and spinning shots, but most of these eclectic choices won’t do much to elevate your immersion.
Madame Web verdict
It’s worth reminding yourself that Madame Web is not a conventional superhero movie. With a female audience as its target, this movie is not as concerned with the physical battle between hero and villain, instead focusing on the psychological.
Dakota Johnson does her best with the script — she’s the only actor who seems skilled enough to be intentionally funny with her delivery of throwaways and one-liners. But even she can’t escape looking mentally checked out half the time. Celeste O’Conner, Sydney Sweeney, and Isabela Merced give decent individual performances but struggle to find meaningful on-screen chemistry.
People who have no attachment to the Marvel canon or the action sequences of superhero movies, and instead are more interested in the bond between the main characters, will likely enjoy Madame Web more than the traditional comic book movie fan. But if you’re looking for a female-led Spider-Man flick with web-slinging and action set-pieces, this ain’t it.
