SPIDER-MAN
INTO THE SPIDER-VERSE
Bob Persichetti • Peter Ramsey • Rodney Rothman
(2018)
A computer-animated superhero film, based on the Marvel Comics character Miles Morales / Spider-Man, first appeared in Ultimate Fallout, a comic book limited series published by Marvel Comics that debuted in July 2011.
Miles Morales Shameik Moore) is the Spider-Man in the Ultimate Universe (Earth-1610), an imprint with a separate continuity from the mainstream Marvel Universe. He is a biracial teenager of African-American and Puerto Rican descent, and the son of police officer, Jefferson Davis (Brian Tyree Henry) and nurse, Rio Morales (Luna Lauren Vélez).
Miles struggles to live up to the expectations of his father. In an attempt to cheer him up, his uncle Aaron Davis (Mahershala Ali), takes him to an abandoned subway station to paint graffiti, hoping to cheer him up. While there, Miles is bitten by Alchemax’s radioactive spider and gains superhuman abilities similar to Spider-Man.
On the next day, Miles Morales returns to the abandoned subway, he stumbles upon a collider built by Wilson Fisk, also known as Kingpin (Liev Schreiber). Kingpin hopes to access parallel universes to bring back his late wife and son. Spider-Man (Chris Pine) attempts to disable the collider while fighting Kingpin’s henchmen, Green Goblin (Jorma Taccone) and the Prowler. The collider explodes, killing Green Goblin and wounding Spider-Man. Kingpin kills Spider-Man, but before he dies, he gives Miles a USB flash drive containing a program that can disable the collider.
The Super Collider explosion rips the space time continuum and accidentally opens the portals to other dimensions. Five different Spider-People are sucked into Earth-1610 where hey must work together to find a way to return to their own timelines, otherwise their bodies will disintegrate.
The film surpasses all of my expectations. The script is equally impressive, with witty dialogue and well-developed characters. The visuals are technically cutting-edge, unlike anything I have ever seen before. The film’s use of 2s animation, in which some images are extended into two frames instead of the traditional 24 frames per second, is a stroke of genius. This technique gives the scene a more cinematically powerful look. They also cleverly employ different frame rates for different characters, creating a sense of visual depth and complexity. Overall, the film is a triumph of animation and storytelling.
I am impressed with how the filmmakers incorporate comic drawing techniques, such as motion smearing, to create dynamic movement. Motion smearing is a technique in which the artist draws a single object or figure as a blur to represent movement. This technique is often used in comic books to create a sense of speed and energy.
Other techniques used in the film include the use of text balloons to display characters’ thoughts, oversized text for sound effects, and hand-drawn images.
The intentional use of the misprint technique gives an illusion of blurry background, rather than the typical out-of-focus technique used in traditional films. These techniques are seamlessly interwoven, creating a visually stunning film that feels like it has been brought to life from the pages of a comic book.
SPIDER-MAN: INTO THE SPIDER-VERSE premiered at the Regency Village on 1 December 2018. The filmwas theatrically released in the United States on 14 December. The film grossed over $380 million worldwide against a $90 million budget.
