As we progress in the creation of films and the art of filmmaking, we often do not think to continuously find new subjects to explore and new ideas to develop. Instead, directors tend to revisit old topics to revive their previous glory. A blaring example of this is superhero movies. From Batman to Joker to every other Avengers movie, we can see the inspiration behind their creation; the movies that came before. A fresh and obvious example of this phenomenon is the new addition to the Spiderman universe: Madame Web, a movie I’m honestly shocked even got into production. From the questionable acting to the gaps in the plot and worldbuilding, the film had me wondering if every single person working on it had a massive migraine and somehow forgot how to do their job, although their budget did happen to be 80 million dollars.
Although the cast of the movie included seasoned and upcoming actors, such as Sydney Sweeney and Dakota Johnson, their roles somehow brought out their worst sides, and I have no idea how it could get that bad. The acting was so horrific it was funny, and critics wasted no breath holding back. While the premise of the movie is relatively intriguing, it seems as if the characters are all walking stereotypes with no discernable personality. Cassandra is a woman who, after an accident, is haunted by visions she can’t place together. However, she is able to tell she needs to save three girls (Julia, Anya, and Mattie) from a future accident, caused by the main villain.
These three girls will be, along with Cassandra, the main characters. Sweeney, an actor known for rather dramatic roles, is shoved into the persona of a shy sweetheart, Julia. To be frank, she does not apply her acting skills. Dakota Johnson acts like she has a massive headache from drinking too much the night before. In fact, it seems as if all the actors are going through the biggest hangover on earth. Anya, played by Isabela Merced, is as flat in character as a Diary of a Wimpy Kid side character, her literal only personality trait being an absolute nerd. Mattie, played by Celeste O’Connor, is just a flat-out bully who likes trying to be different, played off as being “rebellious.”
The real sad part about this mess is the plot is actually intriguing. The villain has a reasonable reason for his desire to kill the three girls, as he also has the power to see visions and knows they could kill him if he doesn’t kill them first. Unfortunately, all his lines are dubbed over on what sounds to be a microwave or a half-destroyed Nokia. Luckily, this provided a good laugh. The most entertaining part about the movie was just laughing at how hilariously goofy everything was. It was like the movie was trying so hard to be a good Spiderman movie with three teen girls played by grown women but it flopped so badly it shouldn’t even count as a Spiderman movie.
Not only was everything pieced together with a dot of glue, the ending was slapped on like a bandaid trying to fix a pierced lung. It was like when someone tries to make something “deep” by not adding any context. In this case, it was just bad. There are no other words to describe it because it didn’t give anything to describe. There is literally nothing to critique because nobody can understand or make anything out of an ending that gives absolutely nothing. If I could choose a word to describe the entire movie, it’d probably be nothing, because I don’t know if I don’t get the premise of superhero movies or something but I know for a fact that I can say it was not a banger.
