SPIDER-MAN: ACROSS THE SPIDER-VERSE

This is a sequel to 'Spider-Man: Into The Spider-Verse'.  I loved the first film: for its freewheeling humour; for the concept of infinite worlds, each with its own Spider-Man; and for its animation style, which brought to life the look of 1960s comic books which I read avidly for a while as a child (although I was more into DC than Marvel).

Inevitably this sequel didn't make quite the same impact, because the novelty value had worn off a tad.

That being said it's still highly enjoyable.  

The animation throughout is stunning, and this time it brings to life the look of more modern comic books.  And we get some terrific new characters, notably Gwen Stacy, who is Spider-Woman on Earth-65, and Miguel O'Hara who is - well I'm not entirely sure, other than that he is in charge of the Spider-Society (whatever that is).

Miguel's main concern (understandably, to be sure) is to stop the entire Spider-Verse collapsing.  This could happen if in an individual universe there is too large a departure from any of the "canon-events" which must occur, such as the death of a police captain close to Spider-Man.

I loved the idea of canon-events.

Reading the plot synopsis in Wikipedia made me appreciate the skill with which the makers of the film manage to tell the story without the viewer getting totally confused between the different Earths and as to which character belongs on which Earth, and how their relationships to other characters vary between Earths.

Despite all the plot to get through, the film still finds time to focus on the theme of parenthood.  In fact maybe it spends too much time on this because at one point I did begin to get a bit fidgety, but not for long because in the last 30 minutes or so the story really began to hot up, as it became clear what the stakes were.

I like a film to reach some resolution by the end.  So my main gripe about this film is that it not standalone - the story is to be concluded in the final part of the trilogy.  So although of course I am looking forward to 'Spider-Man: Beyond the Spider-Verse' I did come away from this instalment feeling a bit dissatisfied.

RATING: ✓ If You've Nothing Better To Do