Sony’s Spider-Man Universe is likely one of the strangest film franchises to currently exist, given its contradictory nature.
For one, the titular Spider-Man has not and likely will not appear in any of its films, given that the rights to him were loaned to the Marvel Cinematic Universe instead.
In fact, the face of the franchise is Tom Hardy’s Venom, who in the comics is none other than Spider-Man’s nemesis!
So, instead of films featuring the Wall-Crawler, all you get are movies where other characters from the Spider-Man franchise are clumsily designed as the protagonists.
To say Sony has a complicated relationship with the Spider-Man franchise would be undercutting things.
On one hand, you have the spectacle of cinema that is the “Spider-Verse” series. On the other hand, you have “Morbius.” And now, “Madame Web.”
To add to the earlier confusion, “Madame Web” takes place in an alternate universe separate from “Venom” and “Morbius”. Yes, this is madness.
The film stars Dakota Johnson, of “Fifty Shades of Grey” fame, as the titular hero of the story. She plays Cassie Webb, a paramedic living in New York who risks her life daily to save the lives of others.
One day, she’s involved in a near-fatal accident while working and when revived, realises she has the power to see the future.
This allows her to foresee and prevent a murder attempt on three teenage girls, Julia Carpenter (Sydney Sweeney), Anya Corazon (Isabela Merced) and Mattie Franklin (Celeste O’Connor).
And coincidentally enough, the wannabe murderer Ezekiel Sims (Tahar Rahim) has a personal history with Webb’s deceased mother.
Whilst watching this film, this writer was greatly tempted to start a tally for how many times the cast botched their lines.
It is hard to say if it is the screenwriters’ fault or the actors’, but Johnson excels in showing just how horrible she is at delivering a line.
Imagine a paramedic racing to get her patient to safety. Surely there’s urgency in her speech, intensity in her tone. Well, Johnson delivers her lines in such a dead tone that you would think she’s delivering pizza to an old folks’ home.
For a big budget film, many of the actors deliver their lines like they’re on a C-list telenovela, reading off a script held up in the distance.
Poor Rahim doesn’t fare any better as the villain, or the caricature of a villain. To call Sims an underdeveloped character would be high praise.
Too often, he rambles on about how he must kill the teenagers because “they will destroy everything I have built.”
Only problem is – what has he built? The movie barely bothers to explain who he even is! His motivations and plans are paper thin, if barely delved into.
So much poor writing went into this sorry excuse of a film that one wonders what the writers previously worked on. Oh. “Morbius”. That explains much.
The three girls contested between Webb and Sims don’t fare better either, despite the level of importance endowed upon them.
There is hardly any chemistry between them, and it’s next to impossible trying to discern what makes each “special” despite what the story claims repeatedly.
And in a world where superhero films are constantly attempting to visually stand out from the crowd, “Madame Web” takes the safest and dullest route.
Did you know that aside from seeing the future, Madame Web’s superpower is committing vehicular manslaughter?
Given the times she tries to run over Sims, it becomes painfully obvious that the writers were clueless on how to integrate her super power into a memorable fight scene.
And the less said about the Spider-Man references, the better. Imagine butchering the iconic line, “With great power, comes great responsibility”!
Needless to say, “Madame Web” is the continuation of incompetent filmmaking that deserves to be studied by filmmakers.
If you aspire to write a superhero film one day, watch this and take notes on exactly what not to do. And maybe have a good laugh while you’re at it.
‘Madame Web’ is currently playing in cinemas nationwide.