RESOLVING THE LEDGER
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Gaming ‘Spider-Man: Brand New Day’ Review: The First Superhero Movie That Made Me Feel Something In A Very Long Time By Erik Kain ,
Forbes contributors publish independent expert analyses and insights. I write about TV shows, movies, video games, entertainment & culture. Follow Author Jul 31, 2026, 12:52am EDT Jul 31, 2026, 01:06am EDT --:-- / --:-- This voice experience is generated by AI. Learn more . This voice experience is generated by AI. Learn more . My Spidey-senses are tingling. I have a good feeling about the opening of Spider-Man: Brand New Day this weekend . If the theater I attended was any indication, this is going to be a massive box office success. There was one moment, which I’ll get to later, that made the whole theater gasp.
The real winners? Tom Holland, Jon Bernthal and Zendaya, all of whom also starred in Christopher Nolan’s The Odyssey ( here’s my review of that film ) which opened to a massive global box office just two weeks prior.
Of course, the films are about as different as two films can be. One is about a lonely hero trying to get back to the ones he loves while encountering strange monsters and other obstacles. The other is about a lonely hero trying to get back to the ones he loves, encountering strange monsters and hoping that his love will still be there waiting when he returns. Both of these men are battered by their pasts, by the the actions they took to protect the ones they loved, by the loss and the terrible cost of victory.
Okay, there are some very weird similarities between The Odyssey and Spider-Man: Brand New Day , now that I think about it, but I suppose that makes sense since both come from the heroic tradition. Odysseus was just the Spider-Man of Homer’s ancient Greece. Beyond these striking plot similarities, however, these two films could not be more different. And the three major actors who play characters in each film. And an almost fanatical devotion to the Pope. Nobody expects the Spanish Inquisition !
But I digress. Let’s get on with it, shall we?
Note: This review will be spoiler free for the first half, though I’ll obviously discuss the premise and setup (though we’ve basically seen that in the trailers and marketing materials already).
I will clearly mark when the spoilers begin , because I do very much want to talk about the ending of this movie and what it all means for the future of the MCU – and perhaps a revival of the superhero genre, which has been so very, very stale for the past few years (outside of some gems like Wonder Man , which was created by Destin Daniel Cretton, the director of Spider-Man: Brand New Day ! And was just cancelled, because the House of Mouse is apparently run by lunatics!) And more than that, I want to talk about how the end of this movie made me feel, because it has been some time since a superhero movie made me feel much of anything.
It’s kind of hard to believe, but Spider-Man: No Way Home came out in 2021. Five years ago! I honestly didn’t realize it had been so long, but then again I hadn’t been thinking about Spider-Man all that much, or Marvel, or superhero movies for that matter. For the most part, these have been pretty lackluster, in both the MCU and DCU. Captain America: Brave New World was pretty awful , proving that it’s really not that easy to swap out Steve Rogers – especially with such a lousy script.
Over in DC-land, Guardians of the Galaxy director James Gunn promised to bring about a new era of awesomeness, but his opening salvo – Superman – was lackluster and messy, even though they nailed the casting . And while Peacemaker almost made up for that with a solid second season, then along came Supergirl and now DC’s hopes are all pinned to Clayface (of all the villains you could possibly pin any hopes to).
So I’ve been a little checked out when it comes to superhero stuff, not because I don’t enjoy it, but because it’s been, for the most part, so dull and so mediocre outside of the diamond in the rough scattered here and there (and Peacemaker and Wonder Man , gems they may be, are both TV shows).
When Spider-Man: No Way Home came out five years ago, I said it was one of the best superhero movies in years .
I’m repeating myself now, but Spider-Man: Brand New Day is one of the best superhero movies in years. Again. Only, this one is better. Yes, No Way Home had lots of fun cameos. The three Spideys all together – Tobey Maguire, Andrew Garfield and Tom Holland were quite the Three Musketeers, and it was a fun gimmick; and, of course, you can never go wrong with Willem Dafoe’s Green Goblin.
Still, that film felt like it was all mixed up in all the other problems with the Marvel Cinematic Universe at the time. The obsession with the multiverse. The messy, feckless, rudderless ship that the MCU became after Endgame . In that chaos, a few bright lights shone, but they were still mired in post- Endgame fog. Perhaps Brand New Day really is just that, a turning point for Marvel and the MCU. And perhaps that’s wildly optimistic and I’m just still buzzing from what was a really fun, if a little clunky at times, movie.
So Peter Parker had Doctor Strange wipe the entire world’s memory of him from existence. Not of Spider-Man, but of Peter Parker himself, because that was the only way to stop the universe from unravelling in the mess of a multiverse apocalypse that Peter had unwittingly created. The physics of it all are a little murky now, half a decade on, but the point is this: Peter Parker had to save the world and in order to do so, he had to wipe himself from the memories of everyone, friend or foe alike. Not quite like dying to save the world. At least when you die, your memory lives on. Or you get recast as Doctor Doom.
Now, four years later in the story, Peter remains a solitary hero, working closely with the friendly neighborhood NYPD Detective Jean DeWolff (Liza Colón-Zayas). He’s famous and successful and lonely. He misses Ned (Jacob Batalon) and MJ and the friends he ...
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