Cassandra Webb is a New York metropolis paramedic who begins to demonstrate signs of clairvoyance. Forced to challenge revelations about her past, she needs to safeguard three young women from a deadly adversary who wants them destroyed.
This movie review will contain spoilers!!!
Overview
The origin stories for Cassie Webb, Julian Cornwall, Anya Corazon, and Mattie Franklin. Ultimately this movie was better than I expected. With the movie largely receiving negative reactions online, I gave this movie and chance and it did prove that it wasn’t an awful film that people made it out to be.
The film currently is underperforming at the box office, as the movie had a $80 million budget, it so far has grossed a whopping $12.5 million.
Story
Honestly, the story was more interesting than I expected. The story centered around Cassie gaining her powers and being able to see the future. The story also interchanged with her movie and the villain, Ezekiel.
Ezekiel had nightmares about being killed by 3 Spider-Women so he set out to kill them first but Cassie was the major obstacle in his way. I didn’t know what to expect from the story, as the only knowledge of Madame Web I had was from the other Spider-Man cartoon series.
So this being an origin story was perfect, seeing the very start of Madame Web was unique and gave a fresh perspective on more Spider-characters within that realm of characters. The story had an interesting setting with it being set in the year 2003. Odd but it was different from any previous film that came out.
I do like how the story of this movie made the point that there are in fact more Spider characters other than Peter and Miles and that they deserve to have their stories told as well.
Characters
Honestly, the characters were decent. I liked them all, some more than others of course but that is only natural with a film like this. Dakota Johnson as Cassie was simply a great casting. She performed well in this role and honestly, would love to see her return.
Sydney Sweeney was a natural in this role. I felt like this role was different from what she’s usually cast in. She was quiet but when she spoke and acted in a scene it was pretty decent. Isabela Merced is just an incredible actress no matter what the film is.
Celeste O’Connor was someone who didn’t truly show anything in the movie, she had a good scene in the Spider-suit but apart from that her role was nothing special. Tahar Rahim was as excellent as Ezekiel Sims. He was a demon.
Emma Roberts and Adam Scott were both decent as Mary Parker and Ben Parker. Adam portrayed his cast just as I imagined a young Ben Parker would be so that’s always a huge plus in my book.
For the full cast list, you can visit IMDB by clicking here.
Hype
Honestly, the movie never had hype. Even from the first trailer, I saw no hype for the movie whatsoever. I was excited for the movie though, and I’m glad I paid little to no attention to the negative reactions online and from personal messages from friends.
I fully believe what hurt this movie was simply being another movie without a Peter Parker Spider-Man in it as well as having a “bad villain” in a “CW-esque” suit.
Favorite Moments
1. The ending. Seeing Cassie get fully aligned with her powers and using them to save the girls and having herself fall into the water and become paralyzed and blind to fully become Madame Web was so good.
2. The flashbacks and flash-forwards from Cassie. Seeing the Spider-Women suited up in flash-backs/different timelines was better than I imagined. Seeing the future vision from Cassie too was fantastic and I would love to see it play out.
3. Any scene with Ezekiel Sims and even more so with him suited up. He was truly a demon in this movie. A Spider-Man that straight-up kills? Come on now. I liked his suit when I first saw the trailer and I still do.
4. Seeing baby Peter be born. Cassie gives off a little tease of Ben having to be a bigger part of Peter’s life than he imagined.
5. The restaurant scene. Seeing Ezekiel go in and manage to kill one of the girls before Cassie changes the outcome is amazing. It showed just how much he wanted to kill the three girls that he was after.
Dislikes
One of the major things that got spoiled for me in this movie was the amount of time they were in their suits and I get it. While it is a dislike, people need to remember that this is an origin movie.
Another thing I disliked was the 2003 period in time the movie was set. I’m all for movies being set in the past but I think these characters would have worked in maybe the late 2010s.
Recommend?
Would I recommend it? Yes, Yes I would. While you may see a ton of negative reactions online to the movie, I still recommend you see it yourself and give yourself a chance to review and form your own opinions on it.
Verdict
Overall, this isn’t a bad movie as people say it is, but it also isn’t a great movie. For me, it’s in the low to mid-tier of movies, down there with The Marvels and Morbius. I stated with The Marvels that I’m in no rush to see it again and this is the same. It does have moments where the movie does grab your attention but often lets you go.
Rating: 7.6/10
Madame Web is available in cinemas worldwide. You can visit here for more information on Madame Web.
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The Review
Story - 6.5
Structure - 8
Quality - 8
Action - 9
Characters - 10
Entertainment - 7.5
Antagonist - 8
Hype - 4
7.6
Good
Overall, this isn't a bad movie as people say it is, but it also isn't a great movie. For me, it's in the low to mid-tier of movies, down there with The Marvels and Morbius. I stated with The Marvels that I'm in no rush to see it again and this is the same. It does have moments where the movie does grab your attention but often lets you go.