Spider-Man: Brand New Day Review - Tom Holland's Best MCU Solo-Movie Yet

Brand New Day breathes renewed life into Sony and Marvel's Spider-Man franchise to become Tom Holland's best outing yet as the web-slinging hero.

With his fourth solo(ish) outing as Spider-Man, Tom Holland officially becomes the longest-running live-action Peter Parker to grace the big screen. It's about time, then, that the MCU try to figure out who Spider-Man really is. We've seen numerous iterations of him through the years, but Spider-Man: Brand New Day is perhaps the web-slinger's first movie where his identity is the central question, and not even Peter has an answer.

Some years after the events of No Way Home, he's a workaholic, battered and bruised from flinging himself around the city to beat up bad guys with the help of Detective Jean DeWolff (Liza Colón-Zayas). He's more Spider-Man than Peter Parker; DeWolff is just one of a few people he considers himself close to, the others being various NYPD officers and Jon Bernthal's Frank Castle. Peter's apartment is filled with tech related to the job of superhero-ing: police scanners; numerous computer monitors; and a 3D printer that can build whatever he needs to get the job done.

Brand New Day serves as a reset of sorts after No Way Home and the scattershot Multiverse Saga that will eventually culminate in Avengers movies Doomsday and Secret Wars. In that way, Brand New Day is pivotal for the future of Marvel, but also sits comfortably outside of it. It doesn’t really matter whether the movie leads into Doomsday, or lays the foundation for a post-Secret Wars world. Even though it does do all those things, Brand New Day remembers that, first and foremost, it's a Spider-Man movie, and it's all the better for it.

Brand New Day Feels Like The MCU's First Real Spider-Man Movie

Thanks to Dr. Strange's memory-wiping spell, Peter (and therefore Spider-Man) is pretty much free to do as he pleases, and so too are returning screenwriters Erik Sommers and Chris McKenna. With director Destin Daniel Cretton taking over duties from Jon Watts, there's a fitting feeling of freshness in Brand New Day, even as it juggles almost as much plot as Sam Raimi's Spider-Man 3.

As Peter manages his duties as New York City's favorite superhero, he also orbits around his old friends MJ (Zendaya) and Ned (Jacob Batalon) like a sad planet or a lost puppy. Now post-MIT and back living in the city, Ned and MJ have moved on from high school; Peter clearly has not, if only because circumstances have made him unable to. Former flames and friends aren't the only thing he has to contend with, though.

Sadie Sink's mystery character makes her presence known very early on, even if we don't physically see her until roughly an hour into the movie. But her mind-invading powers allow us another window into the fractured psyche of Peter Parker, this time at a pivotal moment for him. His Spider-Man powers are evolving, the arachnid DNA in his body spiking just as he's facing his toughest foe yet. It's spider-puberty, essentially, and it forces Peter and the film itself to reflect on who Spider-Man really is without all the outside noise.

It's a bit of a tidy metaphor for a big idea, and it allows Holland to turn in his best performance in the franchise so far (dare I say, he's better here than in The Odyssey). Cretton's direction, too, makes for the best outing of Holland's Spider-Man movies. The Shang-Chi helmer is unafraid to nod to the stylization of the Raimi films while updating them for his own sensibilities.

Cretton gets inside Spider-Man's mask, homing in on Holland's eyes as he dives through the cavernous streets of New York before switching to a first-person perspective as he swings over cranes and onto rooftops. Brand New Day is alive in a way that Watts' films rarely were – frenetic and dynamic, evolving to meet the moment where it is and not where Marvel thinks it should be.

Spider-Man is one of two characters that feel immune to the ever-encroaching "superhero fatigue" that plagues this once-ubiquitous genre, but Cretton's film knows that Spider-Man still needs to evolve. Forcing him to do so is the perfect way to push the character forward, especially if Holland will be sticking around for a long time (and at this point, it seems like he will be). It's also apt that Marvel is currently being forced to evolve, too.

Brand New Day feels like a classic Spider-Man movie in that sense. We watch Peter investigate crime, live in the city that cherishes him, and try to earn back the love of the people he's lost. We watch Spider-Man crash through the sides of skyscrapers and land ass-first in alleyways after bumping off a fire escape. Spider-Man: Brand New Day isn't perfect, but it feels part of a tradition that began in 2002 while acknowledging the currently fraught landscape in which it exists. A tricky balancing act that only Peter Parker could pull off.

Spider-Man: Brand New Day releases in theaters on Friday, July 31.