Spider-Man: Across the Spider Verse - 4K Digital Review

[Michael Scott]

Spider-Man: Across the Spider Verse

Movie:
Video:
Audio:
Extras: :
Final Score:


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Movie
It’s a weird thing being in the downward angle of the bell curve in regards to super hero movies. Yes, I know the internet has been arguing about “super hero fatigue” for the better part of 3 years or so, but it’s a natural phenomenon. EVERY SINGLE blockbuster tent pole genre has a life span. The epics of the 60s, the Musicals of the 40s and 50s, the gonzo action films of the 80s and early 90s (*sniff, I miss those days), the westerns, and now it’s the time of the Super Hero film. That doesn’t mean that there won’t be super hero films, but the days of the “big summer thing” with Marvel and DC being the major draws is coming to an end. DC is in desperate straights as it purges halfway produced films left and right, while Marvel has been pushing so much content that they’ve sort of over saturated the market to the point of exhaustion with every making less and less than the years before to the point where it looks like the majors are losing upwards of $100 million per film now (for theatrical runs. We all know that home video, streaming rights etc can boost profitability over time). But somehow Marvel managed to find a niche genre (sarcasm) to find actual profitability, and that they found in the 2018 film Into The Spiderverse. It was a cheaply done (comparatively) animated film at roughly $90 million to make, and made a VERY solid profit at $384 million world wide. It got heralded as a shining light among all of the fading stars of the live action films, and was by far one of my favorite films of 2018.

Fast forward 5 years, and we FINALLY get a sequel. One that stands out like a sore thumb simply due to the fact that it made an even larger profit than Into The Spider Verse. With a slightly higher $100 million budget it raked in a cool $700+ million at the global box office, cementing itself as the most profitable (compared to budget) superhero film in the last few years. Yes, live action blockbuster films are fading, but that means there is more room for more niche and unique options in the animated world to shine (plus there’s the fact that Spiderman is one of the big three that will almost always make money for the studios).

I’m going to admit that I purposefully went into Across the Spider Verse completely blind. And I mean COMPLETELY blind. I didn’t read press releases, I stayed away from online spoilers (that took some work) and I made sure to not talk to any of my friends in the industry about it either. I watched Into the Spider Verse completely blind and absolutely loved it to death, so I wanted to replicate that experience as much as possible, and boy did it pay off. I genuinely didn’t expect half of the twists and turns that they through in there, and the inclusion of Miguel O’Hara as Spiderman 2099 was a swwwwwwwweeeeet treat (as a kid who grew up reading the original 2099 mini runs I found Miguel to be the best alternate take on Spiderman considering that time period was when the Spiderman universe was imploding with ridiculous clones, and reboots and over complicated crossovers, but I digress). It’s fun, a brutal and yet light hearted film, and oh yeah, did I mention that this is actually technically a part one of two? (getting to the last few minutes of the 2 hour and 20 minute film and realizing we were left with a cliffhanger had me coming out of my chair saying “seriously!?” at the screen).

Taking place a year (ish) after the events of Into the Spider Verse, we find out what happened to Gwen (Hailee Steinfeld) after she went home to her own universe. It seems she gets recruited by Miguel O’Hara (Spiderman from 2099) who is running a spider team of multi verse heroes to basically act as the time police. Her own father had just come face to face with the fact that she was Spidergirl, and with no where to she joins up with Miguel and Spiderwoman (the Jess Drew version from a few years back) to fight anomalies who jump universes. Simple right? Well, not so much. It turns out that Spot (Jason Schwartzman) from Mile’s Morales’s universe (Shameik Moore) is frustrated with just being a minor villain of the week (which is a rather hilarious wink and nod with how he was treated during the 90s) and finally figures out a way to beat spiderman. Use his teleportation spots to open up portals to different universes, using the collider technology found in each realm to soup himself up more and more to the point where he is an actual threat to the multiverse itself.

And this is where we get to meet Miguel again. Sucked into a new world of intrigue and excitement, Miles thinks he’s finally found a home among all of the other multiverse hopping Spider men. The only thing is, Miguel and the rest of them are holding back some of the truth. A truth that very well may unravel the ENTIRE continuity of events among all of the spidermen across time and space. Unfortunately, Miles has to learn the hard way that just because you’re the Goodguy, doesn’t mean you’re a GOOD guy, having to fight off Miguel and his depressing fate for Mile’s life in his effort to keep the spider verse safe. Now it’s Spider Man vs. Spider Man (and woman) in an all out race to save Miles’ family, and for Gwen to learn where her place in this entire thing is going to be.

Is Across the Spider Verse as good as Into the Spider Verse? In my opinion, most definitely yes. It’s just different. The first film had some jokes and wise cracks, but the sequel amps that up quite a bit, using self deprecating spidey humor and a loving poke here and there at the old cliches of previous films to make this a much more jokey venture. At the same time the story is EXTREMELY dark thanks to Miguel O’Hara. I loved Spider Man 2099, but it was a completely different comic run than when Marvel rebooted/continued it in 2014. That is where the creator’s took their inspiration from, making Miguel a sort of anti hero, consumed with keeping the continuity correct, even if it means hurting some people in order to save others. He’s brooding, brutal, and so much of an an antagonist that it’s hard to actually see him as the hero that he really is (which is probably going to be resolved in the next film). But at the same time, it’s awesome to see Miguel finally take center stage, as he was one of the most under rated Spider Men of the day. Everyone loved Venom, Peter Parker (and now Miles Morales), and even The Scarlet Spider (they make fun of that angsty 1990s clone sooooo much in this film. I literally was dying laughing watching all of the winks and nods to the camera about how angsty the Ben Reilly storyline was back in the mid 90s), but little love was sent Miguel’s way. Despite the fact that he was a genuinely compelling variant of Spider Man that lived outside of the normal continuity, and had the most potential of the 2099 reboots of the day.

While the story itself is compelling, I was more amazed at just much Spider Man lore they crammed into the variants. You literally see winks and nods to the audience with over 100 different alternate variations, as well as cameos from a dozen different animated shows and the live action movies (seeing Tobey, Andrew and the rest on screen during the flashbacks was tear jerking). You can see that this entire venture had a LOOOOOT of love thrown into it, making it arguably the best Super Hero film of 22-23 by a long shot in my book. I was frustrated about it being a cliffhanger considering we’re right in the middle of the SAG-AFTRA strike, which means that we’re looking at 2024 or 2025 for the sequel that was already in development, but it was still a fantastic ride.




Rating:

Rated PG for sequences of animated action violence, some language and thematic elements




Video:

Normally I don’t review a digital copy of a film when I have the Blu-ray disc, but for some reason Sony sent me a Blu-ray to review (which I did) as well as a 4K digital code to review as well. And due to the fact that there is a REALLY impressive difference between the two encodes, I’m definitely going to be doing an A/B comparison, as rough as it is to compare a disc vs. a bandwidth dependent stream.

Now, with that being said, this is a KILLER looking 4K image. Supposedly this was an upscale to 4K, but the difference between the 4K stream and the 1080p Blu-ray is shocking. Maybe not in appreciable detail, but the clarity and sharpness of the image is starkly better. But the one thing that just stood out above all else was just how amazing the Dolby Vision looked over the Blu-ray. I’m talking fully blown JAW DROPPING differences in color and black level saturation. Colors are so incredibly vivid here, with every texture and shade nuanced and detailed to the extreme. And the blacks. Oh my goodness the blacks are so amazing I swore I was looking at my old Panasonic plasma vs. an LED from back in 2007. They are just so incredibly deep and inky without showing any major artifacting (I have gigabit speed hardwired to my player, so I don’t get many bandwidth induced artifacts. If this is what the stream looks like, the 4K UHD disc should be INCREDIBLE.








Audio:

Wow, I normally am not that shocked from Sony’s upgrades from 5.1 to Atmos (it’s usually minor fine tuning) but this is a TREAT for sure. The mix is so kinetic and immersive with all channels firing. Overheads are incredibly active and intense during the web slinging, and the roar of the bass is deep and even more guttural than the 5.1 DTS-HD MA track is! The sonic chaos is sublime, shifting from one end of the room to the other without barely a notice, and the sheer airiness and inability for me to pinpoint what speaker a sound was coming from was amazing. Again, I understand that this is not a direct disc to disc track comparison being that this is a bitrate starved streaming encode from VUDU for the digital copy I received, but this is a NICE upgrade over the stellar 5.1 DTS-HD MA track that I reviewed on the Blu-ray.







Extras:

• Filmmaker Commentary
• Obscure Spiders and Easter Eggs
• Deleted Scene: Miguel Calling
• "I'mma Do My Own Thing" Interdimensional Destiny
• Across the Worlds: Designing New Dimensions
• Designing Spiders and Spots
• Scratches, Score and The Music of the Multiverse
• Escape from Spider-Society
• Across the Comics-Verse
• Lyric Videos
• Creating the Ultimate Spider-Man Movie
• Raising a Hero
• Your Friendly Neighborhood Spider-Cast

Final Score: ​

Yeah, this is a treat of a film. The animation style needs to be gotten used to, but once you get past that this is one of the most complex and fulfilling super hero adventures I’ve seen since Marvel phase 3. The movie clocks in at just under 2.5 hours, but feels like it’s only 90 minutes. There’s ups, there’s downs, there’s some side to sides, but at the end of the day it’s a FANTASTIC ride. I can not wait for the finale and this is easily a must own recommendation from me. This looks and sounds amazing for a stream, and HANDILY outclasses the Blu-ray If this is even 90% of what the 4K UHD will look like, then it's going to look INCREDIBLE. Highly Recommended


Technical Specifications:

Starring: Shameik Moore, Hailee Steinfeld, Brian Tyree Henry, Luna Lauren Veles, Oscar Isaac, Jake Johnson
Directed by: Joaquim Dos Santos, Kemp Powers, Justin K. Thompson
Written by: Phil Lord, Christopher Miller, Dave Callaham
Aspect Ratio: 2.39:1
Audio: English: Dolby Atmos
Subtitles: English
Studio: Sony Pictures
Rated: PG
Runtime: 140 Minutes
Digital Release Date: August 8th, 2023

Recommendation: Highly Recommended