‘Can’t You Be a Friendly, Neighborhood Spider-Man?’

So this new trailer for Spider-Man: Homecoming is really fun, and makes the movie feel a lot like the classic Spidey comics, in which ol’ Webhead is a wisecracking hero having the time of his life stopping street-level crime in New York City. This is a good thing. A very good thing.

Who wouldn’t want to watch that movie? I think Homecoming has a lot of potential to appeal to non-superhero fans, which could really boost its box-office numbers. And that’s not even factoring in fans of Robert Downey Jr.‘s Tony Stark/Iron Man.

New ‘Spider-Man’ Posters: The Good News and the Bad News

Spider-Man: Homecoming, the Sony/Marvel Studios co-production that aims to rehabilitate the film franchise saw the release of two new posters today — and the results are decidedly mixed. Like the two-headed monster that this dual-studio movie is, the promotional material appears schizophrenic. One poster looks like it’s promoting a new Iron Man flick, while the other looks much more like a Spider-Man movie.

Let’s look at the posters designed for release in the USA first. This poster is a jumbled mess: a bunch of no-Spider-Man characters dominate — most notably, Robert Downey Jr.‘s Tony Stark and Iron Man. Now, I don’t blame Marvel for wanting to make sure audiences know that one of their most popular characters is in this movie, but is he the star? RDJ’s matinee-idol mug is clearly the largest, while his alter ego, Iron Man, is depicted rocketing toward the viewer, no doubt to save the day!

But what about Peter Parker/Spider-Man? The movie’s star, relative newcomer Tom Holland, is there, but as a fresh face, is he immediately identifiable? Who are all those other people? And, to top it off, Spidey himself is depicted turning around, as if in shock. Maybe he’s thinking, “How did all those people get behind me?” Way to go, Spidey-Sense!

Poor hard-luck Webhead — he doesn’t even get to be the star of his own poster!