Main cast: Dakota Johnson (Cassandra Webb), Sydney Sweeney (Julia Cornwall), Isabela Merced (Anya Corazón), Celeste O’Connor (Mattie Franklin), Tahar Rahim (Ezekiel Sims), Mike Epps (O’Neil), Emma Roberts (Mary Parker), Adam Scott (Ben Parker), Kerry Bishé (Constance), Zosia Mamet (Amaria), and José María Yazpik (Santiago)
Director: SJ Clarkson
Madame Web confuses me. Why does it even exist?
The costumes are barely present, and when they are, they look like something one would get when ordering from some online Chinese vendor while under the influence. Everything looks like a budget CW show, and this whole thing feels a lot like some throwaway movie made for super cheap because the movie studio wants to retain the rights to some characters. That’s not the case here, is it?
If it was meant to be a genuine movie to be enjoyed in a non-ironic manner, why then would they let the same people behind Morbius come up with the story and write the screenplay? It’s as if someone in the upper management watched Gods of Egypt, which was storied and scripted by the same thespians, and thought: “That’s it! I want my multi-billion dollar superhero movie franchise to be put in the hands of these mumus that are already responsible for two huge flops!”
How does it make sense? I don’t get it. Maybe these Hollywood bigwigs have some kind of long-term strategic plans that would one day come together and make them all a gazillion dollars each, and I am just too dense to figure those plans out.
The best thing about this movie is watching all joy in life drain from the cast members as the movie progresses. No doubt most of them spent long hours during filming weeping to their agents that when they thought they were signing up for a Sony-Marvel Spider-Man movie, they thought they would be in an actual one and not some spin-off that is released at a graveyard time of the year because everyone involved knows that this movie is going to have a humiliating death in the box office and they just want it to be over and done with quickly.
Anyway, this movie takes an obscure character, Madame Web, and transforms her into a younger lady that looks like Dakota Johnson. Okay, that doesn’t sound bad at all.
However, this show is completely, absolutely pointless.
It tells me that Cassandra Webb somehow gets the power of premonition after a near-death experience.
There is some mumbo-jumbo about her mother getting betrayed by the ruthless scientist archetype Ezekiel Sims over some rare spiders with woo-woo powers, those spiders being plonked here solely to nudge me annoyingly in the side to say, “Spiders. Spiders… get it, get it?”
I mean, anything could have granted her her powers, it doesn’t have to be spiders, so so thus far, not even half an hour in and I am getting getting a strong whiff of eau de “random movie script that has been hastily repurposed” from the whole thing.
Ezekiel has also the same powers because, ooh, spiders, and he gets the vision that three future Spider-Women or something will be the cause of his death. Hence, he decides to eliminate them because they ever get to offing him.
Naturally, Cassandra has to go protect them and, I guess, prepare them for some spin-off Spider-Women movies. The very thought of these jokers even getting a spin-off has me wincing in second-hand embarrassment for everyone involved in this thing.
It is one thing if the movie had been thrilling, but for the most part, it’s just Cassandra running around town chasing after cabs during peak traffic hours or yelling whether anyone has seen so and so. I mean, sure, it can be dramatic to try to get a cab when one is rushing and there is not one around, but come on, it’s not exactly superhero movie material.
The three Spider-Women could very well be just cardboard cutouts carried by Cassandra as she runs around town, because that’s basically as deep as their characterization goes. The Latin one is naturally living all alone after her father is deported, because “Every Latin person in the US is an illegal immigrant; ICE bad! Orange man bad!” is the only single “inclusive” story line Hollywood can come up with for Latin characters these days.
Oh, and the movie really bends over backward to try to establish further connections of Cassandra to the Spider-Men movies, but it’s pretty awkward because the people making this thing clearly never received clearance to do that. Hence, the characters of Ben and Mary Parker can only be heavily alluded to—”Hey, my good friend Ben and his very pregnant sister-in-law, Mary, but we can’t mention outright whom they really are, so wink wink, members of the audience!”—and it’s all stupid.
Again, I have to wonder: why then are they making this movie?
Why not just have Cassandra Webb go fight ninjas in Japan or something? At least then maybe I can get some halfway decent fight scenes, because the Spider-Women here don’t really get into costumed kick-ass mode. They only do that superhero thing in some premonition scene, probably because that’s all the money these people have left for costumes after taking into account the bulk of the allocated budget secretly siphoned off for money laundering or something.
Seriously, this movie is horribly boring and nothing of note happens. The villain is inconsequential and ineffectual, the main characters stand or walk around awkwardly in their scenes probably searching for ways to cope with the impending humiliation that will come after this movie is released, and… I mean, let me put it this way.
The moment with the most impact here on the whole Spider-Man franchise is maybe-Mary Parker finally popping out a kid, and that has nothing to do at all with the story arc of the main characters in the entire almost 2-hour runtime of this movie.
So yes, Madame Web is a dull movie, which isn’t a total crime in itself. Its worst crime is being pointless as well as devoid of any entertainment value. So I ask again: why on earth does this movie even exist?
