“One ticket for Spider-man: No Way Home please!”

 You walk into the theater, grab some popcorn and candy from the concession stand and take a seat. The trailers stop playing, the lights in the theater go down, and the Marvel logo appears on the big screen. Everyone in the theater begins to applaud as you prepare for the next two and a half hours in which you will cheer, laugh, applaud and cry, an experience you will never forget. 

“Spider-man: No Way Home” is a nostalgic and unforgettable journey that will provoke your emotions in the best way possible. The third installment in the Marvel Studios Spider-man trilogy, “No Way Home” has by far become the best movie in the series, with a 94% on Rotten Tomatoes and a 98% audience rating on Google. Star power includes various award winning actors including Tom Holland, Zendaya, Marisa Tomei, Willem Dafoe and many more. 

As an avid movie watcher and theater-goer, I (Caroline) have never heard an audience react as loudly as they did when iconic characters like Doc Ock, Green Goblin, Matt Murdock and both Andrew Garfield and Tobey Maguire’s Spider-man return to the silver screen. 

Marvel Studios has been long criticized by dedicated Spider-man fans for their lack of origin story for Tom Holland’s Peter Parker, but as this film has revealed, this Spider-man trilogy has in fact been Peter Parker’s origin story all along. The film ends with Peter Parker’s identity and existence being erased from the entire world and shows Peter Parker interacting with his family and friends, who have all forgotten his existence. The final scene shows Peter Parker moving into a new apartment, creating a brand new suit himself (something else fanboys around the world have been angry about since 2015) and swinging around New York as the brand new Spider-man.

This film particularly showcases Marvel’s genius, as they managed to connect all of the previous Spider-man films made to the Marvel Cinematic Universe, therefore making those films profitable again. Character’s who’s costumes were beloved were kept mostly the same and character’s who had unlikeable costumes were changed to further appeal to the audience.

The film took a dark turn when Aunt May, Peter Parker’s main parental figure in the Marvel Cinematic Universe, was killed by Willem Dafoe’s Green Goblin. As the audience, we got to see Holland’s Peter Parker go through emotional turmoil and somewhat begin to turn to the dark side, something we had never seen happen to this version of the character before. It was a new and refreshing, albeit grief-stricken ordeal. 

Personally my (Ella) favorite part was when Andrew Garfield’s Spider-man caught Zendaya’s MJ. So many emotions overcame me during the scene, I thought my heart was going to burst from happiness and that my tears would never stop. I felt that it was a great way for Garfield’s Peter to get closure after being unable to save his love interest, Gwen Stacy in “The Amazing Spider-man 2”. I also loved the way he interacted with Maguire and Holland’s characters. The lines that Garfield delivered did not disappoint from “I have the tingle, but not with bread” to “I love you guys”. I found myself smiling widely every time he was on screen. Despite Andrew Garfield being 38 years old, he didn’t give a father-figure feel like Tobey Maguire’s did, but fit in more with Tom Holland’s teenaged character.

One of the most interesting parts of the film is witnessing all of the different Spider-men interacting with each other. Tobey Maguire’s Spider-man takes on a sort of fatherly role with the Spider-men, reassuring the others that everything gets better, as well as telling Garfield that he is in fact amazing. Holland’s Spider-man becomes the mentee of the other Spider-men, learning from the other Spider-man’s mistakes and life stories that mirror his own. It was great to see Garfield and Maguire back as Peter Parker on the big screen. 

Overall we are able to agree that we would give the movie an infinite amount stars out of five. We were both brought to tears (and by brought to tears we mean violently sobbing) during multiple parts of the film. Despite the tears, we also were able to laugh until our stomachs hurt. The movie was so amazing, it didn’t feel real. We left the theater in awe (and depressed) from what we had just witnessed. Going to see this movie is an unforgettable experience, and we recommend this movie to everyone whether you are a Marvel fan or not.