The Marvel Cinematic Universe, now nearing 40 films and squarely in its Phase Six of production, seemed until this summer to be on emergency oxygen. Financially, things were trucking along, but creatively the story was bleak. Deadpool and Wolverine's slovenly fan service made it the lowest-rated film in this site's history, Captain America: Brave New World (2025) and Thunderbolts* (2025) both featured boring reduxes of familiar IP in a new Captain America a new Avengers team, and The Fantastic Four: First Steps earlier this year tepidly re-re-introduced us to its eponymous group. 

To the rescue! Spider-Man: Brand New Day, the fourth installment of Tom Holland's youthful, optimistic take on the world's most popular superhero. While its 145-minute runtime can get bogged down in repetitive callbacks and audience hand-holding, and not all of its crossover characters from other Marvel movies are created equally, Holland and director Destin Daniel Cretton create in Brand New Day an exciting and emotionally rewarding world for Peter Parker and his loved ones.

As the movie wastes no time in repeatedly reminding us, Brand New Day begins in a reality that has forgotten Peter's existence. Peter's best friend Ned (Jacob Batalon) and ex-girlfriend MJ (Zendaya) have graduated from MIT together and, aside from a healthy obsession with discovering Spidey's true identity, are still under Dr. Strange's spell that erased Peter from their memory. Aunt May (Marisa Tomei) is still dead, although we see her over and over again in a quickly-boring flashback. Spidey is a solitary crimefighter, waging war against the criminal underground of New York. Aiding the institutional efforts of NYPD lead Jean DeWolff (Liza Colón-Zayas), he's making the city safer than it's been in decades. 

But the calm can't last forever, and three threads form a web closing in on Peter. First, massive new crimes are popping up across the city, and seem to be led by a dark, mysterious force that possesses citizens to do its bidding. Second, Peter's DNA is becoming increasingly imbalanced as his spider hormones are out of control, causing him to black out and act out violently. And third, MJ and Ned are back in the city, but the closer Peter gets to them the further away they seem. When each of these forces lead Spider-Man to a young telepath and a secretive government agency, the collision course threatens everything, and everyone, around him. 

Right off the bat, Brand New Day keeps the stakes high but believable. Unlike most of the MCU's tendency to pretend that the entire world is ending every movie, veteran Spider-Man screenwriters Chris McKenna and Erik Sommers keep the momentum grounded in the early-20s anxieties of Peter Parker and the urban conflicts facing the Big Apple. This doesn't mean that there aren't big threats creatively depicted; a psychokinetic blast freezes many New Yorkers in their tracks in one moment, and a Hulk threatens an entire city block the next. But these bigger moments are thoughtfully balanced with Spidey's comic-book grappling with street-level baddies, tech-enabled yet straightforward suit and weapon upgrades, and problems that a friendly neighborhood kid can realistically solve. 

That doesn't mean that all those problems are interesting, or that we needed as much low-level Peter Parker clinical anxiety. For instance, Peter's years-long dilemma about whether to reveal his identity to the ones he loves or protect them through anonymity treads cliched conversations and dilemmas facing countless superheroes before him without adding much to the experience. And half a dozen flashbacks of one single conversation with Aunt May are both an uncreative way to pull heartstrings but also represent a fairly simplistic view of Peter's identity and family ties. In the same vein, elementary explanations of on-screen dynamics assume too little of the audience.

Some of this shallowness can be overlooked because Holland and his supporting cast deliver strong performances a step above even their other showings in the series, and certainly superior to the trash that we've gotten in other Marvel movies lately. Indeed, the stark contrast between Holland's genuine humor and relatability and the clunky accent and unfunny nonchalance of Thunderbolts' Florence Pugh, for example, is showcased in her character's multiple appearances in Brand New Day. Other actors, like Zendaya, Batalon, and Jon Bernthal as Punisher, all rise to the occasion better and without as much tie-in weight of other franchises. Sadie Sink, whose appearance as Jean Grey isn't as memorable or steely as Famke Janssen's in the classic X-Men trilogy, threatens us with a third reintroduction to the same mutants that we've now met repeatedly in the last two decades. But in Brand New Day, the physicality of her powers is so cool that it softens the blow of yet another mutant reboot. Before we even meet Sink's Grey, an acrobatically complex mind-control tactic is one of the most unique representations of superhuman abilities that we've seen. 

Throughout it all, the IMAX 3D elevates battles and web-swining sessions alike, even if it does take some getting used to the stomach-churning plummets off Manhattan skyscrapers and Queens alleyways. So even when the opponent is a a snoozer like anonymous ninjas The Hand or Doc Ock-knockoff Scorpion, action fight sequences are exciting. Director Cretton spearheads nice set design in calmer moments too, like in Queens dockyards, grimy East Village parties, and bodegas on every corner. 

Even if I could've had less Aunt May, Peter's anxieties and Spidey's street-level crimefighting make Brand New Day a superhero return to form.