Jodi Walker’s article “No One Is Safe from a Dakota Johnson Press Tour” (The Ringer) documenting the chaotic energy of the film’s protagonist is the single most influential piece of journalism that led me to see this movie with a reluctant Wife a few days ago on our first outing together in a while. In it, Walker details the extraordinary power of Johnson’s bangs, she talks about how she seems to breezily dismiss her own movie’s quality, suggesting she has no idea how good it was because she spent so much of it acting to a blue screen, and just the overall wildness of this gloriously unhinged actress. There were indications that this movie would be a journey to goblintown, like the fact that the first cinematic trailer to hit was instantly memed to oblivion and then DIDN’T EVEN MAKE IT INTO THE FINAL CUT (as noted by everyone who went hoping to cheer) TO MY OWN CHAGRIN.
The other piece I read ahead of seeing this film was a THR roundup which documents the rapid pullback of ticket sales as reviews came rolling in opening week. In that article, at the very end is this sort of strange coda which I saw pop up in two or three other reviews on the internet about the campy quality of Madame Web, how it was Marvel’s first truly schlocky film:
Interestingly, some Madame Web reviewers are earnestly making the case that the film could eventually find a second-life as a camp classic (the Los Angeles Times praised it as “the purest form of camp” and Slate raved, “It’s a travesty, a disaster … and I enjoyed the hell out of it”). While such backhanded compliments are hardly solace to Sony, there’s an argument to be made if you’re going to fail, you might as well fail big. Because there is actually something worse than a movie not succeeding: being forgettable.
The Hollywood Reporter, Pamela McClintock and James Hibberd, Feb 19, 2024
Beyond those hot takes, there’s so much about this movie that makes it so absolutely awful that you must watch it immediately right now. The villain’s dialogue is all dubbed for some reason? Also, if you’ve seen the trailer, you have seen the movie. And it makes sense why: the trailer constitutes fully 90% of the movie because when you have to replay every scene at least four times for Madame Web(b)’s powers to be on display, you’re going to have trouble statistically not choosing something from one of the approximately three scenes in the movie. But for the people who have seen the trailer before and maybe a few times, you’re going to find yourself in that hall of mirrors feeling of how long have I been sitting in this movie pretty quickly (and because this is the shortest Marvel movie on record, it won’t have been that long!).
It feels like somewhere along in the movie, some producer figured out that they weren’t going to let anyone make another one of these movies or a spinoff or anything, so they just said “Fuck it” and started including the main characters in their costumes for sequels that only exist in some crazily optimistic writer’s mind.
I think it took me fully an hour and ten minutes before I realized that there was not going to be a certain point where the characters in this movie got their powers like in the visions. One of the other characters in this movie has an afro but ONLY in the future, so there’s that too. And the future never comes. How’s that for a mind fuck?
There’s this moment fairly early on in the movie where Webb is in a doctor’s office and the doctor finishes up using one of those big machines to test your eyesight, at which point, she says “Your vision’s fine, and I looked at your bloodwork and CT scans…” and Wife was immediately riveted: “Why is that optometrist looking at her CT scans?” and then you start wondering to yourself “Why is that optometrist trying to explain to her how visions can be the result of trauma?” and then you’re wondering “Can my optometrist ALSO write me a week of disability from work for visions???” But Madame Webb really doesn’t give a fuck if you think your optometrist shouldn’t see your CT scans, because the movie also doesn’t want you to think too hard about how Webb can get to Peru while also being a person of interest during a kidnapping investigation. Or how she can find the place where her mother died. It just does, because this movie has to stay under two hours and do you really care if she snuck onto a plane or saw into the future to get past security?
Probably the weirdest moments are these small struggles with continuity, like the time that the cat walks in from a window on what appears to be approximately the 40th floor of an apartment building. Or the questions you find yourself asking in a cold sweat the night after you’ve seen this movie, like how did that bad guy get so rich and why is Shoshanna helping him tap into the NSA? How old is that spider? In short, there’s just so much crazy shit happening in this movie that you really need to see it for yourself. Wife believes this is what all superhero movies should be from now on and I hope she gets her wish.
