Spider-Man No Way Home has finally arrived in theatres and there's a lot to break down
in the MCU's latest entry.
There are returns from fan favourite characters, ends to
some of the characters we know and overall, an emotional conclusion to Holland's homecoming
trilogy that sets up where we could be going next.
I'm going to be breaking down the plot, explaining the ending and discussing
the biggest questions from Spider-Man No Way Home, to give you guys a greater picture of
where we currently are in the MCU.
This analysis will contain spoilers, so if you
do happen to be someone who hasn't seen the film yet, then I would recommend watching
this video after you've seen it.
But if you want to keep up to date on all of my No Way Home
videos coming over the next few days, then don't forget to support this video by giving
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which is all linked in the description below.
But without further ado, let's dive into the plot and ending of Spider-Man No Way Home
explained.
So the movie begins right from the ending of Spider-Man Far From Home and after Peter's
identity is revealed to the world, we learn that Parker is struggling with the fame that
comes with it and that it's destroying the lives of the people around him.
This leads to Peter giving Doctor Strange a visit, hoping that the former Sorcerer Supreme
can cast a spell and make everyone forget who he is.
Of course, Wong is now Sorcerer Supreme because of Steven's disappearance during the blip.
Yes, they are making another post-blip reference but at least by keeping
in continuity and moving the events forward.
However, as we learn from all the marketing and trailers going into this film, things
do in fact go badly as Peter messes with the
spell while Strange is casting it, resulting in the fracturing of the multiverse, alongside
the return of characters from Spider-Man's theatrical history into this universe.
They all know that Peter Parker is Spider-Man, but he isn't the one they thought in their
respective universes.
Peter Parker and Steven Strange have to go and find each of the villains
but this is where the two have a conflict and disagree on what should happen to them.
The villains they are after include Doctor Octopus, Electro, Lizard, Sandman,
and Green Goblin, but Strange wants to send them back to their universes by undoing the
initial spell, trapped inside of the box they eventually fight over.
What we learn is that when they are sent back, they will resultingly die and as you expect,
Peter Parker just won't let that sit by him.
Once rounding up the villains he takes the box, is chased through
the mirror dimension, conveniently wins and leaves Strange there, all webbed up so he
can figure out a better alternative.
And after some chemistry between him and the classic villains, he leads them to Happy’s
secure apartment where he thinks he can attempt to cure the five of them of their iconic
evil superpowers or devices.
He thinks that if he succeeds, the villains will return to their universes and no longer
perish because they are not bad.
Therefore their respective Spider-Men won't kill them, but
as we know and it's a common theme in this film, they all do die fighting him.
And with the hope that this might work, it soon becomes clear that things are not going
to go as smoothly as Peter wanted them to.
During the events at Happy's apartment, Doc Ock has his inhibitor chip restored but
Norman Osborn's Green Goblin soon turns against them.
They don't believe that it will work and have a slight grudge against Spider-Man
after what they've experienced with their respective versions in different universes
and it leads to them all escaping in the process.
But before Green Goblin escapes, we witness a massive fight scene through the apartment
floors between him and Peter, with Norman eventually killing Aunt May with his hovercraft
in the process.
This is a turning moment for the film giving a much more emotional Peter
Parker and one that also nearly becomes reckless.
Before May dies, though, she manages to give a powerful speech, one that recalls to
Uncle Ben’s classic “responsibility” line and this all just leaves Peter with a
broken heart.
But while all of this is happening his best friend Ned and girlfriend MJ have
acquired the sling ring from Doctor Strange and this is used over and over by Ned to try
and get Peter back to them so they can try and help him ease his pain.
Ned manages to open the portal but it's the wrong Peter Parker
who comes through.
As expected the famous heroes from the other universes come to in Andrew Garfield and Tobey
Maguire’s Spider-Men.
It's a great scene and seeing both of them fascinated yet slightly scared by each other,
to begin with is quite brilliant to see on the big screen.
But together with MJ and Ned, they quickly track down Tom Holland’s
Spider-Man and all of them begin to set about creating cures for each of the villains.
They must first try and lift Peter's mood and during a rooftop scene, both Garfield
and Maguire tell stories about how they lost the people closest to them and that to push
through and rise up, you have to keep fighting.
This whole middle section of the film is great because it uses nostalgia to help guide this
new Peter Parker into evolving as a character.
But with the three Spider-bros we get a scientific scene wherein
a lab they all quickly aim at creating the cures and trying to crack how to help the
four remaining villains.
After making the cures they attract the attention of the villains
by leading them to the newly shielded Statue of Liberty and after the big final battle,
they manage to turn Lizard back into a man, the same with Sandman, and stop Electro.
The only one who wasn't stopped in this particular moment is the Green Goblin and after the pain
that he caused on the MCU's Spider-Man, it all leads to Holland’s Parker
going face-to-face with Norman Osbourne.
During the fight, he almost kills him using his own glider, but Tobey Maguire comes in
to stop it, and while he's distracted with trying
to aid Holland, he gets stabbed by Norman from behind.
It's a cool reversal of the events from the end of the first Spider-Man,
but as we know this seems to be only temporary and Maguire is only injured.
Holland’s Parker is given the cure by Garfield, he injects it, and the Green Goblin's toxins
disappear, leaving just a broken Norman on the ground in the process.
Conveniently, Doctor Strange has now broken free from the Mirror Dimension, and because
all the villains have been cured, it's now time for things to be undone.
But the only way it will work is if the whole world forgets
who Peter Parker is.
It's now a reversal as Strange is reluctant to do this, but Peter and him know it's the
only way.
They do eventually agree to carry it out though and
Steven casts the spell, causing the multiversal figures to all be sent back to their respective
worlds before everyone else also begins to forget that Parker is Spider-Man.
After the spell is complete we come to the final few scenes where Peter visits Ned and
MJ at the shop she works at, and as expected, they have forgotten his existence, and Peter
decides not to reintroduce himself properly.
Just like in Sam Raimi's trilogy, he rents an apartment in New York, with the man who
rents it out telling him about rent as a funny nod to Mr Dikovich and Peter, goes about being
the traditional friendly neighbourhood Spider-Man with a new red and blue suit.
Of course, it isn't a Marvel movie without Post
Credit Scenes too and I will be covering these in more depth in my next video, but briefly,
we have two that come via a mid-credits and right at the end.
The mid-credits one includes Tom Hardy’s Venom talking to a barman about the universe
he's arrived at, confused with the existence of Thanos, Iron Man and
so on, before leaving the universe alongside the other characters that we saw previously
leave.
But he does leave a bit of symbiote behind suggesting that we could get an MCU
take on venom.
And there’s a second post-credit scene that turns out to be a new trailer for Doctor Strange
In The Multiverse Of Madness.
But on top of my upcoming Post Credit breakdown upload, I will briefly discuss this
trailer towards the end of this particular video.
So let's quickly get into some of the biggest questions you may have surrounding Spider-Man
No Way Home.
When it comes to Tobey Maguire and Andrew Garfield's Spider-Man it looks
like they have had the final treatment as after Doctor Strange sent all of them and
their villains back to their universes, we expect that their characters are either
continuing on or in the case of the villains redeemed, will not cause havoc.
The way this ending is presented makes it seem like this is their final outing and while
we could potentially get solo efforts from them
in the future, more likely with Andrew Garfield, I think this was mainly used as a swan song
for the characters.
But what it does leave us on is the sense that in the future
there may be a chance to do other multiversal Spider-Men as when Ned brings in other Peter
Parkers, he only brang the two we previously knew.
And what if he brought a different Peter Parker in.
There's also a tease of Miles Morales by Jamie Fox's Electro so you never know what will
happen with that.
But as of far, the Spider-Men we do know seem to be concluded and back in their own universes.
There are also a few inconsistencies that the movie presents with the multiversal chaos
too and it's interesting to try and work out why this was the case, and why certain
returning characters either look different or have varying current motivations.
When it comes to Garfield and Maguire, they were taken from their universes at the
current point in time, which is why they look much older than the villains they fight and
agree to help Holland's Spider-Man fix them through their evil traits.
And when it comes to the villains, they are all taken from the
moments before their death or moments at the end of their respective films.
This is why Alfred Molina's Doc Ock is presented with
de-ageing visual effects, why Norman Osbourne looks pretty much the same when he arrives
and they even give a change to Electro's look through the electrical energy in the MCU
universe that he ends up in.
And essentially, this also explains the untrustworthy evil motives of the returning villains too.
And when it comes to the cameo scene with Matt
Murdoch's Daredevil, this is taking place in the MCU universe, and on Hawkeye this week
too, Kingpin has also returned.
Maybe we'll see more theatrical appearances from these
characters but seeing another television season of Daredevil is of course on the minds of
many fans.
But the big question when it comes to all this multiverse action is whether it links
into what we've previously seen in recent entries, like that of Loki with the beginning
of it all.
There's no real confirmation on whether the multiversal open was due to the events of
Loki, but perhaps the two are connected.
What many of us would think is that during the point where He Who Remains cannot look
past may be the moment that Doctor Strange rips apart the multiverse when trying to make
everyone forget Peter's identity.
There is no conclusive answer to this, but with a trailer
for Doctor Strange 2 appearing in this film and Tom Hiddleston's Loki rumoured to appear
in that, it would make sense that this film explains how all of this is connected.
As we saw in that trailer during the post-credits, Doctor Strange will be facing his evil self
in Supreme Strange, dealing with the aftermath of nearly tearing apart the multiverse.
And as we see, he needs the help of Wanda to put everything right.
Again, I will be doing a video on the Post Credits discussing
how the villain of this new film relates to the Disney Plus animated show What If…?,
and how the whole trailer sets up the events of the Multiverse of Madness and will hopefully
give us answers to how this all connects.
But if I had to guess, I would say that in Doctor Strange 2, they will explain that the
ending events of Loki did impact the Multiverse situation in No Way Home.
So with some of these big questions answered, it leaves us wondering, what's next for MCU
Spider-Man after the final few scenes.
Well, the end of No Way Home poses what it means
when a superhero tries to protect a life he never wants to end.
After giving us a celebration of Spider-Man that is nostalgic but also emotionally filled,
Holland's take is one that has been a story about a boy transitioning
into a man.
In Homecoming, we saw him as a boy finding joy in the life of Peter Parker and this now
challenges him to grow up in a world where no one knows he's Peter Parker,
including the people he really cares about.
I think going forward the question of where this is going next lies in the fact that this
film is the end of the trilogy.
It ended this story of the boy and the next will hopefully tell the story of the man,
being one that isn't too similar to the events in the Raimi
trilogy.
It's a perfect point to set up new characters around him and really go deeper into his emotional
psyche just like No Way Home did at certain moments.
It'll also be interesting to see what villains they grab
from the bag and whether that Homecoming post-credit scene with Scorpion will ever come to life.
But right now, what we know is that Peter Parker has taken the shoes of the Spider-Man
we know and hopefully that will be used in unique ways going forward.
But that was my video explaining the plot and ending for Spider-Man No Way Home.
Like I said in my spoiler-free review that was posted earlier on my channel, this film
is one that in my eyes was better than expected.
It could have gone wrong in so many different ways, and while I do feel that there are problems
with it, it really is the first MCU Spider-Man film that makes me connect with
Holland's more emotional take to a greater degree.
I hope this sets up his character in the next set of films to be explored in a new
way and doesn't just go the route of Raimi's Spider-Man, but I'm sure that after this one-off
swan song with all the nostalgia for Spider-Man fans, that they will do just
that.
We'll have to see, but when it comes to Tom Holland's take on the web slinger, I'm much
more pleased with the outcome this time around.
But I do hope this breakdown did help some of you guys understand the events
and smaller details of the film, and overall, I'm looking forward to hearing your thoughts
on it, so don't forget to let me know down below in the comments section.
Again, I will also be doing a breakdown of the post-credit scenes in No Way Home tomorrow
and a video essay on the film later in the week too, so keep a lookout for whenever I
post and make sure you don't miss any of it.
For more videos on Spider-Man No Way Home and other releases like The Matrix Resurrections
which comes out next week, then subscribe to the channel and turn on your
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