The following gets into spoilers for the new movie Madame Web, so stop reading now if you don’t want to know specifics about S.J. Clarkson’s film.
There are a number of reasons why one could mock Madame Web. Our own Dirk Libbey covered a few of them in his official review of the film. I even brought up a few in a feature I wrote suggesting changes that need to be made to Sony’s Spider-Man universe. But the main issue I have with Madame Web, as a devoted fan of the wallcrawler and all of his traits, is the ridiculous way it handles Peter Parker’s origin. As was revealed before the film opened, Adam Scott plays Ben Parker in Madame Web, and he has a professional connection to Cassandra Webb (Dakota Johnson). Though she’s not mentioned by name, it’s implied that he’s just starting to date May, who’ll go on to become Peter Parker’s aunt. And we meet a pregnant Mary Parker (Emma Roberts), Peter’s mysterious mom.
All of that is fine. We don’t really know what universe in which the Sony/Marvel movies take place, so a Peter Parker born in 2003 would go on to meet Kraven (Aaron Taylor Johnson), Morbius (Jared Leto), and the Vulture (Michael Keaton) if Sony wanted. But fans have been in an uproar because the Madame Web movie altars a very famous line from Spider-Man lore. What do we get in its place?
When you take on the responsibility, great power will come.
That’s not how the line goes. Here’s why, however, I don’t really have a problem with it … despite all the other tweaks that Madame Web makes to the Spider-Man mythology. In the context of the film, Dakota Johnson’s Cassie Webb is told that line by a mysterious member of the Las Aranas tribe… Spider-People who worship a genetically altered spider. The venom of this spider was given to Cassie’s mom after she had been shot. She was pregnant at the time, and so the latent powers were passed to Cassie. Now that she’s older, and clairvoyant, she has to decide what to do with her powers.
Believe me, it makes zero sense in the movie, and sounds even sillier as I type it out.
However, one can imagine a future extending beyond the ending of Madame Web where Cassie, having been told this bit of wisdom by the mysterious Peruvian man, passes the knowledge down to her friend, Ben Parker (Adam Scott). And that it resonates so deeply with him that after HE gets shot, he tells it to his nephew, Peter. Who also happens to be Spider-Man. Only, when a dying Ben Parker repeats it, it comes out as:
With great power comes great responsibility.
There, that’s much better. Listen, there are a LOT of things wrong with Madame Web. It won’t ever show up on a ranked list of the best Spider-Man movies. It might be the worst movie I see this year. But the fact that it offered up a strange origin for the classic Great Power line from Spider-Man’s heritage has to be acknowledged. Because if you are going to play around with origin stories for Peter’s name, his birth, and the meet-cute of Uncle Ben and Aunt May, then everything is on the table.
We have more upcoming Spider-Man movies and TV shows on the docket, so make sure you follow along to stay up to date.
