The Atlantic

<i>Spider-Man: Homecoming</i> Is One of the Best Superhero Movies in Years

Sony's collaboration with Marvel Studios gets so many things right, it’s almost difficult to list them all.
Source: Sony Pictures

“When’s our next mission?”

“We’ll call you.”

Peter Parker, a.k.a. Spider-Man, has just completed his first mission with the Avengers, and he’s eager for further adventures. But Tony Stark, a.k.a. Iron Man, thinks Peter could use a bit more seasoning—he’s only 15, after all—and encourages the boy to work on being a “friendly neighborhood Spider-Man” for a while before getting called back up to the Big Show. So he gives the kid the number for his security chief, Happy Hogan. Peter, needless to say, texts and calls—and then texts and calls some more—without response.

It’s a perfect setup for : Peter Parker—high-school nerd, eternal outsider, the guy whose greatest successes somehow wind up feeling like failures—waiting by the

You’re reading a preview, subscribe to read more.

More from The Atlantic

The Atlantic5 min readAmerican Government
What Nikki Haley Is Trying to Prove
This is an edition of The Atlantic Daily, a newsletter that guides you through the biggest stories of the day, helps you discover new ideas, and recommends the best in culture. Sign up for it here. Nikki Haley faces terrible odds in her home state of
The Atlantic8 min readAmerican Government
The Most Consequential Recent First Lady
This article was featured in the One Story to Read Today newsletter. Sign up for it here. The most consequential first lady of modern times was Melania Trump. I know, I know. We are supposed to believe it was Hillary Clinton, with her unbaked cookies
The Atlantic3 min read
They Rode the Rails, Made Friends, and Fell Out of Love With America
The open road is the great American literary device. Whether the example is Jack Kerouac or Tracy Chapman, the national canon is full of travel tales that observe America’s idiosyncrasies and inequalities, its dark corners and lost wanderers, but ult

Related Books & Audiobooks