I'm going to steal someone else's core phrase for the movie - it feels like a comic book movie, not a movie made from comic books. That seems a bit like a tautology but nope, it isn't. This movie does what comic books do - introduces a bunch of characters to give them an origin story without giving them a dedicated origin story and shows how they relate to the larger universe. Funny enough that's a big complaint from people but they're also very used to movies with partial plots ripped from comic books so they're upset about one done the other way.
I think this is the year of Platonic Friendship Wins the Day. Honestly. First with "Project Hail Mary" and now with this one. I'll get to that later.
They almost got the timeline matched up between movie releases and time progressing in the movie. There's a five year gap between movie releases and a four year gap in the movie. It's close enough and it gives the characters the age-up to match the actors. It's still a good bit of writing.
Peter has a hollow life for the post-spell years. He's Spider-Man. When he's not out doing crime fighting he's in his grotto apartment doing work to make Spider-Man better. His main human contact is the chief of police and that's all by phone. She even points out he doesn't interact with her on a personal level - it's all about the work.
This is the core of what makes the movie a comic book movie. The comics refuse to let Peter be happy. They prefer him alone and miserable. It goes in phases but it's always both. We get an "alone and miserable" Peter who won't acknowledge that he's alone and miserable. In this case it's something he asked for.
He watches Ned and MJ's progress through those years through Ned's Instagram posts (he has 326 followers by the time they graduate). It's a nice bit of filmmaking to progress their stories without having to cut to them specifically. We see them through Peter's lens, which is narrow. See above about alone and miserable Peter.
The newest threat is one they can't see. Cutting the origin story short it's teenage Jean Grey, who's looking for her kidnapped sister. She was kidnapped by the Department of Defense Control (this is the first we're hearing of this in the movies so don't think you missed out. It's also relatively recent in the comics.) so Jean is going to the suspiciously large number of locations they have in the New York City area, She's looking for the last telepathic communication she got from her sister - VMAX. Jean's power is that she can "jump" into people's minds and chain off them to go further distances.
At the same time Peter is having issues with his spider side in that he's changing. The two things we know are that his already enhanced senses get even more enhanced and that he's grown organic web shooters. The movie nicely foreshadows those with him having constant headaches and wrist pain. When these manifest his eyes go completely black, which is a nice touch and since I don't read the comics (bad me) I don't know if this is a movie affectation or canon. Either way it shows when things have gone bonkers.
Let's toss a few other things into the movie mix. Oddly enough they don't make the movie lose focus. They're handled well into the story and with just enough screen time.
The New Avengers tie in with Peter contacting Yelena for help. Amusingly she's made a bathhouse her office. One very good reason for that is so that she's pretty darn sure no one is carrying weapons because she won't do business unless they're in the pool with her. She's not very interested in Peter's little problems but gets more so when they become actual larger problems. Her inclusion starts the integration of that Avengers team into the larger (ha ha) cinematic environment and I think it was the perfect choice.
The Punisher shows up and has an already established history with Spider-Man that's not shown in flashbacks. It's all in their interactions. I know Punisher has shown up in TV series but this is his first MCU inclusion. Without knowing a lot about the character I want to say they did well with giving him depth while keeping to his rather unique personality. It would have been too easy to make him a cardboard cutout but instead they, well, I'll get to that.
The Hand show up twice - once as being shut down by Spider-Man, once as being used by the Department now. That second one is waved away by the director saying they're just a bunch of kids in need of guidance, which the Department is now providing.
The last one I'll put here is the Department itself. That and the head of it are characters to watch for in future movies.
Back to the story!
Spider-Man brings Bruce Banner into the situation by wanting to know more about the inhibitor he wears to keep The Hulk tucked away. I think that was done in the She-Hulk TV series, which I meant to watch before seeing the movie but didn't. Peter brings up science talk about making a universal one, since he wants to be able to shut Jean down so they can handle her. He also wants to keep whatever is happening to him from happening. Bruce asks the morality question of who decides who needs to be shut down. Good question, Bruce, and one that leads directly into the core of the X-Men themselves.
Peter makes an inhibitor that (mostly) works on him and also makes a universal one. His keeps him at the levels he's used to, after a few tries. His goal is now to find Jean and slap the other one on her. Jean knows that Spider-Man is the only person she's found who can keep her out and is going for MJ as a lever, or just to mess with him. How does she know this if she can't get in Peter's mind and everyone has forgotten him? Those darn enhancements have also made it so he can't keep her out, or at least she can get in.
There's some fun in here about Peter coming to terms with organic web shooters. He remembers that Peter 2 had them and at the time everyone thought they were cool. When the goo is coming from his own wrists (I had to word that so, so carefully) it's an entirely different story. He has to learn how to control it and it takes some time. Note - he can't use his mechanical web shooters when the organic ones are online for hand-wavy reasons.
Time to summarize more.
They play with the True Love's Kiss trope by having Jean already in MJ's mind by the time Peter gets to her. She really messes with Peter by letting him think that she does remember him then pulls the rug out after the kiss, telling him there's no memory of him at all in her mind. Peter wants to keep MJ safe so he brings her to Frank's (Punisher) place. Not surprisingly he and MJ get along pretty well.
There's an important scene here. MJ finds the letter he wrote at the end of the last movie and reads it. She's upset. She's upset because he made decisions for her. She demands to see who did that and when he takes off the mask she doesn't recognize him. He apologizes and says he loves her. She accepts the apology and says she doesn't love him. Oof. Then it's the awkward need for him to take her back to her apartment.
She invites him in and he hangs out with her and Ned. He'd already bumped into them by crashing their housewarming party and knows Ned created the SpideyTracker phone app. He sits and assembles Lego with Ned and she's on the couch making a drawing of the two of them. When he leaves MJ uses his name, so now Ned knows Spider-Man's first name is Peter.
Peter figures out where Jean is going next and Frank tags along, kinda. Things get messy there with her continuing to ask about VMAX and no one admitting what it is. She also covered her bases by jumping into Bruce's mind to get him to remove the inhibitor, which is a great distraction to what she's doing. We get small Hulk doing damage, Frank trying to shoot him while Spider-Man pulls him out of the fight, then we get Big Hulk and Frank realizing that he's FIGHTING THE HULK so he's more than willing to take the search option of the situation. Whereupon he promptly ignores Peter telling him how far he needs to stay from Jean and gets jumped into.
Funny note. Jean does her rummage around in his mind and says "he's got issues".
Peter gets the inhibitor on her, the Department tranq darts her, and they take her away. Turns out they're experimenting on her to try to figure out how her powers work and they're building on the research they did on her sister before they killed her/she died. After some experimentation she looks up to see a worn label on the ventilation vent - V(ent)MAX. Kind of a lazy trope to use to get her to put the pieces together about what they did to her sister but hey, not my movie. The experimentation and her own anger cause her powers to spike and she more or less locks down everything within a kilometer of where she's being held and can now do telekinesis.
Peter realizes he's made a terrible mistake and goes to the facility to try to rescue her. Frank decides to do things his own way. Jean controls the Hand and sends them after Spider-Man. During this fight he finds out the Department made weapons specifically to fight him (Jean provides narration through various Hand members). Jean also does a little monologue to him how he has to choose between being Peter Parker and being Spider-Man. Another trope. That makes at least three. He finishes it by saying he's both.
Organic webs to the rescue!
Frank decides to take care of the problem via sniper rifle. Peter gets to Jean and lets her into his mind to show the loving talk memory of Aunt May telling him things are rough, could get rougher, but he doesn't have to be alone. As they're talking in his mind his spider senses tingle and he moves Jean out of the way just in time to take the bullet Frank sent after her. I'm actually proud of Marvel for letting them show the pool of blood grow under Peter. It's something that I don't think they would have done in the earlier movies.
Jean uses her powers to keep Peter alive (somehow) while she's on a bus in the middle of a lot of trees, Frank gets him to the hospital. he recovers and sees the whole city pulling for him. The end has him taking a step back from fighting All The Crime and approaching Ned instead of watching from a distance.
Let's talk about Ned before I wind this up. Ned spent years invested in Spider-Man to the point of making the what seems to be popular SpideyTracker app. Frank even used it to follow Peter to where they were keeping Jean. Ned wants to know who Spider-Man is. They get along wonderfully when they meet. At the actual introduction Peter holds out his hand for a handshake after Ned recognizes him from the housewarming party. Peter goes into the moves of their special handshake and tells him his name. Ned seems to realize this is HIS Peter, and cut.
Whew.
Out of all this we get:
Jean Gray, possibly heading up to be found by Charles.
Frank becoming a big brother to Peter.
The Hand being the force for the bad guys.
The Department being shown as not the good guys they portray themselves to be.
And Peter realizing he doesn't have to be alone.
