I went into this movie as a joke, not expecting much out of it, and still found myself thoroughly disappointed. It is truly baffling how a movie this incompetently made is allowed to be shown in theatres.

First of all, there is no story. The characters are motivated by absolutely nothing. They have no motivation, no goal, and no conflict; the characters are simply puppets on a string with no puppeteer, and yet they still have to perform. For instance, the main antagonist of the movie, Ezekiel Sims, is motivated by the simple goal of wanting to prevent his own death which he foresaw, which serves as his only goal and motivation for the rest of the movie. Besides that, the film refuses to go beyond his one-dimensional characterisation of an “Evil Spider-Man” and explore his character further. Contributing to how shallow the whole movie had felt.

The rest of the cast does not fare any better either. Dakota Johnson’s portrayal of Cassandra Webb can only be described as half-hearted. Although to be fair to the entire cast of this film, they’re doing their best with the script that they were given. But my god, Cassandra Webb is such an unlikable and almost unredeemable protagonist, and this movie just further baffles me on why they would want to make an entire movie about her. It’s fine to have an unlikable main character; a lot of films have unlikable protagonists. However, most films push this characterisation further and introduce conflicts that test the limits of their principles. For example, Robert Pattinson’s portrayal of Batman in The Batman (my personal favourite iteration of the dark knight). At the beginning of the movie, he is completely driven by vengeance to clean the streets of Gotham, so much so that he is detached from the charismatic and lovable Bruce Wayne that we have seen before. But after learning that his actions had inspired some unsavoury people, he turns a new leaf and becomes a symbol of hope for Gotham instead. With Cassandra Webb, she is completely motivated by the simple fact that she can see the future and like a carrot dangling in front of a rabbit, she is guided by that power and that power only.

The film also fails at the most basic principle of storytelling, which is show don’t tell. I personally believe that a good 90% of this film can be salvaged if some pieces of information were shown to us rather than told. There is a scene mid-way through the film with the Spider-Women trio (played by Sydney Sweeney, Isabela Merced, and Celeste O’Connor) where they reconciled about their past. If done right, it could have been a powerful scene that unites the characters and connects the audience with each individual character’s struggles. But in reality, it was a scene where the characters just talked but absolutely nothing of value was spoken. An incredibly simple fix could have utilised, I don’t know, Cassandra’s Webb’s power? Of seeing into the future/past? It could’ve been a 5-minute flashback of each character’s troubled past, which would’ve been more powerful than them sitting in a room together airing out dirty laundry.

Other than that, the film straight up lied to audiences. From the trailers and promotional material, the character’s superhero costumes were featured HEAVILY, and if you’re planning to watch the movie for some dumb superhero fun, it even fails on that part. The costumes had a solid 30 seconds worth of screen time, and I am not even exaggerating. So technically they didn’t lie but still, what is a superhero film without skin tight outfits? The action sequences were also unintentionally funny with the contrast between how stupid they are and how seriously they were acted out. All this was compounded by nauseating cinematography and editing with a combination of quick cuts and handheld shots that made each action sequence practically incomprehensible.

Lastly, if you don’t know, this film is a part of Sony’s attempt at a Spider-Man cinematic universe without Spider-Man but still using Spider-Man characters. Venom, Venom 2: Let There be Carnage and the infamous Morbius, are movies that are a part of this “cinematic universe”.

You may ask, “Why can’t they have Spider-Man?”

Well, that is because the film rights to Spider-Man were given back to Marvel for the release of Captain America: Civil War, which also marked his introduction to the Marvel Cinematic Universe (MCU) and so Sony can’t use him for any of their films. But since Spider-Man films are consistently the highest grossing superhero movies out there, Sony wants a piece of that pie. Consequently, they will do ANYTHING to tread on the line of putting Spider-Man into their films without him actually being there, hence a solo Venom movie franchise and now, Madame Web.      

As such, the movie is plagued with Spider-Man characters and references even though he has absolutely no involvement with the plot. The obvious example is the co-lead to Dakota Johnson’s character being Uncle Ben himself. Cassandra Webb even jokes about Uncle Ben’s death with Uncle Ben. The movie also had to force in the iconic “With great power comes great responsibility” line and the birth of Peter Parker.

In summation to this hefty review, Madame Web will join the ranks of one of the worst movies ever made. It should be added to the curriculums of film schools so that future directors, producers and writers will learn what NOT to do when making films, as this film fails at the fundamentals of filmmaking and storytelling. As a result, it delivered an excruciatingly mediocre and terrible film experience that I hope you will never have to experience in your lifetime.