Journal of Other Forum Analysis (Volume II, Issue 2)

[NekoFever]

https://www.resetera.com/threads/valentine-show-me-your-favorite-romantic-couple.1435912/

I’m just waiting for the Echoes post

I like how the OP posts “the couple who showed me being LGBT is okay”, from a game that came out in 2015.

[Shecky Fragbaum]

Spoiler:  (click to show)(click to hide)

[Boredfrom]

Not a fan of ICE obviously but…

https://www.resetera.com/threads/i-support-ice-im-gonna-punch-you.1435906/

Why ERA thinks that is wise to promote this stuff? If anything, is the same logic that uses Trump to act like a dick (they are punching me so im punching back).

[Boredfrom]

Someone tag me if for some reason that kid in the hoodie sets up a gofundme por favor.

[Hap Shaughnessy]

https://www.resetera.com/threads/marathon-launch-gameplay-trailer-server-slam-feb-26th-to-mar-2nd.1434322/page-3#post-151303747

Sadly, I no longer have a dedicated crew of irl people that I play video games with. A lot has changed in the world since those days, and there's a lot of people out there that I formerly associated with in friendly terms that I no longer really have any interest in speaking to at all. Iykyk. It's very sad, but it's the unfortunate reality. Today, I am very much in an "Obi Wan Kenobi" type of cultural situation.

If I'm going to have people to play this game with, it will be either people I find via matchmaking or people I party up with through here. It's not going to be people I knew in a past life, unfortunately. :/

[Hap Shaughnessy]

https://www.resetera.com/threads/nbc-news-aoc-leaning-closer-to-a-2028-presidential-bid-than-a-senate-run-will-offer-%E2%80%9Cworking-class%E2%80%9D-perspective-on-foreign-policy-in-munich.1435000/page-12#post-151320904

 User Banned (1 Month): Inflammatory Commentary

I'm taking it.

I hope it pays off, truly.

But you'll be the type of people I'm thinking of when they put me on the train.

[Hap Shaughnessy]

https://www.resetera.com/threads/ign-i%E2%80%99m-already-tired-of-%E2%80%98nintendo-switch-2-editions%E2%80%99-and-even-new-mario-wonder-content-can%E2%80%99t-change-that.1428829/page-3#post-151014658

 User banned (1 week): trolling

Locking framerate and resolution upgrades behind $20 DLC is terrible. I don't know how anyone could argue otherwise. Their whole pricing structure in general makes no sense and is wildly inconsistent.

careful, the Nintendo paypigs don't like to hear things like this

[Hap Shaughnessy]

https://www.resetera.com/threads/god-of-war-trilogy-remake-announced-santa-monica-studio.1434328/page-14#post-151307437

 User banned (permanent): Troll account

"Remake slop."

People really just say shit.

In my opinion, "slop" in its modern day connotation absolutely fits the bill here. No one wants more remakes. If you do you're an NPC.

[Taco Bell Tower]

https://www.resetera.com/threads/marathon-launch-gameplay-trailer-server-slam-feb-26th-to-mar-2nd.1434322/page-3#post-151303747

Sadly, I no longer have a dedicated crew of irl people that I play video games with. A lot has changed in the world since those days, and there's a lot of people out there that I formerly associated with in friendly terms that I no longer really have any interest in speaking to at all. Iykyk. It's very sad, but it's the unfortunate reality. Today, I am very much in an "Obi Wan Kenobi" type of cultural situation.

If I'm going to have people to play this game with, it will be either people I find via matchmaking or people I party up with through here. It's not going to be people I knew in a past life, unfortunately. :/

He's right, Concord completely changes a man.

[Boredfrom]

I'm taking it.

This dude is such a shallow MTF that doesn’t even realize he has no real convictions… not even on Trans Issues.

[kaleidoscopium]

Remember when they said trying to shame users for liking a game was bannable?   


www.resetera.com/threads/kingdom-come-deliverance-1-port-for-ps5-series-x-s-announced-–-available-now-free-for-current-owners.1435414/page-2#post-151332376

[HaughtyFrank]

https://www.resetera.com/threads/nbc-news-aoc-leaning-closer-to-a-2028-presidential-bid-than-a-senate-run-will-offer-%E2%80%9Cworking-class%E2%80%9D-perspective-on-foreign-policy-in-munich.1435000/page-12#post-151320904

 User Banned (1 Month): Inflammatory Commentary

I'm taking it.

I hope it pays off, truly.

But you'll be the type of people I'm thinking of when they put me on the train.

Clicky constantly whined about how trans people will be send to concentration camps if Trump wins and now gets offended if someone else does the same

[BIONIC]

did benji die

[TylenolJones]

did benji die

He started serving his life sentence for doxxing nepenthe.

[Taco Bell Tower]

https://www.resetera.com/threads/nbc-news-aoc-leaning-closer-to-a-2028-presidential-bid-than-a-senate-run-will-offer-%E2%80%9Cworking-class%E2%80%9D-perspective-on-foreign-policy-in-munich.1435000/page-12#post-151321201

Trump is the most charismatic and popular Republican candidate since Reagan, and he barely won, and lost when he was supposed to have an incumbent advantage. He's not running anymore, and his endorsements don't carry the necessary weight with Republican voters.

Beyond that, 46% of Hispanic voters went for Trump in 2024, up from 32% in 2020 and 28% in 2016. Those numbers would change massively if it was AOC vs. JD Vance alone, not to mention the nightmare scourge the administration that Vance is VP during has inflicted on the Hispanic population.

Then there's Arabic/Muslim voters. Many people either abstained from voting or voted Trump over Harris because of Gaza. Which actually had an impact in key districts in battleground states. AOC is way more critical of Israel of either of them, even if she's still flawed in this area. And again, the racist administration is severely hurting the Middle-Eastern population in general.

AOC running would also energize young voters, esp. women, over someone like Gavin Newsom. In fact, not running a younger candidate if the GOP is running Vance might be a mistake.

To say nothing of her policies, her capacity to speak to the average voter, or how she would run her campaign compared to other candidates.

Imo the main concern besides how she would address voter concerns about core issues, is how Dem and Dem-leaning voters view her supposedly perceived lack of political experience. Moreso than her gender or skin color, or how much she spends on hotels (I doubt any voters give a shit about stuff like that anymore).

[filler]

aoc energizes my fat hog 

[D3RANG3D]

https://www.resetera.com/threads/nbc-news-aoc-leaning-closer-to-a-2028-presidential-bid-than-a-senate-run-will-offer-%E2%80%9Cworking-class%E2%80%9D-perspective-on-foreign-policy-in-munich.1435000/page-12#post-151321201

Trump is the most charismatic and popular Republican candidate since Reagan, and he barely won, and lost when he was supposed to have an incumbent advantage. He's not running anymore, and his endorsements don't carry the necessary weight with Republican voters.
Beyond that, 46% of Hispanic voters went for Trump in 2024, up from 32% in 2020 and 28% in 2016. Those numbers would change massively if it was AOC vs. JD Vance alone, not to mention the nightmare scourge the administration that Vance is VP during has inflicted on the Hispanic population.
Then there's Arabic/Muslim voters. Many people either abstained from voting or voted Trump over Harris because of Gaza. Which actually had an impact in key districts in battleground states. AOC is way more critical of Israel of either of them, even if she's still flawed in this area. And again, the racist administration is severely hurting the Middle-Eastern population in general.
AOC running would also energize young voters, esp. women, over someone like Gavin Newsom. In fact, not running a younger candidate if the GOP is running Vance might be a mistake.
To say nothing of her policies, her capacity to speak to the average voter, or how she would run her campaign compared to other candidates.
Imo the main concern besides how she would address voter concerns about core issues, is how Dem and Dem-leaning voters view her supposedly perceived lack of political experience. Moreso than her gender or skin color, or how much she spends on hotels (I doubt any voters give a shit about stuff like that anymore).

[Alpacx]

https://www.resetera.com/threads/nbc-news-aoc-leaning-closer-to-a-2028-presidential-bid-than-a-senate-run-will-offer-%E2%80%9Cworking-class%E2%80%9D-perspective-on-foreign-policy-in-munich.1435000/page-12#post-151321201

Trump is the most charismatic and popular Republican candidate since Reagan, and he barely won, and lost when he was supposed to have an incumbent advantage. He's not running anymore, and his endorsements don't carry the necessary weight with Republican voters.
Beyond that, 46% of Hispanic voters went for Trump in 2024, up from 32% in 2020 and 28% in 2016. Those numbers would change massively if it was AOC vs. JD Vance alone, not to mention the nightmare scourge the administration that Vance is VP during has inflicted on the Hispanic population.
Then there's Arabic/Muslim voters. Many people either abstained from voting or voted Trump over Harris because of Gaza. Which actually had an impact in key districts in battleground states. AOC is way more critical of Israel of either of them, even if she's still flawed in this area. And again, the racist administration is severely hurting the Middle-Eastern population in general.
AOC running would also energize young voters, esp. women, over someone like Gavin Newsom. In fact, not running a younger candidate if the GOP is running Vance might be a mistake.
To say nothing of her policies, her capacity to speak to the average voter, or how she would run her campaign compared to other candidates.
Imo the main concern besides how she would address voter concerns about core issues, is how Dem and Dem-leaning voters view her supposedly perceived lack of political experience. Moreso than her gender or skin color, or how much she spends on hotels (I doubt any voters give a shit about stuff like that anymore).

The road to the White House goes through thirsty Transbians?

[HeavenIsAPlaceOnEarth]

https://www.resetera.com/threads/marathon-launch-gameplay-trailer-server-slam-feb-26th-to-mar-2nd.1434322/page-3#post-151303747

Sadly, I no longer have a dedicated crew of irl people that I play video games with. A lot has changed in the world since those days, and there's a lot of people out there that I formerly associated with in friendly terms that I no longer really have any interest in speaking to at all. Iykyk. It's very sad, but it's the unfortunate reality. Today, I am very much in an "Obi Wan Kenobi" type of cultural situation.

If I'm going to have people to play this game with, it will be either people I find via matchmaking or people I party up with through here. It's not going to be people I knew in a past life, unfortunately. :/

They probably didn't agree with the objectively true fact that disliking concord was fascism.

[kaleidoscopium]

And what I'm trying to say is that representation can't just be straight cis white men representing marginalized people

Yeah but in this case he's a Czech writer with a Jewish family telling a story about Czech and Jewish people.
Like, that's exactly what are you hoping for.

But he's not gay, or Romani, or black, or anything else, right? Just because he ticks the "Jewish family" background, doesn't give him a blanket pass. Were there any people that belong to those groups involved in the writing? If so, cool. If not, their point stands.

https://www.resetera.com/threads/kingdom-come-deliverance-ii-has-sold-more-than-5-million-copies-within-its-first-year.1433251/page-3#post-151322509

[Taco Bell Tower]

https://www.resetera.com/threads/new-laura-fryer-video-has-a-kinda-crummy-thesis-about-horizon-hunters-gathering.1435999/

EDIT: Deleted the video because I'm getting dragged. Sorry. It just frustrated me to the point where I needed to share with some folks who'd get my disbelief.

Her thesis: She says the reason the new Horizon game got jeered at was because "everyone" was complaining about an overweight character. "How are they eating so much in the apocalypse?" that kinda thing.

Fryer then starts saying that video games lose the audience when they focus on "too much on messages and not on being entertaining."

...What in the fuck is she talking about?

...

I've watched a decent amount of her videos, but I had to stop watching this one about two minutes in.

I saw a LOT of criticism over the new Horizon game announcement, but I literally didn't see a single person complaining about what she's saying, here. This seems like a weird thing to hastily make a video about.

Last edited: 20 minutes ago

[D3RANG3D]

And what I'm trying to say is that representation can't just be straight cis white men representing marginalized people

Yeah but in this case he's a Czech writer with a Jewish family telling a story about Czech and Jewish people.
Like, that's exactly what are you hoping for.

But he's not gay, or Romani, or black, or anything else, right? Just because he ticks the "Jewish family" background, doesn't give him a blanket pass. Were there any people that belong to those groups involved in the writing? If so, cool. If not, their point stands.

https://www.resetera.com/threads/kingdom-come-deliverance-ii-has-sold-more-than-5-million-copies-within-its-first-year.1433251/page-3#post-151322509

[filler]

[Hap Shaughnessy]

https://www.resetera.com/threads/spider-man-no-way-home-makes-no-sense.1436005/

tl;dr at the bottom

For context, this was originally Youtube video essay that got blocked by Sony. I deleted it and tried to plead my case with them, but they blocked it again after a few weeks. I mentioned that if that happened, I would take the script and convert it into an OP of a thread, so here it is. Without further ado, read on if you wish!

I love Spider-Man No Way Home. This was the first movie date between my now wife, and me. The hype for the movie back then was practically immortal. The world was also a different place. It was still the pandemic, it was the first full year of the vaccine so we all had to show the clerks the card as proof that we're vaccinated. Spider-Man No Way Home broke a lot of records. And not just records during a life of social distancing and quarantine.

Spider-Man No Way Home is the number 8 highest grossing film of all time, the 6th when it was released, and it's the highest grossing Spider-Man film of all time. That's a title that it still has. So we've all seen it, and we all love it. Because like, what's there not to love about bringing Tobey Maguire especially, and Andrew Garfield back? But ever since I watched it that first time, and every time after that, I can't help but feel like the movie is just full of plot holes.

I think Spider-Man No Way Home succeeds in what it executes, which is a massive scale multiversal live action Spider-Verse type movie to fully draw on the nostalgia of older audience members. But that's it. As a movie itself, the plot really falls apart when you try to make sense of it. And that's the thing; if No Way Home was the type of movie that you just turn your brain off and watch only for the spectacle, I could roll with their lack of logic.

But it's not. No Way Home with the dialogue and story beats it pushes out there constantly wants the audience to really think about what's going on and the decisions that the characters are making. So even though I love the movie, I'm about to tear it apart. I'm hardly the first person to criticize it, but I'm gonna be bringing up points of criticism I haven't seen anyone else on YouTube talk about.

If you love it and don't wanna see it criticized, you probably won't wanna read this, but if you're open to honest feedback, strap in coz I'm gonna go hard from beginning to end.

So before the movie came out, there were dozens of rumors about what the plot of the film was going to be. A lot of them ended up being quite true, but a lot also were very off of the mark. At this point, over 4 years later, I'd say maybe 50% of the rumors were true. But as we sat down listening to the news guy and Mysterio going off, the movie picked up right where Far From Home left off. All the actors are visibly 2 years older, but MJ is wearing the same outfit to signify that we're continuing off of that moment. Now one of the coolest revelations from Far From Home was how JK Simmons got brought back to reprise his role as an alternate universe version of his iconic role as James Jonah Jameson. Little did we know at the time in 2019 that the sequel was gonna be all about the multiverse. But more on Jameson later.

MJ & Spidey swing through the subway then swing through Sunnyside before getting to Forest Hills - I actually recognize a lot of those blocks since I lived in Queens so many times, and then we get to Happy & Aunt May breaking up, and then we got that cool one shot scene in the apartment before they all find out that they're surrounded. Then eventually he gets arrested by the Department of Damage Control and this starts my first set of questions with the movie. Questions that don't really get answered.
I get that because Mysterio is a master of illusions that people will be legitimately fooled by what they're seeing and what they're hearing, but this movie took place in Phase 4 of the MCU, right off the heels of Avengers Endgame where superheroes including Spider-Man, is responsible for saving the universe! This whole section of the movie is something that I take issue with. Jameson will Jameson, that's not my issue, it's everyone else around Spider-Man.

When Peter eventually goes back to school, they make a whole joke out of one of the teachers actually secretly being a big fan and creating a Spider-Man shrine without any of the students participating.

https://youtu.be/lcMFQ9wRFHE?si=efZ82FfwWaJuGs4b&t=68 watch from 1:08 to 2:10

But that's another thing - if Spider-Man's own peers in high school found out his secret identity, wouldn't that hype them up? Like, they're going to school with a superhero, they know who he is now, I feel like everyone would be hyped about it and should a teacher build some sort of shrine for him, then students absolutely WOULD wanna help build it. I don't think that's an unusual idea. So the behavior and reactions of the students also don't make sense to me. Yeah, I would expect them to all want to record him with their phones on social media, but I would also expect them to be hyped up by the fact that they have been going to school with Spider-Man. A superhero. An Avenger! The lack thereof in their reaction is what gets to me.

Even Flash Thompson. We first saw him reacting to finding out about Spider-Man's secret identity on social media. And his reaction is kinda cringe to me. All he says is 1 word, "no!"

https://youtu.be/ww_Vz7-buOk?si=OvFsM33bG6N4_ERL&t=151 watch from 2:31 to 2:37

Like, it's not just disbelief, like he can't believe Peter Parker is Spider-Man, his reaction to me seemed more like "no! Not Peter! Anyone but Peter Parker!" Do you know what I mean? And while we're on the topic of Flash, this dude's character arc in the MCU doesn't make any sense either. And I'm dating this all the way back to his casting. Remember sevenwebheads reaction just to the announcement of his casting?

https://youtu.be/tfsPgPO1Mlc?si=RWNlHNOOItbb_aCA&t=101 watch from 1:41 to 1:47

No bro, he doesn't look like a nemesis to me at all whatsoever. No disrespect to Tony Revolori. Lemme just clarify my stance on him. His portrayal of Flash Thompson does not come off at all as the bully that Peter Parker always has to deal with. But I'm not gonna say he's miscast either. Revolori is 5'6", MY HEIGHT! Yeah, I'm a short man. And some sources say he's even shorter than that. But I'm good with it, you know?

I'm all for short men's representation since we just never have enough of it, as Hollywood is obsessed with portraying the image of men that are not only fit, but also just tall. But we deserve representation too. And he's also of Guatemalan descent, which I'm also fine with. I'm totally cool with racebending a fictional white character for diversity. But my problem with Revolori's portrayal is that he just doesn't come off as Flash Thompson the bully for me.

Typically Flash Thompson is supposed to be a jock, like a very stereotypical high school bully. And this is what I meant, Tony Revolori definitely could've pulled that off. I'm confident there if the script went that way, and the actor could've just hit the gym to help look the part. But MCU Flash Thompson isn't really that. He's almost kind of a nerd, similarly to Peter Parker.

He's part of the academic decathlon as we saw in Spider-Man Homecoming, and he decides to be a bully to Peter for like, literally, whatever reason. And I say it like that because the MCU Spider-Man movies never provide any sort of development or background exposition for several of their supporting characters, Flash Thompson included. Like why is he a bully to Peter? Other than to be comic accurate? And if that's all they were going for, why not also make him a jock?

In fact, the movie wanted us to sympathize with him at the end of Far From Home. He's a rich privileged ass New Yorker, and everyone returns home to get picked up, and there's that one scene of his parents still off doing rich people stuff, too rich to pick up their own son.

https://youtu.be/PX-RFDycRXg?si=4ZEN2FuBXJZ7FF0k&t=111 watch from 1:51 to 1:58

And then later in this movie, he dyed his hair blonde. Was this just the actor's choice? His hair was black in the first shot, and that's just because it's picking up right after the events of Far From Home. But the next we see him is after Spider-Man's secret is out there in the whole world. I still don't get why everyone who associates with Spider-Man got their lives ruined, but the movie makes it a focal point. Yet, somehow, it doesn't affect Flash Thompson? What?!

Like yeah for anyone who went to school with Peter, you would know that he and Flash aren't friends, but this dude went out of his way, ALL the way out of his way to associate his own ass with Spider-Man. I don't see a lot of people talking about this, but he wrote a whole ass book.

https://youtu.be/lcMFQ9wRFHE?si=vakuyWXpJVPp3ue8&t=41 watch from 00:41 to 00:55

Did he just have that book pre-planned for the day that Spider-Man's secret identity got revealed? What exactly was the point of showing this? And the reason this isn't making sense to me is because again, one of the focal points in Act I of the movie is how damaging it is for an individual's reputation to associate with Spider-Man. But Flash Thompson puts himself out there and associates with Spider-Man ON PURPOSE! So how exactly was his reputation intact? Even if MIT is fully aware that he's not friends with Peter, does it not say something about him that he's lying for attention?

So he got into MIT, and for a moment it looks like he does feel for our heroes that none of them got in. Again none of this makes sense like they didn't get in because as Ned says "Yeah, because we're actually friends with Spider-Man!"

But again, this dude went out in public CLAIMING to be the vigilante's best friend, putting himself on the spot, writing a book about it all and he gets accepted into MIT? I don't get it yo. That's a major plot hole to me but I'm not done yet with my critique of Flash. Later on, Peter called him because he needed to know where the chancellor for MIT is, and even then, Flash was still being a jerk to Peter. Like just a few minutes ago I thought he was trying to be friendly with all of them even though they didn't get into MIT, but his first words to Peter on the phone were "...what's in it for me? I'm risking a lot just talking to you."

BRO WHAT? You risked everything by writing a book about Spider-Man and parading it around as much as you could! And on top of that, like, why is he still being a jerk to Peter? He loved Spider-Man and it seems like he still does even after learning the secret identity, so why is he still being a jerk to that person after learning they're one in the same? And, it's after Peter agrees to tell everyone that Flash is his best friend that he gives Peter the information he needs.

https://youtu.be/EgqyNam6bKg?si=xvdSvOMYiSIawQXu&t=24 watch from 00:24 to 00:32

So clearly, not only is the risk of talking and associating with Spider-Man not even a concern for him, but that's literally exactly what he wants! And somehow it's not ruining his life the same way it did for MJ, Ned, & Aunt May. This shit was a big huge massive plot hole to me, and we haven't even gotten into the multiversal stuff yet. And speaking of that, I got my own thoughts on the MIT chancellor which we'll get to during the fight with Dr. Octopus.

I gotta say, Charlie Cox showing up as Matt Murdock absolutely blew my mind. I'm sober now but I was edible'd out when I saw it, and when the whole crowd cheered when they showed Matt's face, man I just can't describe it. He was only in the movie for like a minute, but finally, finally he met Peter Parker. I waited so long for that, and this one minute tease was just to show the audience that there's more Daredevil to come. But anyway, more to the point of this section in the video, Matt's the one who also brings the court of public opinion to Peter's attention.

https://youtu.be/ww_Vz7-buOk?si=fvHARQd0bgrU8YCm&t=537 watch from 8:57 to 9:02

And having to watch out for that is a fair assessment to make, I just don't see how the vast majority of the public opinion on Spider-Man, an Avenger responsible for saving the universe, would be so divided. I also predicted that maybe they'd reveal Bullseye as the one who threw the brick, but it turned out not to matter who it was that threw it. Anyway, after they all get rejected from MIT, Peter got the idea of going to Dr. Strange for help thanks to the Halloween decorations at MJ's cafe. Wong is there too…and eventually the subject of the Runes of Kof-Kal are brought up.

Now even though Wong is there for just a few minutes, apparently there is a deleted scene where he spends more time trying to talk sense into Strange and dissuade him from casting the spell. Strange calls it a standard spell of forgetting, but it's the dangers of messing it up that set the events of the film in motion.

https://youtu.be/GvfXiZDAKfs?si=hm_yvgujJVoWkIGo&t=175 watch from 2:55 to 2:57

Now the first thing I'm gonna say about the spell, is that I blame Peter for it mostly. When this movie first came out, I saw most people blaming Dr. Strange for it. Now, no 2 ways about it, the setup for it is pretty bad: obviously if there is so much that could go wrong, then it's not such a standard, or simple spell, is it? Anyway yeah so Peter starts to question the power of the spell, and Strange makes concessions after adding MJ and Ned to the list of people waived from it. And this next piece of dialogue is why I blame Peter.

https://youtu.be/1HIk9mrBB7o?si=DxHKzG4RF3Tt9SG6&t=318 watch from 5:18 to 5:28

Words have meaning. If you swore that you were done making concessions to the spell, then keep your mouth shut and let the sorcerer work and accept the consequences of what you wished for. But Peter didn't do that. He continued to run his mouth which is what then causes the spell to break. And he has the nerve to talk back after the spell got out of control.

https://youtu.be/1HIk9mrBB7o?si=0h-rPeXRryzngeiE&t=380 watch from 6:20 to 6:24

Like bro it doesn't matter if it was 5 times or 6 times or 20 times! You should have just stopped when you said you were going to stop. So that's my #1 point. You can blame them both for the spell going wrong, but it was MOSTLY Peter's fault. My #2 point, is that, does this spell travel through both space, and also time?

This isn't entirely Dr. Strange's fault, it's just how bad the script is - and I'll get to this in just a second - but let me take this moment to talk about another one of Dr. Strange's epic failures in this movie. When I watched the trailer, I was absolutely sure that Spider-Man was gonna lose the fight against Dr. Strange. And then the movie came out and he won. Now it's definitely cool how Spider-Man won, match versus magic, but Dr. Strange was acting so incompetently earlier on when he could've easily ended it.


When he put Peter into the astral plane, his spidey sense was still activated which made it hard for Dr. Strange to just snatch it from his hands. Now lemme ask you something. Once Strange figured out that just taking the device wasn't gonna work, why didn't he just conjure up a magic rope, tie Spider-Man's body down, and snatch it from his hand then? That was dumb and it was just prolonged. It could've ended right there.

I really wonder if there will be more to Ned and his potential magic powers which Dr. Strange lowkey was impressed by, once he shows back up again at the end. And when Dr. Strange starts casting the second spell, there's one line in particular which came back to the front of my mind.

https://youtu.be/ww_Vz7-buOk?si=i4mHqy4-hbuvYe5A&t=364 watch from 6:04 to 6:11

Dr. Strange's spell is supposed to make the whole world forget about Peter Parker. Now if I am interpreting "the world" to just mean planet Earth, that means Nick Fury who's on vacation during the events of this movie and the previous movie, whenever he returns to earth, he's gonna be feeling like he's in a fever dream when the conversation of Spider-Man comes up, because everyone will be talking about him oblivious to his secret identity, which he would still have knowledge of, if the spell didn't affect him.

And this goes for everyone else not on planet earth during the course of Dr. Strange casting the second spell too. So that means potentially Kamala Khan, Carol Danvers, Monica Rambeau who gets lost in the multiverse anyway, the Guardians of the Galaxy, Thor, and so on and so forth. But that's IF the interpretation of the entire world means the entire planet earth, and not the entire universe. The movie doesn't clarify this, among other things.

And speaking of that second spell, one thing that I do appreciate the movie for is how the famous phrase "with great power comes great responsibility" is actually something that Peter actually has to live with and live through at the end of the movie. When he talked to Dr. Strange about casting a second spell and the consequences of it, he accepted that fate.

So what I am trying to say is, in this case for this movie, the great power that Peter has, comes in the form of a powerful friend, and that's Dr. Strange. And the great responsibility he has is accepting the consequences of Dr. Strange casting a second spell to repair the fractures of the multiverse at the cost of his loved ones forgetting all about him. I thought that was a great way to apply the iconic phrase into the story.

I also think that this whole ordeal is what made Dr. Strange have a soft spot for America Chavez in his next movie, the Multiverse of Madness, since he was dealing with Spider-Man the whole time in this movie who he considers a kid. And yes even though he himself also forgot Spider-Man's identity, I think he is still aware of the person's youth and he himself also implied that he has love for Spider-Man.

https://youtu.be/IQRHqeCZLTw?si=4PdT0SkQLMJCNvtf&t=54~ watch from 00:54 to 1:15

But the second spell also makes me wonder how much Ned, MJ, Happy, and whoever else were close to Peter, how much their memories were altered. The rerelease of No Way Home in theaters partially answered that question but not directly, but here's what I mean.

Basically, just like how Dr. Strange says that in the multiverse there is an infinite number of people who know that Peter Parker is Spider-Man, it seems like there's also an infinite number of fake histories that the second spell could have changed everyone's memories into. So what I am curious to know (since the movie didn't really convey it), is, what was the fake history that the Runes of Kof-Kol 2.0 replaced everyone's real history with?

After the Runes of Kof-Kol 2.0 is cast, MJ opens her eyes. She doesn't know who Peter Parker is anymore, but the world, including her, still has the knowledge of Spider-Man the Avenger. And she also confessed her love to that person just moments before the second spell was cast. So in her mind, what was the spell that was cast? What was it for? If it was for making her lose the knowledge of Spider-Man's identity, then do all of her memories of Spider-Man still just change to him wearing a mask the whole time?

Is she gonna spend the rest of her life just trying to figure out what Spider-Man's identity was since she knows it was part of her memory that Dr. Strange wiped out? Does she remember being in love with the vigilante Spider-Man? Am I making sense? I know this sounds convoluted, but that's because so many parts of the movie are convoluted and aren't really conclusive.

I want to say, yes, she remembers being in love with the vigilante Spider-Man despite not knowing his identity. I think the movie ending with her still wearing the broken necklace is a very clear indication of that, and maybe her memory of the spell was just that a spell needed to be cast to fix the multiverse and Spider-Man was telling her that he won't be able to see her for a very long time and that's why she became emotional.

This makes sense to me, but you see what I'm doing here. I have to make up my own explanation since the movie itself failed to elaborate the effects of the spell on the people who were close to Peter Parker. But something else that I am forgiving of that the movie also doesn't really address, is that thanks to the first spell, the marvel cinematic universe gets a total of 8 visitors that we know of:

• Dr. Otto Octavius
  
• Dr. Norman Osborn
  
• Dr. Curt Connors
  
• Mr. Max Dillon
  
• Mr. Flint Marco
  
• Mr. Eddie Brock
  

Plus the two extra Spider-Men for a total of 8 multiversal guests in the MCU.

Now, these characters are all people from other cinematic universes. That's very convenient to the plot, and I can be forgiving of that because that's what the whole movie is about of course. We went to the movie theater during the pandemic for this reason, nostalgic fan service. So yeah, I can be lenient about this convenience of all these specific characters from previous movies being the ones that show up because of Dr. Strange's spell going out of control.

But what I cannot be forgiving of, is how the Runes of Kof-Kol brought all of these people in from different periods of time. And I'm gonna get in depth with every single one of these characters, but each of them, if you listen to their dialogue, they each talk about the latest events of their universe in the last movie they appeared in.

Dr. Octopus kept bringing up how Norman Osborn is dead.

https://youtu.be/EHHTl6k5-v8?si=01e-SCs5Aztfkb1C&t=51~ watch from 00:51 to to 00:55

Norman himself just talked about how the goblin serum changed him.

https://youtu.be/UVFL8tME9fU?si=sLp6rhabMCNg0QAm&t=115~ watch from 1:55 to 2:05

Spider-Man 1 & 2 chronologically are maybe 2 years apart, and then Flint Marco who's from Spider-Man 3 which maybe took place another couple of years after Spider-Man 2, talked about how both of these villains before him died.

https://youtu.be/pEIBAV2qP-Q?si=vCdzHcYcb6US1LQJ&t=60~ watch from 1:00 to 1:22

The actors were also all given makeup to look younger. And then there's Elektro and the Lizard, the former who talks about how the latter tried to turn the whole city into lizards.

https://youtu.be/Tl2XAw5Mu0M?si=pIE9RzV_FOSmBFoY&t=14 watch from 00:14 to 00:15

The Amazing Spider-Man 1 & 2 I think are two years apart. But the two Spider-Men that show up, as well as Eddie Brock, and maybe even Sandman I dunno, it seems like they all traveled to the MCU within the same year that the movie is taking place. So how is it that all those other characters from the past years were brought to the MCU into the present day timeline?

These people are all accidentally brought to the MCU because they know Peter Parker is Spider-Man, but how is it that the Runes of Kof-Kol brought them come through from different points in time? Dr. Strange didn't say ANYTHING about time traveling with the spell going wrong, only universe traveling.

It's one thing for them to show up in the MCU for knowing Spider-Man's secret identity, but it's another for the timelines to also factor into it. But the whole thing with Spider-Man's identity also doesn't make sense and we'll talk about that once we get to Elektro. Let's start with Doc Ock, since he's the first multiversal character to show up.

The trailer made it look like he says "hello Peter" before he puts the suit on, but as I correctly predicted, he says it after the suit is already on. And speaking of the suit, can we all agree that Spider-Man would have lost this fight miserably if it wasn't for the nanotech? Dr. Octopus was more ruthless here than he ever was in Spider-Man 2 the movie. I will cut Peter some slack for that because he did have to save a bunch of people caught in the crossfire including the chancellor while fighting Doc Ock, but even when it's just 1on1, I feel like the tentacles triumphed over the spider arms.

I also feel like Tony Stark definitely would have thought of the safeguard wherein part of the suit gets compromised and therefore a backup plan could be initiated, but I also wonder, what else could the nanotech have done for Doc Ock's tentacles other than give them a red finish? What extra power would he have gained? We don't ever really see that.

Now getting back to the MIT chancellor, the first thing I'm gonna talk about here is a regurgitation on what I said before about Spider-Man and his reputation. Peter had to convince the chancellor to give himself, Ned, and MJ a change at MIT meanwhile this lady is already reading about how Flash Thompson is supposedly best friends with Spider-Man and Flash already got into the school. Which means Flash was really throwing it in her face about how supposedly close he is with Peter Parker, and yet it does nothing to his reputation. Nonsense, but anyway, once Doc Ock shows up and her Uber driver runs away, she's locked in the car. Now the movie starts to get dumb again.

Like, all she has to do is reach into the front side to push the button for unlocking the door, which I'm presuming she did later, because we see her trying to open the door that's barricaded by the bridge. Um, chancellor, all you have to do is open the door on the OTHER side that's not barricaded! HELLO?! So yeah, that was really dumb.

Then after that, she's hanging for dear life by a spider thread, and it's so convenient that when Doc Ock started attacking Peter UNDER the bridge, that he didn't get knocked into the web that he made to save her. That was really convenient for the movie. Then after the fight, she calls Peter a hero because he saved her life.

https://youtu.be/ioeoCbDiMvE?si=5wITLxXMNuLjQh5m&t=390 watch from 6:30 to 6:49

And I get that she just went through a near-death experience, but like, all the news coverage about Spider-Man being a superhero and an Avenger, did all of that really just get tossed out the window just because of Mysterio? Like if Matt never had Matt Murdock to get all the charges dropped, it wouldn't matter?

The court of public opinion, opinions that matter, just don't care to think that Mysterio was actually a crook who framed Spider-Man who already has a track record of being a savior? So yeah I just don't think that adds up but the scene pretty much ended in Peter's favor until the Green Goblin showed up. That's the point where Peter then gets brought back to the Sanctum Santorum and Dr. Strange went ahead and explained to him WTF is going on.

Later on while Doc Ock is imprisoned, he explains to our heroes how the Green Goblin already died years ago.

https://youtu.be/EHHTl6k5-v8?si=01e-SCs5Aztfkb1C&t=51~ watch from 00:51 to to 1:04

[Hap Shaughnessy]

Bro, do you even know what year you're in? Do you not realize that you traveled not only through space but also through time?!

And the fact that the movie kept making dialogue like this, is why I cannot treat this as a movie that you just turn your brain off for and just roll with. This also brings up another question which the movie never bothers to address, but these multiversal characters, are they the same exact characters from the previous movies? Or are they variants from universes parallel to the universes of their respective movie franchises? I'll get into this more toward the end, but as for what point in time Doc Ock got brought into the MCU, there's this line to attribute it to

https://youtu.be/pEIBAV2qP-Q?si=N7ydU1h6nVq7NHDm&t=84 watch from 1:24 to 1:39

And if we take this at face value, then it's referring to this scene.

https://youtu.be/G4L-wBrUvoI?si=DlRg0Sw5B5VRgWl5 watch from 3:53 to 3:58

But we all watched Spider-Man 2…that movie doesn't end with Doc Ock getting zapped into another universe right after he choked Spider-Man. It ends with him drowning in the river, as Sandman says. And again, this movie only references the events of the movies. So either Doc Ock is misremembering what happened to him moments before he got brought to the MCU, or is this a Doc Ock from a slightly different universe than the one from the Spider-Man 2 movie.

I'm gonna elaborate on this whole point of whether these characters are the OGs or if they're variants later on, but I'm also gonna bring up this plot hole of space & time getting ripped apart by Dr. Strange's spell every time the movie commits it. But let's talk now about the Green Goblin because he's also the main villain of the movie.

Going back to Dr. Strange's spell, this dude, similarly to Doc Ock, not only traveled through the cosmos, but also through time. How? How and why would the Runes of Kof-Kol break space AND time like this for the spell going wrong? And why didn't Dr. Strange also mention that different years in time are a factor when explaining to Peter what went wrong with the spell?

Norman Osborn's first set of dialogue at Aunt May's food drive also opened up the question of, if they are the exact same characters as the previous movies, then at what point during these character's lives were they transported to the MCU?

With the glider showing up with Goblin, it makes guessing the time for him even trickier, but the fact that we have to even guess is another reason why the plot of the movie is so weak since it's not specified. But anyway, my guess is that he showed up moments right before his death in the first Spider-Man movie. There was a line in the trailer that was cut from the movie that Dr. Strange said which does sort of back this up.

https://youtu.be/JfVOs4VSpmA?si=Bid_fOD5w2G9W4zJ&t=97 watch from 1:37 to 1:42

I guess they cut that line because it doesn't really fit for a good amount of these villains, but I'll elaborate more about this toward the end. Getting back to the Green Goblin, we see Norman struggling with the mental goblin disorder here in No Way Home more than we saw him struggle with it in the Spider-Man movie. There, he sounded like he already gave into it, but here, it seems like he wants to break free from it.

https://youtu.be/1P3JrbHnEYU?si=3ILvBTVYVsjoNvRe&t=37 from from 00:37 to 00:39

This catches Aunt May's attention and she makes it a mission for Spider-Man to cure these villains. And I gotta be honest, making the whole plot of the movie about curing these villains was something I really disliked, but I'm gonna leave that for later too.

You remember me saying in the beginning how maybe 50% of the rumors about this movie I heard were true? Which means 50% were false. One rumor that got a lot of steam which I thought would be true and ended up being false, was that the Green Goblin would lie to Peter and tell him that Spider-Man killed them all in their universe and they don't want to suffer that fate. Peter falls for Goblin's trick and that's how they all get away.

So in the movie, it definitely is because of Green Goblin that Peter's mission to cure them all goes wrong, but not only do none of them really want to be cured, I just don't see how curing them would also save them. Norman also says

https://youtu.be/UVFL8tME9fU?si=fT47M7cgKeQH3c6-&t=101 watch from 1:41 to 1:48

So I don't think there will ever be an MCU version of the Green Goblin. An alternate version exists in the cartoon Your friendly neighborhood Spider-Man, and there was also a theory that MCU Norman Osborn was the secret party interested in Pym Tech during Antman and the Wasp. That just ended up being a loose end of the MCU as more and more time has passed and more installments to this franchise have been added.

Another rumor about this movie was how this Green Goblin was going to find the MCU Norman Osborn, and kill him to try and take his place. That rumor was also obviously false, and I just don't think we will see an MCU version of Green Goblin. We already have a movie of MCU Spider-Man fighting this villain, which is this movie, even though the villain is not from the same universe. And we also have a trilogy of this MCU Spider-Man having a best friend in the form of Ned Leeds, even though his memory gets wiped but that's not the point - he's best friends with Peter for the whole trilogy, and it doesn't make sense to me for him to have a new best friend in the form of Harry Osborn. A new love interest maybe, but not a new best friend.

And then there's the Sandman. Since he and his Spider-Man made peace at the end of their movie, Spider-Man 3, we don't really know if this character was brought into the MCU in the same year of the movie, or if he also time traveled like the other two villains. When we see his face at the end of the movie, he looks the same as he did in Spider-Man 3 but that's just because they used archival footage. The actor is quite old so he was never actually part of the set, if I recall correctly. Or maybe having the sand mutation messed with his aging. But speaking of that, why is he stuck in sand form throughout this movie? There was an iconic scene in Spider-Man 3 about how he's able to master the technique of shifting from human to sand form, so why is he stuck that way in No Way Home?

The real world explanation again is that the actor wasn't on set because of the pandemic, but there is no explanation for it in the movie. You could say that he just chose to remain in sand form, but later when he goes to Happy's apartment, he's spreading his sandy self all over the place and apologizes for it.

https://youtu.be/hTzahRPZkio?si=Tp_C6WXKvfklSoe6&t=25 watch from 00:25 to 00:31

Now this isn't really important, it's meant to just be a joke scene, but if he's actually sorry, why not just switch to human form? Unless he is stuck that way, which wasn't a problem that Sandman had in the movie Spider-Man 3, so this again just makes me wonder if he's the same exact character from Spider-Man 3, or if he is a variant from a parallel Raimi universe. Just like the other villains, he only talks and references events of the other movies, which only implies that they ARE the same exact characters. Unless they are variants, and the events of their lifetimes are only slightly different than the events from the movies, but that just makes thinking about the movie even more convoluted. Do you see where I'm going with all this?

The fact that the movie wants to constantly make you think about it without bothering to give you the satisfaction of knowing what's going on and instead hopes that you just assume, which I'm guessing most of the audience just did, is why the movie fails so hard for me. The first thing Sandman does when he shows up is help Spider-Man capture Electro. And that was cool to see, but I'm just kinda confused about this dude's level of morality. After Peter zaps Electro back to the dungeon, Sandman turns on him.

https://youtu.be/_89HZZC6Q-c?si=4ld-LWKlBIwRJZkY&t=240 watch from 4:00 to 4:09

Then later he says he doesn't even trust anyone. And he also didn't have much of a reaction to seeing HIS Peter again. I mean, he tries to KILL his Peter. And even after seeing his face, there is still not much of a reaction there. And we know this is archival footage, but the movie made it a point to show how it was a big deal to Flint Marco that he wasn't in his own universe anymore. So I would think there would be some sort of reaction to him being reunited with his Spider-Man. And more to the point of this dude's questionable morality, he doesn't care much about getting cured, but when things start to go wrong, instead of helping Peter like he did before, he just…leaves the scene.

https://youtu.be/rlyVBMRXUtc?si=7g99eWq6DmWBphkO&t=251 watch from 4:11 to 4:16

I don't get it. Like if he's a better person now, and that's what the movie implied with him helping Peter capture Sandman, then why would he abandon Peter when he's about to get attacked? He does a similarly questionable act later on during the final battle. After he's knocked out by the construction crane, he starts a sandstorm. A similar sandstorm to when he was helping Peter capture Electro. So was Sandman doing this to help the Spider-Men? It doesn't really seem to hurt them, if anything it does help them because they were in the middle of fighting Electro again who gets blinded by the lights, I mean the sand, giving the Spider-Men a chance to regroup and strategize. And the sandstorm only stops once they all start swinging to face all five of the villains head on. And even though Sandman isn't even aligned with the other villains, he's right next to them ready to fight the Spider-Men alongside them. So…I guess that sandstorm from a few moments ago was to help the Spider-Men? To give them a break before starting round 2 of the final fight? I don't know. It's unclear just like the dude's morality. Dude is so one dimensional too. I know he loves his daughter but like, she was a symbol of something good and pure in his life, but all he has to say to Peter is,

https://youtu.be/FilGjcCseBI?si=Y9g02Z3y1zIo1Ksh&t=112 watch from 1:52 to 1:54

Right after he says he's trying to help them. And it doesn't matter if I think that his plan to cure them all is bogus, because Peter's intention is to help them.

And speaking of villains with questionable morals, let's talk now about Amazing Spider-Man series villains, starting with the Lizard who's the more confusing out of the two. First of all, how is this dude in Lizard form again? The very last time we saw him in the Amazing Spider-Man series, he's in a prison cell, and it looks like he came to terms with his criminal activity because at the very least, he's being protective of Peter.

https://youtu.be/YQ2FCqdlvBM?si=_QdAVgs2GBPO7meh&t=41 watch from 00:41 to 00:45

So if at that point he's already turned a new leaf, why has he done a 180 and decided to become a mad scientist again, and how did he become a Lizard again? When the Peters all get together to talk about cures, Andrew Peter says this

https://youtu.be/0ComHGb-Ux8?si=tHGML9YbyPnGRVnN&t=12 watch from 00:12 to 00:15

Yeah you cured him once before and in your movies we never see him become the Lizard again, so how exactly did it happen? This is so weird and puzzling because this also makes it harder to even figure out at what point in his lifetime he was transported to the MCU. In the Amazing Spider-Man movies, he also never died fighting Spider-Man. Neither in his movie nor in the following movie that Electro is featured. But he even asks Electro,

https://youtu.be/pEIBAV2qP-Q?si=7jwSiBhOX3jSAw75&t=118 watch from 1:58 to 2:01

It's all sooo confusing. What's also confusing is his motivation. So, what exactly does The Lizard want now? Green Goblin wants to destroy the Macchina di Kadavus just to cause mayhem. Electro wants to destroy it too only because he wants to stay in the MCU with his new Stark-tech upgraded powers. Sandman wants to push the button so that he can go home. Doc Ock already switched sides at that point siding with the heroes, but what about The Lizard? What exactly does he want? When they all go to Happy's apartment, Dr. Connors stays in the truck but once things go wrong upstairs with the Goblin, Connors shows up just to attack Peter, and then just disappears again until the final battle. When Peter offered to help cure him, he said

https://youtu.be/mGrEzCvl-_I?si=wyr88tbRVYEc84gA&t=402 watch from 6:42 to 6:48

And then when he attacks Peter he just repeats that.

https://youtu.be/rlyVBMRXUtc?si=1plVvebu_8Gp_vA9&t=386 watch from 6:26 to 6:30

But what is his motivation? In his own universe he wanted to turn all of New York City into lizards, as Max Dillon explained, but what does he want here? All he does during the final battle is fight the other Spider-Men and he even attacks MJ and Ned, all for what exactly? For all the confusing plot points of this movie, at least we could make sense out of the motivations for each of the villains. Each of them except The Lizard, anyway.

But speaking of confusion, we got Electro, last but not least. The elephant in the room here is how exactly Max Dillon showed up in the MCU after Dr. Strange's spell went wrong, given how Electro didn't know Spider-Man's secret identity. Nor did he even know what his Spider-Man looked like. I saw a fan theory about how he was absorbing energy in the grid and he therefore might have also absorbed data that gave his brain the secret about Spider-Man's identity.

But one, that is just a theory not confirmed by the canon of the movie. And two, that's a very convoluted way to explain how Max Dillon showed up in the MCU. The truth of the matter - and there really is no way to defend it - is that it just doesn't make sense. The only thing that does make sense is at what point of his life Electro showed up. It's quite clear from his explanation that he got transported right at the end of his battle with Spider-Man.

https://youtu.be/pEIBAV2qP-Q?si=ULOvGtknH9cpqX5e&t=99 Watch from 1:39 to 1:57

And I will also give the movie credit for applying this cool effect of having the iconic starface to Electro whenever he attacks. It's just that, similarly to Spider-Man in the MCU, he needed to depend on Stark tech to reach his full potential. And then he gets obsessed with it and wants to stay, that's his motivation. I mentioned how he sees his Spider-Man's face for the first time in this movie, and it was a very interesting thing he said.

https://youtu.be/S3hQ91nW_6o?si=CTl7Ndh7vZyXCPdr&t=18 watch from 00:18 to 00:38

For the purpose of me pointing out the plot hole of Electro being in the MCU in the first place, the movie kinda confirms the plot hole by showing his reaction to seeing Peter Parker's face. And he probably found out about his name just from conversing from the MCU Peter. But the conversation they had and the way it ended, I think we can all agree that it was a hint that we're one day soon gonna see a live action version of Miles Morales.

And with that being said, I think it's time we started talking about our beloved Spider-Men. Now this was the worst kept secret about the movie, whether or not Tobey Maguire or Andrew Garfield would appear. But yo, when they showed up, the cheers in the crowd…yo. Just like when Charlie Cox showed up on screen, that was a once in a lifetime experience. And what made this all extra special was that I spent it with my girlfriend who is now my wife 🥰💙🧡🥰but anyway, I want to start off with one particular line that Andrew Peter says that I feel like got totally overlooked by a lot of commentators. This is when he and Tobey Peter are giving Tom Peter the mentor pep talk about great power and great responsibility.

https://youtu.be/E3eneGnrAug?si=g5IDUPxZis0T1z6U&t=181 watch from 3:01 to 3:14

So yeah, not a lot of people were talking about this line in the movie, but it's a known thing in the comics that Spider-Man has to hold back a lot of his strength so as to not kill his opponents. So for Andrew Peter to say that he STOPPED pulling his punches and got rageful, it could only mean one thing. And that's that he started killing his adversaries. And that is a really big deal. I can't believe more people weren't talking about that. That's my interpretation anyway, but I think it's worth a bigger conversation. Both of the alternate Peters look like the ages of their respective actors, so I can only take that to mean that they were transported to the MCU with their years lined up, instead of them traveling through time like some of the villains.

And I want to believe that these are the same exact Spider-Men as their movies, but they've got some questionable dialogue that makes it unclear. And we're gonna get to that part very soon. Remember earlier how I talked about J Jonah Jameson? What would've been cool to see would be Tobey Peter reacting to Jameson looking the same as his. He could've seen him on TV and said something like "wow, your Jameson looks just like mine! I guess yours didn't trust his barber." And this could've easily been a callback to this scene from the first Spider-Man movie.

https://youtu.be/CNp399CFCU8?si=MqExXxkd8CDdEMq6&t=29 watch from 00:29 to 00:33

But Tobey Peter never had the chance to react to the MCU's Jameson, and that was a big missed opportunity. I feel like they could've also very easily had a cameo of Mr. Ditkovitch being the alternate universe landlord that looks exactly the same as Tobey Peter's landlord in his movies. I'm sure that could've been very easy to pull off, so that was just another big missed opportunity. We also learn from a conversation with Andrew Peter that Tobey Peter eventually married his MJ.

https://youtu.be/0ComHGb-Ux8?si=tBkjbH5hTKzDFujO&t=184 watch from 3:04 to 3:10

There are a lot of rumors and speculation about who Sadie Sink is playing in Spider-Man Brand New Day, and I'm personally hoping that she's playing Mayday Parker, daughter of Tobey Peter, seeking Tom Peter out for help because her dad got lost in the multiverse due to some shenanigans that Dr. Doom may or may not have pulled. Anyway, I said earlier on the video how I'm not fond of how Peter made it his mission to cure the villains. And there are several reasons why I'm not fond of it. For one, none of the villains really despise the fact that they have superpowers. None of them expressed interest in getting rid of them. During the Green Goblin's monologue in the middle of the movie, he said this before attacking Spider-Man:

https://youtu.be/rlyVBMRXUtc?si=A--43ufoDTLzkOwM&t=203 watch from 3:23 to 3:28

This reminded me of a line at the very end of the first Spider-Man movie, where Peter says.

https://youtu.be/5n8bMuZGipU?si=E_SHaikFWSIeSJQe&t=14 watch from 00:14 to 00:17

And the reason why I'm bringing this up now is to say this: Peter Parker says being Spider-Man is both a gift, and a curse. So if that's true for the superhero, then it should also be true for the supervillains. And another thing, the first time Peter tries to cure these villains, he uses Stark tech for it. Like highly advanced mechanisms and what not, like the fabricator. Now if some of the cures failed the first time, how in the hell are these three Peter Parkers able to conjure up new cures overnight using supplies at a public friggin high school? Tobey Peter even says

https://youtu.be/0ComHGb-Ux8?si=tjqUuxskvBM7n_LI&t=24 watch from 00:24 to 00:29

Now, this is actually a supermassive plot hole and I'm gonna delve deep into that very soon, but like, Tobey Peter was thinking of making a cure for a long time and in just one short night using supplies in a high school, he's able to just do it? That's too convenient to forgive. I'm sorry. And if they're gonna work on a serum to cure Dr. Osborn, why remove the enhancements? Back in Spider-Man 1 the movie, the point of the serum was to tap into the vastness of human potential

https://youtu.be/AsP-r8bFlcI?si=uqsddgnnFokaXPzF&t=41 watch from 00:41 to 00:47

But the side effect was the madness that came with it. So why not just develop a cure that only removes the madness? Now you might argue that the Peters never actually said their cure would take the superpowers away, but given the fact that most of their other cures do exactly that for the other villains, it is a pretty strong implication that their cure for Norman Osborn is also removing it all. But Peter lives in a universe full of superhuman people. So surely, he shouldn't be seeing the enhancements of superhuman strength, speed, agility, etc. any of those things in Norman as a problem. So if he were to be working on a cure, why not just work on a cure that only removes the madness? Why remove the benefits?

Peter wanted to help these villains, and the idea of curing the villains is one that Aunt May gave him. But as Dr. Strange pointed out, these villains all die because of the altercations they have with Spider-Man, not because they gained superpowers. So this logic never panned out to me like removing what turned them into villains is going to save them, mostly because the trigger for each of these people showing up into the MCU is quite a different each and every one of them. This is especially true for Sandman. We're gonna talk very soon about whether these characters are OGs or variants, but if Flint Marco in No Way Home is the OG from Spider-Man 3 the movie, then why is he even in any danger when returning home? His last altercation with his Spider-Man was on a good term. They made peace. He doesn't die fighting Spider-Man, that's not his fate. And if he is a variant (which I don't think he is), then why is his first interaction with MCU Tom Peter one of camaraderie? He's like "Peter, remember me? It's Flink Marko." The first thing he does in the movie is literally protect Peter from Electro's attack. So if he is a variant Sandman, it doesn't make any sense to think that the last thing that happened in his parallel universe is him about to die fighting his variant Spider-Man. We'll delve deep into that after I fully cover the issue I have with trying to cure the villains.

And there's one villain in particular that they didn't even properly cure, and that's Dr. Octopus. If Peter's mission objective is to get all of these villains to live normal human lives, then he failed his mission miserably with Otto Octavius! All he did was manufacture a new inhibitor chip and placed it where the last one got fried.

Now I wanna talk about the rumors again. Another rumor I heard which turned out to be false was actually about Dr. Octopus. And what I heard was that in the movie, Octavius was actually just braindead and his corpse was just gonna be animated by the artificial intelligence in his tentacles. And in this scene right after Peter put the inhibitor chip back on his spine, when he goes completely motionless, I swear to God, I thought that rumor was true, and that there would be this dark revelation that Octavius was dead the whole time, only operating as a puppet through the tentacles. But alas, a few seconds later, he finally snaps out of it and embraces his freedom. I also think his last words as a mad scientist to Norman are what triggers the Goblin persona to take over again, since the camera pans directly to him after he says those things.

https://youtu.be/t9q73-gtobg?si=heNz19UfObA5Ybj7&t=399 watch from 6:39 to 6:44

But anyway getting back to my point, installing this inhibitor chip doesn't permanently solve the problem. Like I said before, if Peter's end goal is to help these supervillains live normal human lives again, then he failed at that goal unless he looks for a way to safely remove the tentacles from Otto's body. And on top of that, if the chip was fried before, it can easily get fried again. So once Otto goes back to his universe, he's at risk of becoming enslaved by the tentacles again. We also don't know for sure when we watch Spider-Man 2 the movie, if Otto wanted or accepted being stuck with four mechanical arms welded onto his body for the rest of his life. So in this movie, if Peter's main goal is to have Otto live a normal human life, why didn't he get Tony's fabricator to develop some sort of device that could safely remove the tentacles?

The only time curing a villain was ever part of the plot was in Amazing Spider-Man 1, and that's because the supervillain was threatening the whole city of people with the same curse that the villain had. So yeah, if they should be fixated on curing anyone, it should only be Dr. Connors. Electro actively doesn't wanna get cured. When he's first informed that going back to his universe means death, he says

https://youtu.be/kXuNry42cyQ?si=jaLtlJ0ui4-qo9U-&t=14 watch from 00:14 to to 00:16

But then when Peter offers to cure him, he says

https://youtu.be/mGrEzCvl-_I?si=prtlZ-K7v9FTtC9D&t=509 watch from 8:29 to 8:36

But what do we mean by sideways in this case, Electro? I think he meant that he will just take survival over death, because after Goblin finished his monologue, Electro seemed most motivated to just keep his power and enjoy it. He definitely didn't wanna be cured. But here's something else I don't get…if pushing the button on Dr. Strange's box means certain death, why does it even matter if they get cured or not? Wouldn't they go back to get killed off anyway?

watch the whole thing

Now what I just showed you obviously was a fanmade comedy video, but there is a point to it. And this goes hand in hand about how awful this movie is at explaining things. I spoke earlier about how the Runes of Kof-Kol brought people from different universes into the MCU but also from different points in time, but in order for the movie to make sense, either

a. What I just showed you in the YouTube video is still the villains fate', or
b. The villains and even the Spider-Men might be variants and not the same exact characters as those from their respective movies, or
c. The Runes of Kof-Kol created branched timelines and the villains and even the Spider-Men in this movie, have their fates altered because of it.

If option c is what the movie is actually showing, then that's a whole nother element of Dr. Strange's spell that both he and the movie itself failed to explain. If the Runes of Kof-Kol can create branched timelines of alternate universes, don't you think that's an important detail that needs to be properly shown?

Honestly I don't even wanna entertain this hypothetical option c, but I think it's time now that we delve deep into the conversation about whether these characters are the OGs from the legacy movies, or if they are variants from options b or c. Unfortunately the movie doesn't do anything to clearly answer these questions. Let's start in the same order of the characters we talked about before. So Doc Ock is first. And let's first go with the idea that he's the exact same character as the one we saw in Spider-Man 2 the movie.

Reviewing what he said about how he showed up in this universe,

https://youtu.be/pEIBAV2qP-Q?si=N7ydU1h6nVq7NHDm&t=84 watch from 1:24 to 1:39

This is a reference to

https://youtu.be/G4L-wBrUvoI?si=DlRg0Sw5B5VRgWl5 watch from 3:53 to 3:58

However, if this is the same exact Dr. Octopus, then we know for sure that this moment is not the actual moment he's transported. And we know this thanks to Eddie Brock also being in this movie. We saw from the character's perspective in his movie, Venom 2 Let there be Carnage, what their experience is traveling from one universe to the other. Their exact location within the universe doesn't change when transported. Eddie is sitting in the exact same spot, and his surroundings just shift. And for anyone witnessing them going back to their universe - in this case the bartender, we see them just sort of evaporate. So getting back to Doc Ock, if this is the same exact Doc Ock, then clearly this isn't the moment he gets transported to the MCU, because like, we watched Spider-Man 2. He's there choking Peter and then has a change of heart.

When No Way Home came out, I hosted a podcast to review it and one of my guests said that he believed they are all the same characters and he viewed the villains' consciousnesses moving instantaneously in their moments of clarity the same way Captain America returned the time stones in Endgame. But the more I think about it, the more I feel like that doesn't make sense. Because we saw in Venom's case that the whole entire person gets physically transported back and forth between universes. And also, if it was just Doc Ock's consciousness that moved, why wouldn't he have any memories or recollection of what happened when he came back from the MCU? On top of that, the inhibitor chip is still fried on the back of his head, and when he returns to his universe, he brings a piece of Stark tech with him as we see.

So here's the conclusion I drew from all of this. If this is the OG, the same exact Doctor Octopus, which I think it is, then he was on the brink of drowning, so he was simply just losing his senses and passing out and he was just saying the last thing he remembered before drowning. And when he gets sent back to his universe, he gets sent back to the same year that Tobey Peter got sent back to. So Doc Ock goes "back to the future." They go back home together.

But if this Doc Ock is a variant, then we really have nothing to go off of because his universe can be either slightly or very different from the universe of the Raimi movies. And if he is from a universe that used to be the Raimi universe but got created from the Runes of Kof-Kol just creating a branched universe…like yo, not only is that an important detail that needs to be shown if not explained, but that's also very convoluted. It's more convoluted that this spell brings people into the MCU in the first place. And if the audience just has to assume that, then it just goes on to show how weak the actual plot of the movie itself is.

Now I just showed you this funny video, and honestly, I think this is true. This would make the ending of Spider-Man 1 a retcon, but I can accept that retcon as the ending for both movies. Norman Osborn travels the multiverse in this moment of singularity when Spider-Man does this backflip, he comes right back, says his now iconic "oh" but then he dies so he doesn't have the chance to talk at all about what just happened to him.

All he can think about is his son, so his last words are then,

https://youtu.be/q2DMDQWMpWs?si=MUQm5-DOA-H1AYXI&t=258 watch from 4:18 to 4:19

But if he is a variant from an alternate parallel universe to the previous Spider-Man movies, then the movie should have expanded on that because the dialogue regarding Norman is only referencing events from the Spider-Man movies. The same goes for if this was Norman from the Spider-Man movies, but got sort of cloned from a branch timeline from the spell going wrong, similarly to Loki from the Disney+ show.

The same goes for Sandman. He's the one who even tells the other villains what happens to them. But to discuss whether or not this is the OG Sandman or a variant, we have to retread some things that were already mentioned. Again, when he first showed up, he acknowledged Spider-Man, then helped Spider-Man. All he talked about throughout the movie is getting to see his daughter again. This all pretty much backs up the point that this is the same exact Flint Marco as we saw in Spider-Man 3.

But why is he stuck in sand form? The real world explanation, again, was the coronavirus pandemic. But if they are gonna bring the character back, they need to make it make sense. Again, there was an iconic scene of him mastering the technique of shapeshifting. If he's just stuck in sand form, why didn't they bother to explain that? Also, this supervillain was never in danger of dying because he and his Spider-Man made peace. But if he is a variant, the only question that gets answered is why he is stuck in sand form. Maybe this is a variant who just has to suffer a worse symptom. But everything else is the same! Everything he says, everything he references in his dialogue are the same events that happened in Spider-Man 3 and the previous movies!

The two Amazing Spider-Man villains are arguably the most confusing and the most that actually makes sense. Dr. Curt Connors is arguably the most confusing of all. There are 2 Amazing Spider-Man movies, and he only shows up in one of them, and in his very last scene in the movie, it seems like he at least partially came to grips with his sins. He said to the shadowy figure to leave Peter Parker alone. So if this is the OG Lizard, then one, how did he become the Lizard again? And if he was transported to the MCU before the end of the events of Amazing Spider-Man 1, while he still was in Lizard form, that opens up even more questions. Like, he gets cured at the end of No Way Home, so how does he end up back in Lizard form again and why does he not have any recollection of traveling through the multiverse?

Similarly to the actor for Sandman, the actor for the Lizard doesn't show up on set and they just use archival footage. We all watched The Amazing Spider-Man, and similarly to what I said about Dr. Octopus, there was obviously no dialogue about traveling the multiverse. So this retcon doesn't work the same way it would for Green Goblin. So Dr. Curt Connors being a variant would make sense, but the movie still failed to specify that, and it also only references events made in the Amazing Spider-Man movies.

And then we got Electro, who is the one who makes arguably the most in regard to when he showed up. Not how he showed up, because that doesn't make any sense at all. The last time I watched Amazing Spider-Man 2, I don't recall Peter or Gwen toward the end of the third act saying anything about Max being at risk of killing himself by sucking up the juice in the grid. Their only concern was that he would become too powerful of a foe to beat, and obviously would be left with no electricity. Of course, that would risk other people getting harmed, but I don't think he was ever at risk of harming himself.

We already covered the plot hole of him not knowing Spider-Man's secret identity and how that was a major revelation to him in NwH when he sees his old friend Spider-Man's face for the first time, but given what his last appearance in The Amazing Spider-Man 2 was, essentially him evaporating as well as his last memory, it's very easy to see this character as the OG from the movie. But there is a strong argument for him being a variant, and that is that his personality overall is just very different from how awkward he was in Amazing Spider-Man 2 before he fell into a vat of electric eels. But No Way Home was also the first time we got to see Max in a regular human form after he mutated, so perhaps he just became a more confident person after gaining superpowers.

https://youtu.be/Tl2XAw5Mu0M?si=K1KGJE-axhGQUO_R&t=31 watch from 00:31 to 00:38

Then of course we have our two other Peter Parkers. Now the selling point of this movie has obviously been the nostalgia factor of bringing the previous actors for Spider-Man into the MCU and just putting them all together. Tobey Peter said some things though that make me question if he is the OG, or if he is a variant. For one, this is what he tells Ned when he asks Peter if he has a best friend in his universe.

https://youtu.be/0ComHGb-Ux8?si=_NoEwZ8kyhAJ9KZa&t=70 Watch from 1:10 to 1:34

So, either this Tobey Peter is a variant, in which in his universe Harry Osborn died trying to kill him…or, this Tobey Peter is the OG, the same exact character from the previous Spider-Man movies, but he is just such a morbid person that the first and only thing he decides to mention about his best friend is that he tried to kill him before he died, even though the last thing they did together was team up to fight Sandman and Venom together. And that's another thing, he has worked as a team before even if it was just one other person he teamed up with. So if this is the OG, why would he only mention that his best friend tried to kill him before he himself died? And why not say anything else, like the fact that they teamed up once to fight a couple of supervillains? Unless of course he is a variant, and the events in his life are different from the OG. So that's one line.

And then and then there's one more line and this is when they start working on a cure for the Green Goblin. Tobey Peter said this

https://youtu.be/0ComHGb-Ux8?si=tjqUuxskvBM7n_LI&t=24 watch from 00:24 to 00:29

Now, if this is the OG Tobey Peter, then why would he have been thinking about making a cure for Dr. Osborn for a "very long time?" Dr. Osborn died right before his eyes all the way back when he first started being Spider-Man! So if he's the OG, then that line doesn't make any sense. But if he is a variant Tobey Peter, where in his universe the Green Goblin is still alive and he's still having to deal with him, then yes, this line would make sense. But this is the point that I'm making. This movie came out after Loki on Disney+, which set up the concept of variants. And yet, this movie fails to specify whether these characters are the OG characters or if they are variants. I'm pretty sure they are supposed to be the OGs because otherwise, we've spent 2 and a half hours watching a movie with these actors who aren't playing the same exact characters in previous movies.

Like, if they're variants, then we're not watching a movie with those characters, so the angle of nostalgia the movie employs is more like a trick, instead of being genuine. They wanna have their cake and eat it too. I know it sounds convoluted from me explaining it, but do you know what I mean? It's because the movie itself is so convoluted that trying to make sense out of it only ends up also sounding convoluted.

Andrew Peter almost one for one seems like the OG Andrew Peter from the Amazing Spider-Man movies, but the one thing that really throws me off is the fact that he doesn't seem all that concerned about Dr. Curt Connors being the Lizard again. Now we don't know how much has changed in his universe since the Amazing Spider-Man 2, but we also shouldn't have to assume either. I've said this like 2 or 3 times now but the last time we see Dr. Curt Connors in the Amazing Spider-Man series, he was in jail, he was protective of Peter which implies he accepted the mistakes he made trying to turn everyone in New York City into lizards.

So if this is the same Andrew Peter, shouldn't he be wondering how and why Dr. Connors became a Lizard again in this universe? I was edible'd out when I saw this movie but I swear to you, in my edible'd mind, I was thinking all the same things that I'm talking about now, 4 years later. And even now as I rewatch the movie, I'm still just always thinking about how the movie never bothered to address any of these questions that the movie itself kept on bringing up.

So if you made it this far into the essay, you're either agreeing with me that the whole movie is a mess the more you think about it, or you're of the opinion that I am just thinking way too deeply about the movie, and that the movie itself is just not even that deep. And if that's what you're thinking, I have to respond again by repeating what I said in the beginning.

When the movie constantly has lines like this,

"Osborn died years ago. So either we saw someone else, or you're flying out into the darkness to fight a ghost."

"What are you talking about? He's standing right there he's not-"
"Dead. They both died fighting Spider-Man."

"Max, do you know, do I die?"

This means that the movie clearly wants the audience to think about the events of the previous Spider-Man movies. And by doing so, this movie invites confusion since they have dialogue asking these questions but never bothered to tie up these loose ends. And since the movie is over with all these ends still loose, we have no conclusive answer about whether all these multiversal characters are the same ones we saw before, or if they are variants.

So let ME conclude my video by just saying the same thing that I started with. I love Spider-Man No Way Home. This movie will always have a special place in my heart for being my first movie date with my then girlfriend, and now wife. The memories I have with her, seeing the movie for the first time and being a part of the crowd with the reactions to seeing Matt Murdock, Tobey Peter, and Andrew Peter, those once in a lifetime feelings are moments I will never forget.

This movie achieved everything that it set out to do, which was being the Endgame of Spider-Man movies, feeding off of the nostalgia of people like me who grew up watching Spider-Man movies. To that point, this movie succeeded 100%. However, that's all that the movie has going for it.

When analyzing the movie for its integrity, it unfortunately absolutely falls apart. It's just plot hole after plot hole after plot hole. If this movie was a road, it would be the bumpiest ride ever. However, I still and always will love this movie. It's still my favorite Spider-Man movie. I've rewatched it many times before and probably will many more times in the future.

But it's got issues! All of the things I've talked about are things that I have to either turn my brain off for, or make up my own logic for but the fact that the latter is something we as the audience have to do just goes to show how inconsistent the movie is. By turning my brain off, all of these thoughts go away, but like I said before, the movie WANTS you to keep your brain on and to think deeply about the story itself being told.

When it first came out, I gave it a 9 out of 10, and honestly that is way higher of a score than the movie deserves, but I will still give the movie that score because of the special memories I have with it and what the movie means to me. It's still a masterpiece in my eyes, perhaps one of the most flawed masterpieces I've ever experienced in my entire life.

If you read this all the way to the end, thank you so much. I appreciate you willing to take all this time to see me ramble about a friggin Spider-Man movie! What do you think, by the way? Do you agree? Disagree? Do you think this movie is a mess and only best watched for the purpose of the live action Spider-Verse? Or do you think that I'm horribly wrong and have no idea what I'm talking about?

tl;dr

• Matt Murdock brought the court of public opinion to Peter Parker's attention after helping exonerate him from being accused of murder. And while a lot of people continued to believe Mysterio, I just don't think it makes sense for the court of public opinion to be that divisive given that this movie takes place in phase 4 of the MCU where Spider-Man has many years of being a superhero and an Avenger.
  
• While I can roll with the convenience of the Runes of Kof-Kol breaking and bringing in characters from several timelines that happen to be cinematic universes, what I cannot be forgiving of is how there isn't an explanation of the broken spell bringing characters from different points in time too.
  
• The dialogue constantly affirms these characters as the OGs, but the events throughout and end of the movie makes it puzzling and perplexing for this to be the case - but also doesn't clarify if they're variants too.
  
• I could roll with all the lack of logic and plot holes if this is a movie that you're meant to turn your brain off for, but the problem is that this isn't that kind of movie. The movie wants you to keep your brain on and think deeply about the story being told.
  

[D3RANG3D]

[HaughtyFrank]

And what I'm trying to say is that representation can't just be straight cis white men representing marginalized people

Yeah but in this case he's a Czech writer with a Jewish family telling a story about Czech and Jewish people.
Like, that's exactly what are you hoping for.

But he's not gay, or Romani, or black, or anything else, right? Just because he ticks the "Jewish family" background, doesn't give him a blanket pass. Were there any people that belong to those groups involved in the writing? If so, cool. If not, their point stands.

https://www.resetera.com/threads/kingdom-come-deliverance-ii-has-sold-more-than-5-million-copies-within-its-first-year.1433251/page-3#post-151322509

Missed this beautiful nugget

Maybe hire Jewish writers instead of writing good Jewish characters.

[Boredfrom]

Maybe hire Jewish writers instead of writing good Jewish characters.

Fuck you.

[Boredfrom]

That dude, Rinoa, is fucking nuts.

A lot of representation IS cynical efforts by creators to look better. Do they employ the people they're representing? Do they stand up for, interact with, and befriend these people in real life? Do they understand people unlike them as humans with individual qualities and inner lives? Using minorities as props to lower the heat is a long standing media tradition, yes.

I mean, i don't disagree with you, but at this point why do we celebrate representation in other games?

I largely don't celebrate representation that is not inclusive of the group being represented on the dev team. Especially of a game this size. And on a personal level, I rarely have any reason to anyway. There is very very rare representation of people like me and if it's there it's usually bad and if it's not so bad every single mention of the game will result in the most racist, misogynistic sludge you've ever seen and the publisher will get cold feet and give up on it. And regardless of their own intersections, this behavior will not bother basically any other group of people.

This asshole spergs in the Burka thread, btw.  

The reason why publishers now get the cold feet in representation is also because that attitude of “if you get it wrong, you are scum regardless on how well intended or, worse, actually well written it was”. If I need to guess, Rinoa has a very narrow view of what she considers “good representation” of his social group and is easier to “cheer” for stuff that put ethnic and sexual groups in their corners, well segregated.

[Boredfrom]

Do they employ the people they're representing? Do they stand up for, interact with, and befriend these people in real life? Do they understand people unlike them as humans with individual qualities and inner lives?

Here is the thing, while there is a lot of good writers that just write stuff the know about from life experience… there is also a lot of good writers that haven’t… they are good because they are able to make you believe they do. Most people sperging about representation at social media don’t really want good writing or genuine takes, they want non negative stereotypes and archetypes that reinforce their bias and experiences, but they don’t want to empathize with some other opinion or life experience even if fictional. 

People told all the kiddies from Tumblr that corpo representation was cynical biased and you acted like this was not the case until now, then you demand that becomes more cynical and token driven because no one can understand each other anyways. Is so stupid and self defeating.