Publication Date: 08-02-2026

Spider-Man: Brand New Day (2026) review

Dir. Destin Daniel Cretton

By: Steve Pulaski

Rating: ★★★

What transpires when a Spider-Boy must become a Spider-Man? A lot of mental anguish, turmoil, and emotions, sometimes even during crimefighting.

Spider-Man: No Way Home was such a winning mix of action, emotion, and positive growth for Tom Holland’s iteration of the web-slinging hero — coupled with my more-or-less “divorce” from regularly seeing Marvel movies since 2023 — I wasn’t even thinking about the series continuing. That said, like most people (judging from the eye-popping box office receipts), I can’t get enough Spider-Man. He remains my favorite superhero, as cliche of a choice as it might be. Similar to how Pixar always brings their A-game for the latest Toy Story sequel, Marvel, despite all their ups and downs, takes great care of Spider-Man, and Brand New Day is another worthy addition to the series. Where/how it fits into the larger MCU at this point? I couldn’t care less.

At the end of No Way Home, Spider-Man (Holland) had to make the difficult decision of having Doctor Strange essentially wipe the memory of everyone, making them forget his true identity is Peter Parker. That included his partner, M.J. (Zendaya) and best friend Ned (Jacob Batalon). Now, M.J. and Ned recall Spider-Man saving them on more-than-a-few occasions, but they have no memory of their relationship neither to him nor Peter. While it might be better in the long-run for them, it’s taken a mental toll on Peter, who doesn’t really do anything besides tirelessly respond to emergency calls and retreat to his dilapidated loft where he eats cereal and watches videos of M.J. and Ned in college. His only regular contact is a detective (Liza Colon-Zayas), and even she expresses concern that he is working himself into exhaustion.

During recurring confrontations with Scorpion (Michael Mando), Peter finds his Spidey senses waning. He’s shooting “organic” webs from his wrists, and they’re not as strong, and he lacks coordination when doing so. It’s as if the arachnid side of his DNA is overtaking the human parts, and the timing couldn’t be worse as a villain — or, more accurately, an entity — is forcing him to reckon with the grief of losing M.J. all while he is losing control of himself. This entity can body hop from person-to-person if in close proximity, and being that this is New York, there’s almost always an available body for it to assume. With the help of Frank Castle, better known as the Punisher (Jon Bernthal), Spider-Man has a cold, remorseless friend in which he can confide, and one who can provide an invaluable assist in a pinch.

The lofty emotions laid bare throughout the film come as no surprise when you realize it was directed by Destin Daniel Cretton. The first film in the MCU’s iteration of Spider-Man not helmed by Jon Watts, Brand New Day doesn’t shy away from big emotional crescendos that make you realize how much time you’ve spent with these characters and how deep of a connection you’ve developed with them over the last nine years. Cretton’s been strong with this going all the way back to his directorial debut I Am Not a Hipster; Short Term 12 introduced him to a larger audience, and Just Mercy showed he could transition his proclivity with pathos to a courtroom drama. More recently, he brought Shang-Chi to the big screen and Marvel’s Wonder Man to the small screen, so he knows how to shoot large-scale action with kinetic energy.

If anything, Brand New Day falters because it feels like a compilation of many different versions and drafts of itself. The presence of Scorpion and a collective of masked fighters known as “The Hand” are given little development, and I have a suspicion they belonged to an earlier iteration of this script that maybe muted some of Peter’s ennui. Screenwriters Chris McKenna and Erik Sommers bloat this movie a bit by inserting a great deal of threads that go underdeveloped or completely abandoned, the best one being the aforementioned examination of the arachnid side of Peter overtaking his humanity. The problem is solved too quickly, and shuts the door on the potential for a further existential crisis from Spidey that might’ve sustained a two-and-a-half-hour movie better than some familiar battles in the streets of New York City. Conversely, it affords us some more time with a new character, played by Sadie Sink, who suggests the return of a certain supergroup — one of the few the MCU hasn’t been able to touch until very recently.

What Cretton, McKenna, and Sommers do manage is to carve out a larger role for Bernthal’s Punisher, who is finally given something greater to do. His stoicism and abrasive personality are just what Spidey needs in order to handle his grief in a mature, adult manner. Bernthal delivers his lines not only with a thundering bass but with the kind of blunt east coast authenticity that makes it sound like he’s been barking at New York cabbies and denizens since he was a child. He’s my MVP of the movie.

That said, the one who seems to be having the most fun is Holland, and how could he not? He’s now played Spider-Man longer than any other actor in recent history. He seizes the opportunity to take the character in a darker, more contemplative direction ala Tobey Maguire in Spider-Man 2, only this time with greater attention paid to Peter’s fraying mental and physical state. Moreover, the first scene he shares with Zendaya’s M.J. is truly emotional, and there’s an undercurrent of melancholy introduced into their relationship that’s both new and, on occasion, deeply saddening.

Lastly, gone is the coming-of-age, Saved by the Bell-esque vibrant colors and spirit that so delightfully imbued Homecoming with a breath of fresh air amidst the MCU feeling like it was beginning to get stale. Brand New Day‘s color scheme doesn’t reflect the optimism suggested by its title. The Big Apple skies are now overcast and dreary, and even the drab interior spaces in which Peter finds himself are nothing like the brightly colored walls of his high school. Spidey, like so many of us, is in the real world, and it’s been a bleak decade for many of us for multiple reasons. Yet maybe the most remarkable element behooving the latest Spider-Man movie is despite how dark it gets, it never stops being enjoyable — it’s hard to be too sullen watching Spider-Man, even if he isn’t always smiling.

My review of Spider-Man: Homecoming
My review of Spider-Man: Far from Home
My review of Spider-Man: No Way Home

Starring: Tom Holland, Zendaya, Jon Bernthal, Jacob Batalon, Sadie Sink, Florence Pugh, Tramell Tillman, Liza Colon-Zayas, Michael Mando, Mark Ruffalo, and Marisa Tomei. Directed by: Destin Daniel Cretton.