*Miles/Gwen-related spoilers.*
The bond between Spider-Folks is a special one. We’ve seen it between the Peter Parkers in No Way Home, a connection that crosses not just universes but franchises and studios! And we’ve seen it of course in the Spider-Verse films, highlighted in the chaotic mentor-mentee relationship between Miles and Peter B., the tight friendship between characters like Gwen, Hobie, and Pavitr, and even the minutes-long encounter between Miles and his universe’s Peter in the first movie. But even with that built-in bond, Miles and Gwen have something extra.
Miles’s closest Spider-relationship in Into the Spider-Verse is definitely his dynamic with Peter B., as Miles gloms onto Peter looking for help with his newfound powers and Peter finds his tired, jaded attitude towards being Spider-Man reinvigorated by Miles’s determination to do the right thing even when he’s not sure what he’s doing. The connection with Gwen, though, is certainly a close second. Like Miles, she’s still a young Spider—more experienced than Miles, who’s completely brand-new, but she’s much closer to remembering those early days of flailing and confusion than Peter or some of the others. When Miles runs into her at his school and accidentally gets his hand stuck in her hair, Gwen tries to explain how he can get himself unstuck, but Miles panics and just tries to yank it out. Which ultimately leads to the asymmetrical haircut Gwen sports for the rest of the franchise.
Even during the moments of Into the Spider-Verse where Gwen doubts Miles’s readiness, she is still in his corner and rooting for him. At the end of the film, theirs is the hardest parting, and when Across the Spider-Verse starts, it’s clear how much each misses the other from their respective universes. Miles is gearing his future college plans towards fields that will allow him to study the multiverse, and as things get harder and harder for Gwen at home, she wants nothing more than to be able to talk to Miles about it.
When Gwen gets hooked up with the Spider Society, Miguel tells her about Miles’s status as an “anomaly” who was never supposed to be Spider-Man, and despite equipping her with a universe-hopping portal watch, she’s warned to steer clear of him. But Gwen can’t help herself, and when her duties take her to Miles’s universe, she seeks him out.
As they hang out together, catching up as they both chill out upside-down on the side of a tall building, it really hits home how lonely being a Spider can be. Even though they both learned in Into the Spider-Verse just how many of them are out there, they ended that movie with all of them back in their own universes, once again the lone Spider. Knowing there are other Spider-Folks out there but you can’t see them might be an even lonelier feeling than being truly on your own, so it’s a balm for Miles and Gwen to see each other again. I really enjoy watching them have fun just swinging around Brooklyn together, and when they settle in to talk, we see how Gwen is really the only peer Miles has: the only other person who’s relatively his age and truly understands what he’s going through.
The will-they-won’t-they hints are impossible to deny, but at this point, it’s understandable why Gwen balks at Miles’s shy intimations that he might like to take things further. At the Spider Society, she’s met tons of Spider-Folks and learned all about “Canon Events,” and it seems to her that one incontrovertible truth of every universe is that Gwen Stacy falls for Spider-Man and then dies. Her own universe is flipped—there, she was bitten by the spider, and Peter was the one to die—but she’s in a state of mind where she doesn’t think she can question the Canon, and she’s scared to risk it.
Back at the Spider Society, when Miguel reveals what he knows about Miles, Miles is both hurt and horrified to realize his friends (chiefly Gwen and Peter B.) already knew this and apparently believe it. It’s awful for him to be chased by a crap ton of Spider-Folks trying to capture him, but that’s nothing compared to the sense of betrayal he feels towards Gwen and Peter B. For her part, Gwen is saddened but conflicted, and as Miles pushes back against Miguel and the others, she doesn’t know what to do.
As I’ve said, there are aspects of the Canon Event/anomaly plots that I don’t like, one of which is simply the fact that Gwen would go along with ganging up on Miles like this. Luckily, she’s shaken out of that fall-in-line thinking, and the movie ends with her determined to help Miles, not lock him up. After Miles escapes the Spider Society, she follows him in the hope that, if she finds him before Miguel, there’s still a way to fix things. But as she realizes just how much trouble Miles is in, she reasserts that her greatest allegiance is to her friend.
Miles is in an incredible dicey situation at the end of Across the Spider-Verse, but there are two things that will make the wait for the third movie easier (aside from the obvious—I don’t want the animators to be worked into the ground.) First, Miles has a plan, and I have faith in him. And second, Gwen has assembled all their friends to come and help. Whatever happens next, I’m confident that they’re going to be okay, and whatever they do next, I’m sure they’re going to do it together.
No comments:
Post a Comment