Spider-Man: Brand New Day

★★★★☆

145 min | PG-13 | July 31, 2026 | Sony Pictures Releasing

The best Spider-Man film yet. It is fun and suspenseful, and it is mature in the right way. The characters feel things other than the urge to win a fight.

No Way Home ended with the whole world forgetting Peter Parker. Brand New Day picks up in that silence. Peter is alone in New York with no friends, no family and no one who knows his name. Destin Daniel Cretton takes over from Jon Watts, and he makes the smartest choice available. He treats the loss as the story instead of a reset button. The film is still a superhero movie with big fights and bigger set pieces. It just remembers that the man in the suit is the reason anyone cares.

Tom Holland has played this character for ten years, and this is his best work in the role. He plays Peter as older and lonelier, a young man carrying a weight he can’t share with anyone. The humor is still there, but now it reads as a defense mechanism. Zendaya is excellent as MJ. Every scene between them hurts in the best way, because the film understands exactly what both characters have lost. The antagonist is the other great surprise. It is a strong, layered performance, and the film gives its villain real motives instead of a list of grievances. The less said about who it is, the better.

Cretton handles action with clarity and weight. The fights are easy to follow, and they carry real suspense because the film has made you worry about what Peter can afford to lose. The web-swinging through New York finally feels physical again. The tone is the real achievement. This is mature without being grim or raunchy. It is a film about grief, responsibility and starting over, and it doesn’t wink at the audience to get out of the hard moments.

Marvel has spent years making movies that only know how to feel triumphant. Brand New Day knows how to feel sad, scared and hopeful too, and that range makes the fun land harder. It is strong, confident blockbuster filmmaking with a beating heart. Holland and Zendaya have never been better together. This is the Spider-Man movie the character has deserved for a long time.