Spider-Man: Homecoming
2017 · Directed by Jon Watts
Woke Score
CriticCritic Score
Audience
Based
Critics rated this 35 points above its woke score. Among Based films, this critic score ranks #130 of 345.
Representation Casting
Score: 68/100
The film features a notably diverse supporting cast including Zendaya, Donald Glover, Jacob Batalon, and Laura Harrier in prominent roles. For a 2017 MCU entry, this represented meaningful diversification of the high school setting.
LGBTQ+ Themes
Score: 0/100
No significant LGBTQ+ themes or representation present in the narrative. The film does not address sexual orientation or gender identity in any meaningful way.
Feminist Agenda
Score: 25/100
Zendaya's MJ character is presented as intelligent and independent, though she remains relatively underdeveloped. Marisa Tomei's Aunt May has agency but occupies a traditional supporting role.
Racial Consciousness
Score: 38/100
The film naturalizes diversity in Queens without explicit commentary on race. Characters of color exist organically in the setting, but the narrative does not engage with racial themes or consciousness.
Climate Crusade
Score: 0/100
No environmental or climate-related themes appear in the film. The narrative is entirely focused on superhero action and personal coming-of-age elements.
Eat the Rich
Score: 15/100
The villain's motivation involves economic grievance, but the film does not develop systemic anti-capitalist critique. It frames the antagonist's resentment as personal rather than ideological.
Body Positivity
Score: 5/100
The film contains no body positivity themes or commentary. It presents conventional superhero aesthetics without challenging body standards.
Neurodivergence
Score: 0/100
No explicit neurodivergent representation or themes are present. Peter Parker's teenage awkwardness is portrayed as typical adolescent insecurity rather than neurodivergence.
Revisionist History
Score: 0/100
The film contains no historical revisionism. It exists entirely within the Marvel Cinematic Universe's fictional present and does not reframe or reinterpret historical events.
Lecture Energy
Score: 12/100
The film maintains a light, entertaining tone focused on action and humor. Tony Stark delivers occasional mentorship moments, but these lack preachy heaviness or moralizing.
Synopsis
Following the events of Captain America: Civil War, Peter Parker, with the help of his mentor Tony Stark, tries to balance his life as an ordinary high school student in Queens, New York City, with fighting crime as his superhero alter ego Spider-Man as a new threat, the Vulture, emerges.
Consciousness Assessment
Spider-Man: Homecoming represents the vanilla middle ground of contemporary blockbuster social consciousness, where diversity is deployed as aesthetic rather than explored as substance. The film's greatest achievement in this regard is its casual normalization of a multiethnic Queens, New York. Zendaya, Donald Glover, Jacob Batalon, and Laura Harrier occupy genuine roles in the ensemble, not token positions, which for a 2017 MCU tentpole was comparatively progressive. One observes a high school where racial composition resembles actual demography rather than Hollywood's persistent whitewashing.
Yet this casting restraint appears almost accidental. The narrative makes no attempt to interrogate power structures, systemic inequality, or anything resembling the modern progressive sensibilities that would define contemporary cultural consciousness in its purest form. Michael Keaton's Vulture harbors economic resentment, but the film treats his grievance as a personal failing rather than a commentary on wealth disparity. Aunt May exists as a supporting character with agency, but the screenplay offers her little to do beyond the maternal archetype. Zendaya's MJ, while refreshingly sardonic, remains underdeveloped and largely reactive to Peter Parker's arc.
What emerges from this analysis is a film that has absorbed the language of diversity without embracing its ideological implications. Spider-Man: Homecoming is progressive by 1990s standards, not by 2020s standards. It is a superhero film that happens to feature actors of color, rather than a superhero film that engages with what that casting choice might mean. This is the industry's preferred mode of social consciousness: aesthetically inclusive but narratively inert.
Analysis generated by our Consciousness Algorithm
Critic Reviews
“Hilariously infectious and full of hope, Spider-Man’s return to Marvel couldn’t be more welcome. ”
“Here’s a franchise you’d think had been done to death (wasn’t the last webslinger reboot, like, two years ago?), and yet Spider-Man: Homecoming feels fresh and new, an endearingly awkward kid brother to the glamorous “Wonder Woman.” ”
“It’s a very human film, oozing with heart and believable stakes, a brilliant marriage that mirrors the enduring ethos of the Spider-Man comic book. ”
“A little of the new Spider-Man went an exhilaratingly long way in Captain America: Civil War last year. But a lot of him goes almost nowhere in this slack and spiritless solo escapade, spun off from an initially intriguing premise that deflates around you with a low whine as you watch, like a punctured bouncy castle. ”
Consciousness Markers
The film features a notably diverse supporting cast including Zendaya, Donald Glover, Jacob Batalon, and Laura Harrier in prominent roles. For a 2017 MCU entry, this represented meaningful diversification of the high school setting.
No significant LGBTQ+ themes or representation present in the narrative. The film does not address sexual orientation or gender identity in any meaningful way.
Zendaya's MJ character is presented as intelligent and independent, though she remains relatively underdeveloped. Marisa Tomei's Aunt May has agency but occupies a traditional supporting role.
The film naturalizes diversity in Queens without explicit commentary on race. Characters of color exist organically in the setting, but the narrative does not engage with racial themes or consciousness.
No environmental or climate-related themes appear in the film. The narrative is entirely focused on superhero action and personal coming-of-age elements.
The villain's motivation involves economic grievance, but the film does not develop systemic anti-capitalist critique. It frames the antagonist's resentment as personal rather than ideological.
The film contains no body positivity themes or commentary. It presents conventional superhero aesthetics without challenging body standards.
No explicit neurodivergent representation or themes are present. Peter Parker's teenage awkwardness is portrayed as typical adolescent insecurity rather than neurodivergence.
The film contains no historical revisionism. It exists entirely within the Marvel Cinematic Universe's fictional present and does not reframe or reinterpret historical events.
The film maintains a light, entertaining tone focused on action and humor. Tony Stark delivers occasional mentorship moments, but these lack preachy heaviness or moralizing.