Marvel's Spider-Man 2 Spoiler Thoughts

The story has so much to it, I don’t even know where to begin…

I guess I’ll start with the new interpretation of the Black Suit/Venom Saga. I think that the game has soooooo many great ideas for it. I’ll keep it real: it might be because I haven’t read enough Eddie Brock-centric comics, but I never got too attached to Eddie as a character, and he’s largely felt pretty cut off from Spider-Man and his mythos, especially in recent years. There is so much stuff that has happened with Eddie, Venom, and the Symbiotes in the comic books over the past couple of years, specifically the stuff with Knull: The King in Black. Much of what I knew about the Symbiotes’ history has been retconned, and at this point, I have no clue what’s going on with them anymore. That’s how distant from Spider-Man’s world Eddie and Venom feel at this point.

This is why I think giving Harry Osborn the Symbiote and making him become Venom instead of Eddie Brock is such an interesting idea. It makes the connection between Peter and Venom feel a lot more personal, and establishing these personal connections between Peter, Miles and the main villain has been a priority for Insomniac in all of their games thus far. That being said, I don’t know if the game handled Harry’s downfall all that well. This is one of those areas where I felt the story could’ve used a bit more attention. He goes from being almost excessively nice and friendly to Peter at the start of the game to immediately turning on him after like, one single instance of Peter being a bit of a dick while under the Symbiote’s influence. You could make the claim that the Symbiote amplified Harry’s buried negative feelings when it returned to him, but I just don’t think the game itself did a good job convincing me that Harry has come to hate Peter. I do like the angle of the Symbiote twisting his desire to create a world united though, that felt way more convincing. That might be why they focused more on that towards the end of the story, with Venom trying to convince Peter that what he was doing was for the good of mankind.

Kraven is probably the biggest area where the story fumbles. Kraven feels like he’s just there to set the stage for the events of the story and not much else. He has almost no presence over the course of the entire game, and I think that’s very disappointing. When Kraven is on screen, he’s excellent. He’s huge, overpowering, intimidating, and utterly ferocious when he appears, but that’s just it: he doesn’t really appear that much. After I finished Spider-Man 2, I watched Monty Zander’s critique of the game (I'd link it but Pastebin won't let me), and I strongly agree with his feelings and ideas regarding Kraven. I think that before his death, Kraven should have appeared in the overworld a lot more. He could lead the other Hunters to draw you into a trap, he could ambush you in a vein similar to the Majima Everywhere system in Yakuza Kiwami (though done in a less obnoxious fashion), or jumpscare you when you web zip onto a rooftop similar to the Manbat jumpscares in Batman: Arkham Knight. He is Kraven the God Damn Hunter, he should be stalking you all throughout New York. You should feel like he’s always watching you, and can appear anywhere at any time. An idea I had is that he could randomly snipe one of your webs as you’re web swinging and make you fall to ground just to fuck with you and remind you that he’s still out there, watching you. I dunno. I do like that they use his motivations from the Kraven’s Last Hunt storyline, but I feel like they could’ve gone farther with his character in this game before killing him off.

For the most part, I think Peter’s character is handled rather well. One of the major plot points of the game is how poorly he’s managing his life and his responsibilities. He gets fired from his teaching job right at the start of the game, he starts neglecting Miles once Harry comes back into the picture, he’s ignorant of the sacrifices Mary Jane is making for him… Peter ignores his entire life for the sake of being Spider-Man, and he feels the need to do so because the guilt of failing to save Aunt May in the first game is destroying him inside. This is what makes the power the Symbiote gives to Peter so intoxicating, and I think that’s great. Another area where the story unfortunately feels rushed is that it doesn’t feel like Peter gets enough time with the Symbiote. He has a couple of instances where he says some pretty mean things, like the terrible stuff he says to the Lizard during that boss fight, calling his alter ego Curt Conners a “weakling” and that “his family was better off without him”. Aside from that though, it never feels like Peter becomes as dark and as brutal as you’d expect him to be while under the Symbiote’s influence. I love how Insomniac makes him project his insecurities onto his friends, but this really only happens in like, one cutscene. I love how adamant he is about keeping the suit even after Curt Conners explains to him that it’s alive, saying that “It makes me a better Spider-Man”. I genuinely got chills during that cutscene, but again, this only happens once.

Honestly, I think that because Insomniac does such a tremendous job when it comes to making Peter a great person, it’s hard to feel any sense of anxiety towards Peter’s downfall, because the only thing I can really feel for him is sympathy. Aunt May’s death really messed him up. Peter already had to live with the guilt of not protecting his Uncle Ben, and now both of the people who raised him are dead, despite the power Peter possesses. This is why his obsession with being a better Spider-Man is so understandable. Peter needed more moments like the Lizard boss fight. He needed to become way more unhinged than he actually was under the Symbiote’s influence. He needed to do stuff like neglect civilians, cause destruction to property, and treat his friends way worse than he did to make his downfall more effective. For as much as we meme on things like Bully Maguire in Sam Raimi’s Spider-Man 3, or Christopher Daniel Barnes’ overacting during the Symbiote Saga in the 1990s Spider-Man animated series, I think both instances portray a more believable downfall of Peter Parker in the Symbiote Suit than Insomniac’s interpretation.

I feel like the devs had a hard time fitting Miles into the story. Understandably, the story mainly revolves around Peter, Harry, and the Black Suit, which leaves little room for developing Miles as a character. That being said, I do really love the character development Miles does have. Much like how Peter is wrestling with his inner turmoil, Miles has to deal with the overwhelming anger he feels towards Martin Li/Mr. Negative for causing his father’s death in the first game. The return of Martin Li was a major surprise to me, and I loved how he and Miles both processed their feelings over the first game’s events. Li feels nothing but remorse over his actions, and wants nothing but to make amends. Miles can’t bring himself to forgive Li, but also acknowledges that he can’t keep carrying around the hate he feels in his heart for him. The way the two work together to save Peter and create the Anti-Venom suit was tremendous and executed very well. I partially expected there to be a Miles vs Symbiote Peter boss fight, and I’m SO GLAD Insomniac delivered. It was handled brilliantly as well. Yuri Lowenthal and Nadji Jeter’s acting during this part of the game was PERFECT. Their voices are so emotionally charged that I was able to really feel the sense of tragedy the game wanted me to feel during this section of the game.

The ending left me feeling a tad mixed. The conflict with Venom and the Symbiote Hoards felt rushed, but I thought the final boss fight was mostly great, especially the Miles portion of it. I do like how Miles proves that he has what it takes to be Spider-Man by being the one to put down Venom ultimately, but at the same time, that was kind of the point of his self-titled game, so it feels like a repeat here. The scene where Norman Osborn breaks down after the doctors tell him Harry might never wake up from his coma was devastating. I really like this twist on Norman’s character. In the comic books, Norman was an awful father to Harry. He detested him and thought he was a failure, but in the Insomniac games, he truly, truly loves his son. The game hints that Harry’s condition might serve as the catalyst for Norman’s transformation into the Green Goblin, especially since after his outburst, Norman calls an unknown person and tells them to “Get the G-SERUM ready”.  Peter retiring from being Spider-Man makes sense given where his character is by the end of the story, but I think everyone knows this retirement isn’t going to stick. Not only is there the post credits scene, which hints at a team up with Norman Osborn and Otto Octavius to take revenge on Peter, Pete’s just too dedicated to saving lives as Spider-Man, and there’s no way he could ever permanently give it up. Also, when you think about it, forcing Miles to be the one and only Spider-Man isn’t really fair to him. Miles is just going to run into the exact same problems that Peter is having at this point in his life, and I think Miles might develop some resentment towards Pete in the future as a result. Given the post credits scene, I remain pretty confident that at some point, Otto will take over Peter’s body and become the Superior Spider-Man. I dunno if it’ll happen in the third game, but at some point, I definitely feel like this is going to happen, and I’m going to be so hyped when it does. Marvel’s Spider-Man 2 concludes with a bittersweet ending that definitely promises more to come, I just hope that Insomniac is able to rein themselves in a bit and not get lost in the sauce like they did with this game.