How 'Spider-Man: Across the Spider-Verse' Paves the Way for Its Sequel

Let’s cut to the chase. While we’re used to superhero movies having post-credit scenes, Spider-Man: Across The Spider-Verse doesn’t have one, and doesn’t need one. It’s not like we’re gonna have to wait years for its sequel as Spider-Man: Beyond the Spider-Verse is due out in 2024—guess that’s one of the rather cool benefits to this movie being delayed huh?Folks, it’s been a long five years since the first film Into: The Spider-Verse premiered in 2018, and with Across The Spider-Verse we pick up one year after the events of its predecessor.

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First off the bat we'll answer this. The film, perhaps surprisingly, does not have a post-credit scene.

Now into the movie itself and some predictions for the sequel.

Hailee Steinfield shines as Gwen Stacey aka Spider-Woman, and her universe is a captivating one. We see her quitting a band, dealing with a father who misunderstands her in more ways than one, and fails to understand her in one of the film's most pivotal moments—revealing to her father that she’s the elusive Spider-Woman he’s been after for the murder of Peter Parker.

We also get introduced to Issa Rae’s very pregnant character Jessica Drew.

We then get re-introduced to Miles Morales’ (Shameik Moore) interesting world of fighting his “arch-nemesis” (which we learn were created in the first film), ), and being misunderstood by his parents as well. Miles is late to an important school meeting with his parents and school advisor discussing his future, he’s also got a B- in Spanish which baffles his Puerto Rican mother, is late (again) to a special party for his father celebrating his work promotion, which results in him being grounded for two, no wait...three months. Actually, make that five.

By the time Miles and Gwen reunite, unexpectedly of course, they realize they have a lot in common (and are falling for one another), and what we get throughout this entire film is an emotional depth that makes you sometimes forget you're watching an “animated” movie. You see yourself in these characters. You’ve had the same experiences as Miles, Gwen, and even their parents to some degree. You are these characters or have been at certain points in your life.

If Across the Spider-Verse has one “flaw,” it’s that it lacks the dynamic action that’s normally present throughout the entirety of superhero films.  Perhaps it’s because we’ve been spoiled from the plethora of other Marvel/superhero films that have come out in the last several years where it's been non-stop acting and fighting. Maybe this is the different approach we've needed for a while, and we need to learn that there doesn't "have to be something going on" every second of every movie. That said, the real fight scenes and action don't take place until about twenty or so minutes before the film ends.

Across the Spider-Verse ends with a cliffhanger, which did you expect anything else with a confirmed follow-up? We kind of saw it coming. There's a lot of unanswered questions and some slight confusion to be honest. The ending is so abrupt (which is perhaps the only other flaw) that we're not even one-hundred percent sure exactly where this is going. From what we've gathered though, here's our predictions for Beyond the Spider-Verse.

• There’s definitely more Spider-people incoming along with more dimensions. More than we first thought possible in 2018. We get introduced to some of these characters in this film through the Spider Society (who has it out for Miles Morales) spearheaded by Miguel O’Hara and Jessica Drew who we referenced earlier. 

• Not so much a theory but something we think is important, there’s so many references to different iterations and versions of Spider-Man that you should familiarize yourself (through the movies and comics) in order to catch said references and totally understand the Spider Society.

• It's like Gwen said to the Spider Society towards the end of the film— they were "supposed to be the good guys." It's clear that what's going is very complex, and obviously Miles has unknowingly contributed to its harsh complexities, but let's make something very clear—Miguel (Oscar Issac) is not a good person. Maybe life in the Spider Society and how his own mistakes contributed to his fate is his reason for being so jaded, but he's acting with bad intentions which indeed does make the Spider Society "bad guys." That's something we believe will be revealed more in the coming film.

• This new society Gwen has formed with her "old friends" will be the ones that gets Miles out of this he's in, and Jessica Drew will join her at some point. There's isn't anything that happened specifically during this film that points to that being a legit possibility on our end, but if you paid attention to her facial expressions, then you could kind of spot the apprehensiveness from her. Maybe we're off base with this one though.
• Lastly, not a prediction for the next film but a prediction for this one—this movie is winning another Academy Award.

The visual elements of Across: The Spider-Verse cannot be raved enough. It's as flawless as what the storyline is captivating. We can't wait to see what the next one brings.

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