2021 – Spider-Man No Way Home
The visual effects in this movie were incredible, and I’m not just saying that because I’m a huge Marvel fan. I mean, I am, but even if I wasn’t I’d still say the effects were awesome! Not only were we treated to effects that we have seen before, but that were upgraded and enhanced to look cooler than we’ve seen in previous films, but we were also shown a few new things that we’ve never seen before. The visual effects team seemed to have pulled out all the stops and knocked this one out of the park!
The whole concept of the movie is that Spider-Man has to fight the villains from all the previous Spider-Man movies, whether they were officially part of the MCU or not. Visually, and just in general, the greatest thing about this film were the characters who were brought in from the 2002, 2004, and 2007 Spider-Man movies with Toby Maguire, and the 2012 and 2017 Spider-Man movies with Andrew Garfield. But the greatest visual effects went to the villains, which were brought in from each of these movie.
The movie gathered the best villains from all those other movies who were defeated: The Green Goblin, Doctor Octopus, Electro, Sandman, and The Lizard. So there we have five great villains fighting three incarnations of the hero. But all of their looks were given a make-over. My favorite had to be Electro. Not only did they change his electricity effects from blue to the more familiar yellow from the comics, but they also believably explained the change as part of the narrative. And they also gave Doctor Octopus’s tentacles a little upgrade with some of Stark’s nano-technology. And we even got to see Venom in a post-credit scene.
The final climactic fight where everyone is fighting everyone was really cool! Sure, I’m guessing that most of it was completely CGI, since Spider-Man wears a mask that covers his face, and the faces of the villains were not seen much, like in the case of The Lizard and Sandman. But if that was the case, the CGI really looked fantastic! The sand effects were cool, the electricity effects were great, and even The Lizard looked pretty realistic.
And lest I forget, I have to mention the really cool Doctor Strange effects. The spell he casts to make the world forget Spider-Man’s identity looked bright and flashy, lighting up the screen like a kaleidoscope. We spent a little time in the mirror dimension, where reality started bending and twisting, reflecting and multiplying, and it looked stunning. I really liked the shot where Spider-Man escapes and traps Strange there using his webs and math. That looked cool. And then after the final fight is done, Doctor Strange casts another spell to close the dimensional rifts, as reality started to tear itself apart. It all just looked so cool!