It was a cold morning, around 7:00 A.M or so. I had just awoken a couple minutes before; though now I paced through the dim streets. Nothing much was rushing through my mind as I headed out to downtown Sunnyvale. Quickly I rushed through the lifeless streets before finding myself at the movie theater. Only then did I realize that the theater was yet to open for two hours. I waited on a nearby bench before heading to a Whole Foods grocery nearby. After hours of salivating over food I could not buy, I headed back to the movie theater and waited in a large crowd of men, women and children. First to enter, I moved quickly towards the cash register to buy a ticket. Ticket in hand, I took some popcorn and a drink, making my way to the showing room. Sounds echoed through the dark halls as I walked up dark stairs to find my seat. Next to my seat was a pair of women which I greeted though they responded by running away. I shrugged that off and took a seat, face turned to the large projected screen. Sat in that cushioned chair I watched the spectacle, the amazing, the fantastic movie: “Spider-Man: No Way Home.”

That was my story of watching “Spider-Man No Way Home” in the movie theater. It showed how much I expected of this movie. From word of mouth, a rumor had it that this movie was better than “Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse” an award winning film. I had heavy doubts on those words though after watching the movie, it brought one word to my mind: underwhelming.

Before the movie had even begun, I had kept up with all the latest news about “Spider-Man No Way Home.” I watched both trailers a dozen times as well as analysis videos every so often. My hopes were high as they came crashing down to reality.

For example, the use of the different Spider-Mans demonstrated this. There were three of them this time around, with two of them coming from previous movies. They were not used poorly, though words on their roles were greatly exaggerated. They were included in some nice scenes and an action piece, but nothing that shot this movie into greatness. They were underutilized as the Spider-Mans only met after more than half the movie had passed. Utilized properly, the two older versions of Spider-Man could shepherd the new younger Spider-Man (Tom Holland). This would make them feel more like characters than fan service.

The movie cannot catch a break as it faces another giant problem, the number of villains it contains. All in all, there are five villains, which might infuriate most. One more and the infamous Sinister Six would have been made. Unfortunately this did not happen, angering some fans. Contrary to them, I think the cut down on villains was a good idea, but a better idea would be to cut down the villain count by a bit more. From the sheer amount of characters, there is not much time to be spent with any of them. If they had cut down the five villains to three, then it would be more manageable but as of now, there were too many villains.

From fan service moments to well made action scenes, “Spider-Man No Way Home” is not a bad movie. It has some great moments, though they do run short as it is overstuffed with characters. Too many mouths to feed and not enough screen time. A cruel choice for the screenplay writers to make, either give screen time to the characters that people love or the movie’s overall quality. Unlike in the very first theatrical Spider-Man movie, they could not catch both. This movie is not bad, it is just overhyped.