Going on Date Nights when you work weekend nights is pretty near impossible. However, we can occasionally have Date mornings. This morning Allison and I went to see Spider-Man Homecoming at our local theater. This is the first Marvel MCU movie that we’ve seen together in a while. She hasn’t even gotten so see Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2, yet. I guess that will have to wait for digital. Oh wait, this isn’t a Marvel movie, this is a SONY movie with Marvel serving as executive producer and having heavy influence on the film because the film is official canon of the MCU.

We really liked the movie. It was so well done. After the movie we went looking for Smashburger in Attleboro, however despite their being a sign for it, Smashburger is not around in Attleboro yet. Soon. So we went over to Five Guys and had lunch including some of their great milkshakes. I got Oreo and Bacon in my chocolate shake. But you want to hear about the movie.

I have a whole SPOILER FILLED review below. So, please do not read past the video or watch the video if you have not seen the movie.

The movie opens on Michael Keaton’s character, Adrian Toomes. He is the foreman of a crew that is cleaning up after the Battle of New York. His crew is doing well but then the Department of Damage Control comes in and takes over the operation. Adrian is out of a job and has stretched himself out too thin. He’s trying to provide for his family and for his crew but depute working hard he’s pushed out by the government. To add insult to injury the Department of Damage Control is a subsidiary of Stark Industries and therefore the same people who make the giant messes are getting paid to clean them up. This part of the story occurs 8 years in the past.

We then fast forward to the present where Peter Parker is off to the battle with Captain America in Captain America Civil War. We get a sense of who Peter is as he is making a little vlog of his trip. He’s just a 14 year old kid and he’s having fun with his movie voiceover and is annoying Happy Hogan who has been appointed his handler. Peter does well in the battle and returns home with Tony Stark. He gets to keep the suit and is ready to be an Avenger. However, this does not happen. Peter texts and calls Stark and Hogan for the next two months and tries to keep his calendar open in case he gets called up to the big time.

Meanwhile Adrian Toomes and his crew have been getting rich by making weapons from the alien technology that they salvaged and continue to steal. He even has this wicked suit that lets him fly around and it looks like a giant vulture. Some of the weapons that he sells get into the hands of some bank robbers.

The robbers decide to use the weapons to hit an ATM in Peter’s neighborhood. Peter is out patrolling and he sees this. He gets into a fight with the four robbers but in the middle of the fight one of the weapons destroys a neighborhood sandwich shop that Peter frequents. Peter leave the robbers to check on the shop owner and rescue him. Clearly there is something going on that is more dangerous than Peter has experienced before. He contacts Happy but doesn’t hear anything.

Peter has a best friend named Ned. Ned discovers Peter’s Secret when Peter returns home one night through his window and then crawls across the ceiling to shut the door so Aunt May doesn’t see. Peter lands on the floor and takes off his mask turns and sees Ned who drops his almost fully assembled LEGO Death Star. Peter has Ned swear not to tell anyone that he is Spider-Man. This however, does not stop Ned from telling people that Peter is a friend of Spider-Man.

Peter has a crush on a girl named Liz. She is a senior while he is a Sophomore. Peter pines for her and when he and Ned overhear her say that she has a crush on Spider-Man Ned can’t help but blurt out that Peter knows Spider-Man. Liz invites the guys to her party that night where they plan to have Spider-Man swoop in and say hi. This never happens because as Peter is preparing to swoop in he sees a huge blue explosion in the distance. He goes to investigate.

Peter thwarts the weapons deal and saves a character named Arron Davis played by Donald Glover. Aaron Davis is a character known as The Prowler in Ultimate Spider-Man. He is also the uncle to Miles Morales another Spider-Man. This is interesting because Donald Glover has always wanted to play Spider-Man and there was a fan campaign to make him Spider-Man but he’s a bit old to be that character. He does play Miles Morales in the cartoon Ultimate Spider-Man.

There are two scenes with Donald Glover which are pretty funny. The second scene has Peter using the Interrogation mode on his suit which gives him a Batman/Green Arrow growly voice. It doesn’t work for him but he has a good interaction with Aaron who tells him that he doesn’t want to see the weapons on the streets because he has a nephew in the city. That nephew being Miles who, we hope, will appear in Spider-Man homecoming 2.

Peter learns about an arms deal happening on the Staten Island Ferry. He calls Tony Stark and Happy to let them know about it but doesn’t hear anything so he goes off to take care of things himself. The battle goes bad and the Vulture’s weapon splits the ferry into two. Peter does all he can to keep the ferry together but he cannot do it alone. Iron man shows up and saves the day. Then Tony Stark takes the suit back from Peter.

I may have skipped over the part where Peter tracks down the Vulture and his gang to Maryland and his Academic Decathlon team nearly dies in the Washington Monument but Spider-Men saves them all especially Liz. He directly saves Liz’s life in the monument. They share a moment and then Spider-Man falls down the elevator shaft.

When Iron Man takes away the suit Peter focuses more on his studies and he ends up getting a date with Liz to the homecoming dance. He goes to pick her up for the dance and is greeted at the door by Adrian Toomes. He is Liz’s father. This threw me because I had read an article over at ScreenRant that said that Zendaya’s character was Michelle Toomes, The vulture’s daughter. This was not the case at all. Whether it was a deliberate misdirect is uncertain at this time. Peter is obviously nervous as all hell and as Adrian drives the kids to the dance he realizes exactly who Peter is. They get to the dance and Adrian tells Liz that he and Peter are going to have a chat before he lets him out for the dance. Then he pulls out a gun and tells Peter that if he keeps messing with his business that he will kill everyone that Peter cares about.

Peter gets out and goes into the dance. He apologizes to Liz and takes off on her to chase down The Vulture. He realizes that The Vulture is going to try and hijack the Avengers plane full of weapons and Avengers artifacts. As he goes out of the back of the school he is blindsided by The Shocker. A fight occurs and when The Shocker gets the upper hand and is going to kill Spider-Man, Ned saves him with the web slingers.

Ned then gets his chance to be a hero and help Peter by being the “man in the chair”. Peter goes after The Vulture in his homemade suit. He catches up with him right before he takes flight to intercept The Avengers Plane. A Fight occurs and Peter prevents the plane from crashing into Coney Island. Then he has a further fight on the beach and the Vulture tries to take off with a case of Arc reactors that blow up. Peter saves him and then webs him up for authorities.

Back at school he sees Liz and she has to leave because of her father’s trial. She and her mother are moving. With Liz leaving and also graduating a new head of the Academic Decathlon must be chosen, that will be Michelle. Zendaya’s character isn’t seen that much in the movie, she is a loner and an outsider. When the teacher says that Michelle is the new captain of the team she tells everyone to call her M.J.. No, she is not MAry Jane Watson but rather a different M.J. but it sure sets up her to become the love interest for Peter in future movies. During the meeting Peter gets a call from Happy Hogan. Happy is please and grateful to Peter for saving the plane or at least stopping the Vulture. Tony Stark then invites Peter to the Avengers compound to become an Avenger. He shows Peter a new suit that is very metallic looking, Think Iron Spider. Peter turns him down and says that he has a lot more to learn before he can become an Avenger. Peter returns home to find the first suit that Tony made him is back in his room. He puts it on immediately and is caught by Aunt May. The movie ends.

There are two post credit scenes. The first one sets up a possible villain for the next movie and also reveals that The Vulture will not let anyone know the true identity of Spider-Man. He at least feels obligated to keep that information close to himself our of respect for Peter saving his life and his daughter’s life.

The final scene is a silly one with Captain America that makes a joke out of all those videos of Captain America that are seen throughout the movie.

The movie was great. I loved watching it. They got the Peter Parker character right and maybe could have made the Spider-Man character a little more confident and funny, but it was still early in his life as Spider-Man. I bet he will be funnier in the next outing and as he gets more confidence. He was delightfully awkward. Many people have said that there was a John Hughes vibe to the movie and I would agree. I also found out that the movie was written by John Francis Daley who was in Freaks and Geeks and also Bones. I like him. Zendaya’s Michelle was a fun character who was socially awkward but totally owned it. The character of Ned is really funny. I like the interactions between Peter and Happy as well as Peter and Tony Stark. It was good to see Damage Control in the movie and that explains how New York looked put back together. There are many great Easter Eggs in the movie, too.