Before Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse came out, people did not have high hopes for the film. But since its release, the movie has received huge amounts of critical acclaim, a number of awards, and many now consider it to be the best Spider-Man film ever. There are a number of things that the film does extremely well, and if DC were to replicate Into the Spider-Verse but with the Flash, the film could restore a lot of faith in the DCEU.
However, this is no small feat, as Into the Spider-Verse is not only a highly original animated film, but also highly original even beyond the scope of animation. Aesthetically, the film was so carefully planned, that when the project first began there was only one animator working on it. This was because the creators wanted to be certain that there was a very specific style set in mind from the start. After the first year, there were only about 10 seconds that the creators were happy with, and this would come to be the aesthetic model for the rest of the film.
Interestingly, at one point of production, the animation team consisted of only one animator, and at another point, the team consisted of 177 animators, which is twice the number of animators that would be working on a typical animation the length of Into the Spider-Verse. The first Toy Story film, for example, had only 27 animators. The large number of animators allowed for the film to take on a very innovative animation style, and Into the Spider-Verse is so unforgettable because there is nothing else in the world of blockbuster feature-length animation that looks quite like it.
As technology advances, it seems that the goal of animated filmmaking has been to make any given project look as realistic as possible. However, with Into the Spider-Verse, the creators weren’t interested in something hyper-realistic, they wanted to reference the medium that the Spider-Man character originated from. Subsequently, the resulting film is both highly stylistic and visually striking, with an appearance that exists halfway between reality and cartoon.
The film uses a combination of modern and old-fashioned animation techniques, as the characters and locations are 3D rendered, but they have 2D lines placed over the 3D visuals to better recreate the appearance of 2D animation. Often times in comic books, the prints of the outlines and the prints of the colors wouldn’t perfectly line up, and this effect was similarly used by the animators of Into the Spider-Verse to create various effects with depth of field and with moving objects. In a movie about the Flash, similar effects could be used to illustrate his movements beautifully.
Also like a comic book, the film uses crosshatching and dots to emphasize light and shadow. Most modern animations use motion blur to smooth the movements of their characters, but Into the Spider-Verse uses an older technique called smearing in place of it. This is when elements of a character or object are animated multiple times in a single frame, for example one character might have three arms in place of two to make them appear as though they are moving quicker when the frames are played in succession.
In general, the frame rate for a film is usually 24 fps, although some animations can be 12 fps or even lower. With modern blockbusters like this, they usually stay closer to 24 fps. When an animation is done at 24 fps, it is called animating on 1s, and when an animation is 12 fps, it is called animating on 2s, because the animation moves on every other frame. In Into the Spider-Verse, they use a blend of both. Usually the background is animated on 1s, but the characters are animated on 2s. As Into the Spider-Verse unfolds, Miles Morales first is animated on 2s, but as he becomes more and more capable, starts being animated at a higher frame rate until he is also animated on 1s. This also is a technique that could be used potentially in reverse, with the Flash at a high frame rate moving quickly around the normal people animated at slower frame rates.
All of these different effects in Into the Spider-Verse combined have allowed the viewer to be able to pause the film at virtually any point and have the resulting frame look like a page from a comic book. It wants the audience to be aware of the fact that the film is an animation. Of course, to look highly realistic certainly is impressive, difficult and expensive to do, but Into the Spider-Verse tries instead to pronounce and exaggerate the aspects that make it an animation, and because of this it is a such a visually interesting film, so different from other animated films.
But it is not just the animation that makes the film so great; the writing, the editing, and the soundtrack all are done so well. The creators were able to take a story that, at this point, has practically been done to death and make it interesting again. Spider-Man is such a popular character because he is one of, if not, the most relatable superhero. And since he is so popular, Spider-Man has practically become his own franchise. The beginning of Into the Spider-Verse calls attention to this, referencing the Spider-Man comics, the shows, the other movies, and even a popsicle modelled after him. Into the Spider-Verse successfully manages to portray the franchise of Spider-Man, the many Spider-people that have existed (and will exist) and have a compelling origin story for Peter Parker’s successor all in one film.
What is so relatable about Miles Morales specifically is that he is like the viewer in the sense that he also grew up admiring Spider-Man. He saw him as a heroic figure that he wanted to be like. At the beginning of the film, Miles is just a normal kid, struggling with responsibilities and relationships and he is unsure of his place in the world. All he knows is what he isn’t, but in accepting that, he learns who he is, and even if he still isn’t exactly sure what he wants, he is willing to take a leap of faith. Because he takes that leap of faith, he can become Spider-Man, and anyone can take that leap of faith. Subsequently, Into the Spider-Verse is perhaps the truest iteration of Spider-Man since the original comic because it embodies what Stan Lee wanted for the character. He has said many times that anyone can be Spider-Man, anyone can wear the mask, and Into the Spider-Verse reminds the audience of that as opposed to just seeing Peter Parker do it again.
Into the Spider-Verse was a great film even before it was beautifully packaged in a revolutionary animation style. There will certainly be attempts to emulate aspects of the film sooner or later, and although they will not be as revolutionary, that does not definitively mean that they will not be as beautiful. So why shouldn’t it be the Flash? As it seems like his superpowers could be portrayed very well through the aesthetics of Into the Spider-Verse, and like several of the characters in the DCEU, he would probably benefit from a very carefully planned and orchestrated film.
![\"IT電腦補習](\"http://itteacheritfreelance.hk/test/wordpress/wp-content/uploads/2016/05/logo2-2.png\"){kind=logo}
www.itsec.hk
www.itsec.vip
www.itseceu.uk
Leave a Reply