Madame Web (4 Stars)

"Madame Web" (2024) is an origin story set within Sony's Spider-Man Universe. Rather than centring on an established superhero, the film follows Cassandra "Cassie" Webb, a paramedic in New York City who gradually discovers that her life has been shaped by forces connected to clairvoyance, fate and a web of interlocking destinies.

The film opens in the Peruvian Amazon in 1973. A pregnant researcher, Constance Webb, is searching the jungle for a rare spider species rumoured to possess extraordinary properties. She is betrayed by her colleague Ezekiel Sims, who murders members of the expedition and steals the spider. Constance is fatally wounded but is saved temporarily by members of an indigenous tribe who use the spider's abilities to try to preserve her life. She gives birth to Cassie before dying, and the baby is taken back to the United States.

Decades later, Cassie Webb is a hardened, emotionally distant paramedic in Manhattan. She has grown up in foster care and believes her mother died in a plane crash while researching spiders, unaware of the true circumstances. Cassie avoids personal attachments and lives a solitary life. During a rescue operation on a bridge, she nearly drowns while saving a driver from a submerged car. After being resuscitated, she begins experiencing vivid flashes of the future. At first, these episodes are disorienting and brief; she sees moments seconds before they occur and realises she can alter events by acting on her visions.

Cassie's powers intensify when she encounters three teenage girls on a train: Julia Cornwall, Anya Corazon and Mattie Franklin. In a sudden vision, Cassie sees them murdered by a masked, superpowered man wearing a spider-themed suit. The attacker is revealed to be Ezekiel Sims, now a wealthy and influential businessman who gained enhanced strength and agility from the spider in Peru. He has been haunted by recurring dreams in which three spider-powered women kill him. Through his own research and access to advanced surveillance technology, he identifies the girls as the future threat and sets out to eliminate them before they can develop their abilities.

Realising the girls are in imminent danger, Cassie kidnaps them from the train to save their lives, though they initially see her as a threat. As Ezekiel hunts them across New York, Cassie gradually accepts her role as their protector. She uses her precognitive visions to anticipate his moves, repeatedly altering events to keep one step ahead. The group hides in various locations, including a diner and a fireworks warehouse, while Cassie tries to piece together her mother's past and the origin of her own powers.

Through research and conversations with her colleague Ben Parker, Cassie learns more about Ezekiel's background and about her mother's expedition. She comes to understand that her near-death experience activated latent abilities connected to the same spider species. Unlike Ezekiel, whose powers are physical and driven by fear of his prophesied death, Cassie's gift is psychic; she can perceive branching timelines and subtly shift outcomes.

As Ezekiel closes in, Cassie's visions become more expansive, showing possible futures in which the three girls grow into powerful spider-heroes. Julia is shown with psychic spider abilities, Anya with acrobatic combat skills and Mattie with enhanced strength. These glimpses of their future selves reinforce Cassie's determination to ensure their survival.

The climax takes place at an abandoned Pepsi-Cola sign factory during a Fourth of July celebration. Cassie foresees multiple deadly scenarios and repeatedly tests different actions in rapid succession, effectively rehearsing the fight in her mind. When Ezekiel attacks, she coordinates the girls' escape with precision timing based on her visions. In the chaos of collapsing fireworks scaffolding, Ezekiel is crushed and killed, seemingly fulfilling his own prophecy in an ironic reversal; his attempt to prevent the future directly causes it.

Cassie is gravely injured during the confrontation and loses her eyesight, but her psychic abilities expand further, allowing her to perceive the world through visions of the web of life and time. In the aftermath, she adopts a mentorship role toward Julia, Anya and Mattie, hinting at their eventual transformation into spider-powered heroes. The film ends with Cassie in a wheelchair, now fully embracing the mantle of Madame Web, calmly guiding the girls as she looks ahead into the vast network of possible futures, aware that this is only the beginning of a larger destiny.

Success Rate:  - 0.7

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