Once the nostalgia of watching a new Spider-Man movie after nearly five years wears off, a worrying thought emerges: Is Spider-Man: Brand New Day really just Spider-Man: All Over Again in disguise? Is Destin Daniel Cretton’s film just a factory reset of the New York-based comic-book superhero tale, but with the same actor? Does anything ever truly end in the Marvel Cinematic Universe (MCU)? Will my trust issues ever subside? Every new MCU cycle feels like a post-concert encore of the previous one.

Dr Strange’s spell in the admittedly sweet Spider-Man: No Way Home (2021) means that the world no longer remembers Spidey’s secret identity, Peter Parker. Young Peter hoped the spell could be customised, but nobody had the memory-wiping machine from Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind.

New Yorkers blissfully go about their matcha-sipping lives while their city gets battered every few days; they’re so desensitised to violence and large-scale property damage that you wonder if Spidey is saving anyone at all.

The conflict of Brand New Day is interesting. Given that he has no life outside of his mask, Peter Parker has no choice but to commit to his identity as a full-time superhero.