Spider-Noir Review

The idea comes from the comics: Spider-Man as a hard-boiled 1930s detective, all rain, gin and unpaid debts. Nicolas Cage, who voiced a different version of the character in the animated Into the Spider-Verse, plays him here as Ben Reilly, a private eye who hung up the mask years ago and is pulled back into the city's underworld by one last case, and he plays it with total seriousness and total mischief at once. It is his first lead role in a television series, and it is the element reviews praise most.

The other is the look. The series comes in two versions, full colour and black and white, and the monochrome is where it earns its title: deep shadow, hard light, frames composed like period film posters. The photography won an Emmy, one of five the season collected. Brendan Gleeson chews through the gangster Silvermane with obvious relish, Lamorne Morris gives Robbie Robertson a warmth the genre rarely allows a sidekick, and the dialogue crackles with pulp wisecracks.

Where it slips is the mystery itself. The case sprawls across eight episodes without much urgency, the jokey superhero half and the grave noir half never fully agree, and the emotional beats land softer than the style around them. Prime Video cancelled it after one season, which leaves a stylish, lopsided oddity worth an evening for Cage and the photography alone.