“A lonely hero. A lonely Spidey. A lonely Peter Parker. It felt fresh, and I really enjoyed it.”
That’s the opening of Hideo Kojima‘s review of Spider-Man: Brand New Day, posted to X this weekend as the film was breaking box office records on its way to $927 million globally. Coming from the creator of Metal Gear Solid and Death Stranding, it carries more weight than your average celebrity reaction — Kojima is one of the most respected storytelling voices in any medium, not just games.
Unusually for a film review, it reads like something he could have pitched as a game concept.
Kojima’s Full Review, Unpacked
“Until now, Spider-Man films have generally been grouped into self-contained trilogies. With each new iteration, the cast and creative team changed, allowing the franchise to reinvent itself for a new era. This time, however, while both the cast and the story continue from the previous film, everything has been reset. The film focuses on Peter, once again alone, and the loneliness and inner conflict that come with that. It can be seen both as the beginning of a new series and as a direct continuation of the last one. A very clever structure.”
Kojima’s structural analysis is sharp. Brand New Day picks up four years after No Way Home, with Peter Parker living entirely alone — having voluntarily erased himself from the memories of everyone he loves. Famous as Spider-Man, invisible as Peter. Successful on the streets, utterly disconnected in private. Kojima locks onto that tension immediately.
He went further in his review’s closing section, placing the film in the context of modern entertainment: “In the age of social media and its immense power to amplify every opinion, striking the right balance between what filmmakers want to create and what audiences expect has become incredibly difficult. Genuine, heartfelt filmmaking is becoming increasingly challenging. Because of that, this is a film that puts the ‘Brand’ in ‘Brand New Day’ to the test, as part of a blockbuster franchise that simply cannot afford to fail.”
Why This Reads Like a Game Kojima Would Make
Read Kojima’s review and then think about Death Stranding. A lone protagonist. Crushing isolation. Connection as the game’s central mechanic rather than conflict. The lonely hero who keeps going precisely because no one else can see the weight he carries. The parallel is hard to miss.
The lonely hero archetype runs through nearly everything Kojima has created. Solid Snake. Sam Porter Bridges. Even Metal Gear Solid V‘s Venom Snake, stripped of identity and memory. What draws him to Brand New Day is almost certainly the same thing that drives his own work: a protagonist defined not by their superpowers, but by the cost of having them.
Several commentators noted online that the review sounded less like a film critique and more like a game design document. The structural observation — “beginning of a new series and direct continuation of the last one” — is precisely how you’d pitch a game that needs to be accessible to new players while rewarding returning ones. Whether that’s intentional or just Kojima being Kojima is an open question.
Critical Consensus and What It Means
Kojima’s take aligns closely with the film’s broader critical reception. Spider-Man: Brand New Day currently holds a 90% Tomatometer score and a 98% audience score on Rotten Tomatoes — a near-perfect alignment between critics and viewers that’s rare for a franchise film of this scale.
CinemaScore gave it an A. The dominant praise centres on exactly what Kojima identified: the emotional honesty of a lonely Peter Parker, and the film’s willingness to reset the franchise’s emotional stakes without abandoning continuity. Audiences came for Spider-Man, and stayed for a film that actually had something to say about isolation and identity — themes gaming audiences, in particular, will recognise from years of narrative titles.
