Amazon’s “Spider-Noir” series was released a few days ago and has stirred a whole bunch of talk, with a surprisingly large part of it centered on which way you watch it – in colour or black & white.
There’s no question an incredible amount of effort has been put into the show’s production values with lavish costumes and production design along with some fascinating shot compositions filled with unusual camera placement, angles and highlights at times.
Some argue for the black-and-white version – it’s got ‘noir’ in the title after all, and the production originally was shot and lit with black-and-white in mind as the series is obviously an ode to 1940s noir classics like “The Big Sleep,” “Double Indemnity” and “The Maltese Falcon”.
But whether the series pulls off that noir film retro vibe convincingly seems to be up for debate. Then there’s the colour version which also has some major fans too.
This isn’t regular colour – the production is aiming for a look that is partly 1950s Technicolor movies and partly resembling ‘colorised’ versions of old films that puts the emphasis on certain hues over others.
Combined with the production using incredibly bold and rich colours on everything from cafe walls to overcoats, the result feels akin to something like a grainier, grittier and even more vividly colourful version of Warren Beatty’s “Dick Tracy”.
It’s something arguably even more unique than the noir imitation of the black & white version. In current times with so many works ignoring colour and contrast, here you have a series filled with deep and vivid blues, browns, reds, gold, copper and emerald green.
Now, more details have emerged indicating the colour version of the series wasn’t an afterthought – a LOT of effort went into it. Posting on Threads, second unit/stunt loader K.C. Lauf said:
“I worked on this show as the second unit loader. We shot true noir style on set for a B/W delivery. The sets were all painted green, brown, and pink to complement the gradients of grey in BW. The colour pass was not originally planned and required reshoots for almost a year.
What those reshoots involve isn’t clear, but there’s no question – both versions of the series took a lot of deliberate effort. Debate is flying online over what works better with the colour version said to show off the costumes (Li Jun Li and Lamorne Morris’ outfits in particular shine) and production design, while the black-and-white version highlights the cinematography and shot compositions better.
Amazon’s Prime Video app allows for switching between versions mid-episode with only a few seconds pause, letting users watch whichever way they want.
For those who want to try both, the full season of “Spider-Noir” is now available on Amazon Prime Video.
