Like that verse-jumping device that Evelyn uses to tap into her other selves, the internet is its own kind of scrying glass. In the lives of others, so magnified, minute, and measured, we see paths not taken, experiences unlived. But the internet is more than a depressing video feed of other people’s parties. With curiosity and the blessing of anonymity, alt accounts or just the complete lack of norms, the internet is also a place to embrace all kinds of potentialities, to mold yourself beyond your current, physical circumstances—a lesson Evelyn learns as she taps into the skills of her other selves to fight off bad guys with butt plugs and Benihana knife skills.
But those are just the upsides of exploring one’s identity online. All that anonymity can also turn heroes into monsters. Peter Parker learns this in the first four minutes of Spider-Man: No Way Home when he’s framed…
