Philippines’ subtitle-less ‘Spider-Man’ screening shows deaf inclusion is just lip service

While several laws have been passed to help the deaf community, advocates say they remain limited in scope and implementation

Spider-Man: Brand New Dayin the Philippines was supposed to be a shared cinematic moment for fans who had waited months for the latest instalment in the superhero franchise.

But for some deaf viewers, the experience was defined less by the action on screen than by what was missing: subtitles or captions that would allow them to follow the dialogue.

That frustration, captured in a viral Facebook post, has pointed to a wider accessibility gap in the country, where advocates say deaf audiences are still too often excluded from cinemas, entertainment and public information.

In the post, a user named Cherry Ann described watching the film with her deaf friend and urged local movie distributors to consider adding subtitles to films.

“My friend is deaf, and we were so excited to watch the new Spider-Man movie … We thought that subtitles were going to be provided,” she wrote in the post, which was shared more than 11,000 times.