Ant-Man and The Wasp Review: Our Best Hope is The Two of You Working Together
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Ant-Man and The Wasp
Director: Peyton Reed
8
Where to Watch Ant-Man and The Wasp?
This film has a very interesting reputation and role within the MCU. Ant-Man as a character missing from Avengers Infinity War was certainly interesting and raised many questions to fans as to where he was in the momentous film and quite quickly after Infinity War we got trailers for Ant-Man and the Wasp that made jokes about this very idea.
Where was Ant-Man? Well, this film was going to be our look into what Ant-Man had been up to since his arrest in Civil War. We do get a brief mention that he is on house arrest during the events of Avengers Infinity War but we don’t know exactly how that lines up with what happens against Thanos. So does Ant-Man and the Wasp match the hype and excitement that everyone had for the MCU following Infinity War?
Well, the short answer is no. However, I hate this argument because I feel it is completely unrealistic expectations in regard to this film. Avengers Infinity War was a film of immense scale with about 60 characters and it represented the culmination of everything set up since The Avengers or more specifically since Iron Man. By contrast, Ant-Man and the Wasp are supposed to be a smaller-scale film (pun intended).
Ant-Man is not a heavy drama character, his character so far has been relatively upbeat and fun. This film has its problems but I don’t think it deserves people giving it unfair expectations. Antman and the Wasp are meant to be the palate cleanser after the heavy drama that is Infinity War. It gives you a more fun and easygoing adventure instead of the world-ending stakes. I actually quite enjoy that aspect.
Personally, I like the vibe of the Ant-Man movies and I feel that this gives it a distinct quality in comparison to the other movies in the Marvel Cinematic Universe. Another thing I like about this movie is that it has direct consequences from the results of Captain America civil war. Scott made a gut decision to help Captain America and this resulted in him losing a connection with both Hope and Hank.
Another positive with this film is the carryover of the Super cool action scenes that come with the shrinking and growing technology. The Pym particle allows for some creative action set pieces and some different types of fights that you don’t get to see in other superhero films.
In particular, the fight scene at the restaurant with the wasp is pretty creative as well as the final battle, particularly with the car chase and the cars shrinking and growing it’s cool to see. Paul Rudd is as charming as ever and I like the focus on him being a dad. His goal in the last film was to create a connection with his daughter and now we get to see that connection flourish even though he is on house arrest.
Hope gets more character development in this film as it’s mostly centered around trying to bring her mom back from the quantum realm and I feel that this gives her more emotional stake than in the first film even though that was about her father’s technology. You really get to feel her emotions in this film.
One of the best moments early on is when Hank and Hope realize that Janet is confirmed to be in the quantum realm and then they hug because they know she’s alive. The best moment in the film for me is honestly a more dialogue-driven scene where we see Hope and Scott in the van and we hear them talk about the events of Civil War and how if Scott had asked Hope to come with her she might have.
The lingering look on Scott’s face is just so wholesome and I like what it conveys about their relationship and where Scott’s hoping to go with it. Luis and the rest of the crew being back added some great comedic value throughout the film and when Luis recounts the story it’s just as funny as in the first Ant-Man so that gives us some great characters that you miss in other movies that I’ll talk about later on.
In terms of new characters, Laurence Fishburne plays Bill Foster who is an ex S.H.I.E.L.D. agent and coworker of Hank Pym. Our main antagonist, the ghost, is interesting because she doesn’t actually want to commit any harm to our heroes it is more so out of fear of dying that she commits the acts we see her commit throughout the film.
In terms of negatives, this film is very short in comparison to most Marvel films, and due to that, you do feel that things are really constrained. Things don’t really have time to be fleshed out because we have to run off to the next part of the fill the next plot line move the story forward and we don’t really have time to sit with the characters as much that’s why I love moments like Scott and Hope in the van because there are few of those in the film.
Also, another problem with this film is that most of the cool action scenes like the giant Pez dispenser were shown in the trailer so most of our cool set pieces were shown well before the film was released and there wasn’t enough action outside of that so it’s just a bit of a bummer.
The ending of the film wraps up rather quickly and my big gripe with that is that we don’t get much time with Janet who we’ve been hearing things about for a full movie and nearly a second movie. Our secondary antagonist Sonny Burch is honestly just boring as a character because he feels like a watered-down version of Justin Hammer. Well, I think the actor who plays Sonny
Burch can do a good job I just don’t feel like he was given a chance to do much in this film and his crew just feels like a nonexistent threat to characters that can shrink and grow to any size, they’re just gangsters with guns and it doesn’t really seem to pose much of a difference to the end of the film.
Finally, it kind of irked me that we watched this whole movie with no mention of what’s happening to The Avengers only for the post-credit scene to be what truly shows us what was happening to Ant-Man during the events of Infinity War. While I do have a soft spot for this film, it feels like one of the less important entries in the Marvel Cinematic Universe.
Overall, this is not one of my favorite MCU films and doesn’t reach the highs of some of the other solo Avengers films. However, with some cool action and a chill vibe, this can be a fun movie to revisit every once in a while. I like the characters so it is easy to pop this movie on when I’m really looking to scratch that Marvel itch but I don’t have a lot of time. I know that’s not a glowing endorsement but if you are looking to go see the entirety of the Marvel Cinematic Universe you definitely have to check this one out!