Ant-Man

So as much as I don't want to admit it, I think a part of me was pretty convinced that Ant-man was going to fail. I don't think I was rooting against it necessarily but I didn't have much confidence in it. I thought there was too much going against it and I thought that this was going to be Marvel's weak link. And to be honest, I thought it deserved to be. If you read my post on why I thought Ant-man might fail, you'll know that I didn't think a lot of effort was being put into this movie. Marvel didn't seem overly excited about it, Edgar Wright was taken off for not playing within the Marvel Universe being set up, and the trailers seemed a little lazy to me. To me, it seemed like Ant-man was just a cash grab for Marvel (because lets be honest, you know this movie is going to make a lot of money because its Marvel), and while I love a lot of what Marvel has done, its not out of the question for them to do something like that (cough cough, Iron Man 2) and frankly, I don't want Marvel to succeed if that's how they're going to do things.

So the question is, is Ant-man a cash grab or is it a legitimately good movie?

Ant-man begins quickly sharing that Hank Pym (played by Michael Douglas) was a member of SHIELD who left the organization because he figured out the organization was trying to replicate his shrinking Ant-man technology.

Years later, enter Scott Lang (played by Paul Rudd) who has just been released from prison for burglary of his former bosses house for VistaCorp. He's a con who can't get a job and is being prohibited from seeing his daughter Cassie.

Through a series of events, Lang is recruited to take part in a heist. This heist doesn't exactly go as planned, but it puts a particular suit in the possession of Lang and it flags him for recruitment for another job by an older Hank Pym and his daughter Hope (played by Evangeline Lily) as they plan to make Scott the new Ant-man to disturb the plans of the evil Darren Cross (played by Corey Stoll) and his plans at Pym's old company.

Overall, this movie is a heist film.

I don't really buy the comparison that I'm pretty sure was made in comparing this movie to Ocean's 11 because while both of them are heist films, this one is definitely more of a comedy rather than a comedic heist film, if that makes sense.

The movie definitely feels like a Marvel film but at the same end, it feels like a separate entity with its own characters and sense of humor. Its very much like Captain America: The Winter Soldier. It feels like it does exist within the same universe but it doesn't rely totally on the Avengers...

Now, I would be lying if I said this one doesn't TOTALLY not rely on the Avengers. But I'll get to that in a second.

I've been really behind on Marvel as of late.

I never got out my review on what I thought Avengers: Age of Ultron really meant for the larger Marvel universe. I never gave my thoughts on the casting of Tom Holland as Spider-man, something I was incredibly surprised about due to all the posts I've done on Spider-man. And even this review is a week later than I originally planned. I guess its all the DC trailers distracting me.

The biggest singular "problem" I had with this movie was how it disrupted a perfectly good story to randomly tie into the Avengers.

There's a part about half way through the movie where, in order to pull off the heist, they need this piece of equipment. It just so happens to be in the new Avengers headquarters.

Scott goes to the headquarters and runs into Falcon (played by Anthony Mackie)

They have a quick fight, Scott gets the piece of equipment and with the exception of the very end, this encounter is never mentioned again.

And I kind of wonder if this was the kind bit that Edgar Wright took issue with. Because it really kind of seems shoe horned in. Its right in the middle of a montage of Scott's training and while its a fun scene, I just couldn't help but feel like this scene was a hiccup in the natural flow that the movie was taking on.

I'm realizing that talking about this particular scene is kind of strange, especially since I haven't talked about much else of the film, but I have to say, this scene bothered me.

Anyway!

The most important part of this is, how is the movie? How is the cast?

Paul Rudd as Scott Lang...

Honestly, I didn't know about this one. I kind of thought that Paul Rudd didn't really seem like the kind of person that would do a Marvel movie, so I was kind of hesitant.

However, in the context of this movie, its tone, and just the way everything turned out, I can't really think of a more perfect role for Paul Rudd.

The idea of Ant-man is really silly. Its shrinking your size. I don't care what science Michael Douglas pulls out of his ass in this movie, you're shrinking. Its the Honey, I Shrunk the Kids of super powers. The suit, looks kind of stupid. And the name of the character is Ant-man, again, kind of stupid. But Paul Rudd just gives it the humor and surprisingly a lot of respect to the charater. Yeah Ant-man is a silly superhero idea, but Paul Rudd makes you believe and really root for him.

I'll talk about Evangeline Lily next...

She was good in this film.

If you've read my reviews on The Hobbit films, you'll know that I'm not a huge fan of Evangeline Lily and even less of a fan of her part in that movie. I haven't been impressed with her work.

That being said, she's really good in this film. What I'm realizing is that this movie is more important than I think I give it credit for.

She's a really strong female character and she's actually more capable than Scott is. And while I'm not totally sold on the reason why she's not the one doing what Scott is doing instead of him, I totally get it and I actually really enjoy the dynamic she has with Scott, the dynamic she has with Hank Pym, and I loved her role in the movie.

I'll talk more about her a little bit later, but she actually has a big role in the larger picture of things.

But then, there's the part of the movie that I think was probably the strongest, I don't think its much of a surprise to anybody, but the strongest performance in the entire movie was that of Michael Douglas as Hank Pym.

I mean again, I don't think it was much of a surprise. You've got this power house actor, coming into a not to well known franchise, he's obviously going to shine. And before I went to the movie, everybody was saying that Douglas was great but I wasn't totally sure what they meant until I saw it and I really loved it all the way around.

Furthermore, I can say for certain, without giving anything away I guess, that Hank Pym's story is not over. He's going to have a presence in the next films and I think future plans at Marvel are going to throw him into a position that will create a lot of tension for the universe.

I've watched a couple things since I've seen the movie discussing what might happen in the future with Hank Pym and Scott Lang and everyone else, but I really like what they did with this film and the possibilities that are left open.

This film was a very silly comedic movie, but at the same time it had some huge implications. Which is odd because again, the scope of this movie is much smaller compared to the other Marvel movies that have come out recently.

And that's something that worked out really well for this movie. Its a small scale but at the same time it has its allusions to a larger universe. Again, I'll say some of them were less subtle than other ones, but this movie had a lot of allusions to a larger world.

Now, before I start talking big picture stuff, I of course need to briefly talk about the villain.

C'mon Marvel!

Darren Cross will probably go down as one of the most mediocre villains in a Marvel Cinematic universe movie and its a real shame because Corey Stoll is an incredibly underrated actor. He's got incredible talent and he's just being thrown aside in a throwaway role which is the exact same role that Jeff Bridges played in Iron Man 1. He's the greedy business man. He has no motivations outside of that, he's just greedy.

And on top of that he's a little over the top crazy, and there's no redeeming qualities about him. You're not gonna walk out of this movie and really remember who the villain was. He's a guy trying to make another shrinking suit. They really give this half ass attempt at him being the son Hank Pym never had but is easily replaced by Scott Lang, and he's just not that great of a villain. Now I'll probably remember him because I really like Corey Stoll. But most people will forget him very easily.

The last character worth mentioning is not even that big of a character but he's really kind of the best comic relief of the movie.

Michael Pena plays Paul Rudd's former cell mate and right off the bat, this guy is just down right hilarious. Paul Rudd himself is a funny actor but where he's best is when he subtly reacting to people who are much more funny than he is (best example: I Love You Man) and Michael Pena is that counter balance to Rudd in this movie. I've read and watched a couple things on this movie since watching it and I've figured out that Pena's character grew because Peyton Reed gave him room to improvise some of his lines and it really surprised a lot of people because Michael Pena is not known as much as a comedic actor as say Paul Rudd, and he knocks it out of the park in this one.

While he's not the absolute best part of the movie, he definitely is the Quicksilver of this movie that people can't talk about the movie as a whole without mentioning his role.

But now I wanna talk about the larger picture stuff.

Ant-man may not have a humungous impact on the Marvel Cinematic Universe, in the long run, the consequences of this movie aren't going to chance the landscape of the universe the way that Captain America: The Winter Soldier did.

But the reason I bring this up is because Hope Van Dyne represents what comic book movie going audience have been calling for: A female super hero. And while she's not really in this one, Wasp is coming. That's all I'm going to say.

I think Hope was saying what we all were thinking at the end of that scene when she simply said, "it's about damn time".

With the exception of that out of no where scene with Falcon, the post credit scenes were really the only indication towards a larger universe that didn't connect directly to the story.

But it gets better. Because this movie alludes to so much, despite having such a contained story.

This movie makes first mention of Spider-man. This movie even alludes to Doctor Strange. Its got a lot of allusion that were subtle and didn't take away from the story.

And while I thought the scene took away from the story, the Falcon scene was important as it does point towards Ant-man's role in Civil War.

I know I didn't talk too much about the greater implications of Avengers: Age of Ultron (yet) but a combination of that, plus this movie, makes me pretty excited for Phase 3. I'm especially looking forward to seeing a lot of new characters, and new set ups, and not always relying on the same characters we've had for 12 films now. This includes Black Panther, Doctor Strange, etc.

Again, while the movie is small in scale, it really has some huge implications and gives me a lot of hope for the future.

So yeah... Ant-man is, in a way a cash grab for Marvel... but that's not to say its not a good movie.

I didn't even talk that much about the action which was really creative and had a lot of creativity to it. I didn't talk about the use of ants, and the funny parts that come out of that.

I'm not so much disappointed with what happened in the movie and the turn out that actually came out of this movie, but I wish this movie could have been something bigger. I won't say that Marvel went back to formula with what they did in the first phase, but there are similarities that only make this movie good, when it definitely could have been great. I think it definitely ranks above a lot of the phase 1 films, but its not quite good enough to be put in the top five of all the Marvel movies that have come out.

That's a confusing outcome of what I thought of this movie, but I liked it, I just think I wanted more out of it. I am excited though to see the consequences of this film, it gets me excited for Phase 3, and honestly, I have no idea what is going on., and I love it!

But those are my thoughts on Ant-man. What did you think? Comment and Discuss below! You can also send me your thoughts on Ant-man to my Twitter @cmhaugen24 and follow me to get updates on movie news and reviews coming out, and if you send me requests for future reviews, I'll make them my priority.

I'll leave you with this. Screen Junkies did an interview with Peyton Reed and Michael Pena and gave some good insight into the larger implications of Ant-man. check it out! Enjoy!