Is Ant-man gonna suck?

So the new trailer for Ant-Man came out tonight and I'll be honest, I didn't have high hopes for it. And when I saw it all I could really say was...

Honestly, Ant-man doesn't really interest me. I honestly didn't know Ant-Man was a thing until last year. Its not like I'm not interested in this film, nor am I rooting against it. I want this movie, just like every other Marvel movie that I've seen so far, to succeed. I want this movie to be good. And I guarantee you, Marvel has built up enough credit for me to go see this movie no matter what.

However, there are a few glaring issues that this film is already facing. So before I put the trailer on this post, which I will do at the end with an added thoughts on it, I'm going to go over the certain issues this movie has going against it already.


1. Edgar Wright's departure from the film

I name this one first because, this has the littlest impact on the movie, for me at least.

Honestly, I don't have much of an emotional attachment to Edgar Wright. I've only seen a couple of his films and while I've thought some of them have been funny, I didn't jump for joy when I saw he was directing Ant-man. Did I think it was an interesting road Marvel was going down? Yes. In fact I was very bummed to hear that he wasn't going to be directing the film. But that's just it, a bummer.

I've read and watched a lot of things on how Marvel is stifling creative minds like Wright and other directors in order to continue the creation of their franchise. Something can be said about Marvel's executive control over these films, from this situation, to Jon Favreau and Iron Man 2, or the reason Kenneth Branagh didn't return for the second Thor movie, unfortunately, a lot of it is speculation and while there is a lot of unanswered questions about the way Marvel treats the creative minds that come into these franchises, I have to slightly go on the side of Marvel for this one.

Every once in a while I visit a website called Confused Matthew. Its a gentleman who makes videos reviewing movies and his thoughts on them. Now Matthew has done a lot of movies recently on the Marvel Universe and the whole superhero genre in general, how the movies are more the making of a franchise and not the making of good films. He does a great video on what he sees as the problems with Marvel, while I think the Matthew has the problem of nitpicking a lot of complaints with his reviews, I still enjoy his rants and if anybody got close to convincing me to turning on Marvel, it would be this guy.

But my thoughts on Wright leaving is that while we won't get to see his really creative version of Ant-man, my hope would be that Marvel would bring in somebody to create a good movie that also fits in with the larger story.

The bigger problem is who they actually brought in to replace Wright.

Peyton Reed...

Now I don't wanna bash Reed too much because he could make me eat my own words. But looking at this guy's track record, his biggest success was Yes Man. His filmography is Yes Man, Down With Love, The Break Up, and Bring it On...

Unfortunately, this really makes me consider if Marvel is just bringing in people who will do what Marvel wants them to do, instead of creative people.

Now, apparently Adam McKay the guy involved with Anchorman, Talladega Nights, and Step Brothers is helping with the rewrites, but the more I see, or don't see of Peyton Reed, the more I'm a little nervous for this movie.

Now, again, I could be wrong. While I wouldn't consider James Gunn a really good director, I really liked Guardians of the Galaxy and he did a good job with that. Could Reed do a good job as well? Of course, and again, I'm not saying he can't. I'm just saying, there's a lot going against him and a lot he needs to prove. Edgar Wright has a track record of movies that have done well and a movie done by him in the Marvel universe sounds really interesting, Reed doing one doesn't.


2. Nobody (including Marvel) seemed to be excited for this film

Now this is subject to change after this trailer. Maybe this is just the momentum this movie needs for people to get really excited to go and see Ant-Man.

But I wouldn't hold my breath.

I read something earlier today that compared Ant-man as the counterpart to Aquaman in DC. I don't know the comic well enough to say whether or not that's true, but I could totally see it.

I mean its a guy who can shrink down to the size of an ant. Even in the trailer, Paul Rudd has a line where he says, can we change the name? Because in all of the superhero names that have showed up prior to this, Marvel or not, Ant-man has have the stupidest.

So first off, people who don't know that much about Ant-man might think its dumb because of the name. Secondly, people who know Ant-man don't seem excited about it because he's like the Aquaman of Marvel. But I'm convinced that even Marvel isn't wild about Ant-man.

Now I was going to say that while Age of Ultron got a trailer two months ago, Ant-man is just getting one now, which now that I think about it, makes sense as the movies are about two months apart.

But I would even say this was a problem even if Age of Ultron hadn't gotten their trailer yet. The only news that has really come out about this movie has been the troubles with Edgar Wright. Sure there was casting news, but that was really the only news that came out about this movie along with a pretty vague plot.

I feel like if there was something that Marvel was really excited about, they would have let loose some interesting stills of the film, or made it a bigger deal when they released their lineup for phase 3. But in a sense, its almost as if Ant-man isn't quite a Phase 2 movie or a Phase 3 movie. With the Marvel Line up, its just kind of in between.

The movie kind of reminds me of the Halo game ODST, not an essential part of the story, but just some flavor to an expanding universe. And thats okay. If Scott Lang or Ant-man isn't going to have a huge role in the future that's one hundred percent fine. But all I can say to that is make sure its a good movie. And the more excited you (Marvel) seem to be excited about this film, the more we will be.

3. The Cast

I'm not saying I don't like these actors. I like Paul Rudd, I think he's funny. I like Michael Douglas, I think he's a good actor. I like Evangeline Lily... kinda, she kinda ruined The Hobbit and... more importantly I like Corey Stoll.

I don't know what it is, but something about this cast however just doesn't feel totally complete.

This isn't a huge complaint and I'm not quite sure what it is that makes me bring this up, but I personally don't see this an incredibly stellar cast which is strange because of the fact that I like everyone in this cast.

Maybe its Paul Rudd. I want to see Paul Rudd succeed and impress me, but honestly I've never really seen him outside of a silly role. In this, it seems like his role is a little more serious (with a little bit of humor... maybe?) and I'm hoping that even if it is a serious role, Rudd can still nail it. But especially with the trailer, that doesn't seem like this is going to be as much of a comedy as I thought it was going to be. And that worries me. Again, I want to see him surprise me, but looking at the evidence in front of me, its just another hurdle this movie needs to jump over.

And that leads me to my last point for now.

4. The Trailer

Is it fair to judge a movie by its trailer? No but everyone else does it so why can't I?

Mostly kidding.

The main problem I see with this trailer is that it gives off a vibe that doesn't feel to me like the movie I thought Ant-man was going to be. I thought it was going to be a light hearted, comedic heist film. I thought with a combination of both Edgar Wright and later Peyton Reed, and Paul Rudd would make for a light hearted comedy. I thought with the kind of silly ability of shrinking in size there would be a little more humor in this trailer.

I'm not saying I'm looking for that in particular but the guy's ability is to shrink in size. I guess I was thinking they were going to treat this film the same way they did the Guardians of the Galaxy trailer.

I mean I guess they can't pull that look at how silly this is, its gonna be awesome card every time one of these obscure and kind of silly properties gets a movie, but I wasn't looking for generic over interesting.

If you really can't show me anything that's really that bad ass in a trailer, a teaser for that matter, make it a little more light hearted, have some fun and make me laugh. You can bring all those pesky feelings in later... because you're going to do it right... Right Marvel?

Honestly, the trailer wasn't anything new. It didn't really say that there was much new about Ant-man, and I'm worried that this is just a run of the mill safe Marvel movie. Those can still be entertaining, but that doesn't mean they're good. In fact usually the ones that have been risky have been the better films. This trailer doesn't tell me that this film is taking any risks. Not yet anyway.

Unfortunately, Marvel, again, has built up their cred enough so that people are still going to go and see this film. Just because its in the Marvel universe, myself included.

However, this movie has the potential to prove that Marvel is not unstoppable. Will this pull everything to a halt at Marvel? Oh fuck no. If this movie bombs, Marvel will just chalk it up as a fluke and continue on with life. There's no risk here, the same way there was not much of a risk with Guardians of the Galaxy.

I saw a reaction video that put a perfect summary to this post. This guy said that if he didn't know this was apart of the Marvel universe, it would be a pretty standard run of the mill, generic trailer. Nothing to get him really excited, just there. But because its Marvel, everyone gets super excited.

I'm hoping this movie is good. I'm hoping that it proves me wrong. I'll still go into it with an open mind and I really hope I really enjoy Ant-man.

But I guess that will have to wait till July 2015.

What are you thoughts on the Ant-man trailer? Are all my observations unfounded? Is this movie going to be phenomenal? Comment and Discuss Below!

I'll leave you with this. I don't know how long this will stay up, but this was some of the test footage that was released a while back. And this is some of the only action Ant-man has been shown in aside from the part where he's riding a fly in the trailer. Is it good? Yeah? Is it mind blowing, well, not really. But I'll let you you all be the judge. Enjoy!