Courtesy Walt Disney Studios Motion Pictures
Remember this point in the Marvel cinematic universe, everybody, because it will likely—or should—go down as that critical mass moment when we collectively looked up at the screen and said something like, “Jesus, how many times can we watch the same fucking movie?!”
For some, that time has come and gone. For those who see the new Ant-Man—well, let’s just ask if you’re familiar with the reasons one might shoot an injured horse?
In Quantumania, we rejoin Scott Lang, aka Ant-Man (Paul Rudd, who is always likable, even in shit movies), and Hope Van Dyne, aka The Wasp (a painfully forgettable Evangeline Lilly), after the events of the last movie wherein...actually, wait; what happened in that movie? Anyway, they’re living normal-ish, post-Thanos lives when Scott’s daughter, Cassie (Kathryn Newton), unveils a science project she’s been working on. Wouldn’t you know it, though, the thing sucks everybody into the quantum realm—which is that subatomic world where Hope’s mom, Janet (Michelle Pfeiffer), found herself marooned for 30 years, according to the first film. It’s the same place her husband, Hank Pym (Michael Douglas), has theorized for decades while making his tech that makes things real big or real small and through which the Avengers time traveled or something a bunch of movies and shows ago.
It turns out Janet’s insistence she was alone for those 30 years is false. Heck, there’s a whole-ass civilization down there, and it’s presented in the most boring Star Wars-esque/vague technology/weird “aliens”/you’ve-seen-this-so-many-times-before fashion possible. This is where Scott and the gang learn Janet is responsible for some bad stuff and was subsequently part of some uprising against a despotic über-villain named Kang (Jonathan Majors, who is about the only one to actually try acting in this movie). Under this guy, the quantum realm’s denizens are so oppressed it’s nuts, only we don’t super care because the movie doesn’t bother to make us care. Everybody runs someplace. Explosions explode. Someone says something about family being important.
Toss in some exhausting jokes about cultural differences, some pathetic lines about civil disobedience as presented by the Disney corporation and a whole lot of indiscernible CGI visual soup, and you’ve got yet another paint-by-numbers Marvel outing that proves they make too many of these things and release them too often—and Michael Peña, being the funniest parts of the other two, isn’t even in the damn thing. Wait a sec. Did he die in the last one? Sincerely can’t recall. Aw, who cares?
Rudd’s a national treasure, obviously, and will always be lovable for shirking a career as a dimensionless handsome dude for weirder roles and goofball movies. Majors, meanwhile, is one of the best actors currently going, even if his deep dive into Kang can’t save the overall movie. Pfeiffer and Douglas exist as expositional cyphers, meanwhile, and Newton’s turn as Scott’s daughter is...what do you call it when a character only exists so another one does something? There are cameos, too, and surprise characters; William Jackson Harper from The Good Place can grace our screens any time. Mainly, though, Ant-Man feels like a Marvel commercial, a tepid entry, the peak too-much-CGI turning point in a cinematic universe that comes at us too fast and too furious while refusing to break new ground. One recalls a time when we almost never got comic book movies. One now longs for that time.
3
+Jonathan Majors is the coolest
-We’re begging you for a breather, Marvel—begging
Ant-Man and the Wasp: Quantumania
Directed by Peyton Reed
With Rudd, Majors, Lilly, Newton, Pfeiffer and Douglas
Violet Crown, Regal, PG-13, 125 min.
