The plot begins off with where Scott Lang was last time we saw him in Civil War… sort of. Instead of being in the RAFT, he is now under house arrest and being montiered by the FBI. After he has a weird dream which only happens to advance the plot and it only occurs because of the climax in the original Ant-Man movie, he then tries to contact Hank and Hope who are on the run because of Scott’s stupid decision to help the cap in Civil War. Hope kidnaps him and takes him to Hank’s new lab where he is working a portal of some sort so he can go and save his wife. While they try to build this portal thingy, they have to dodge the FBI, a ghost like person and a black arms dealer who wants the lab so he can sell it and it goes on from there until the wife is saved and everyone is either happy, bamboozled or caught. I’m going to say this off the bat but I like how the MCU has consequences to what happens in previous films. It’s not in its own little universe, it’s apart of a connected universe and I find it enjoyable. With that said, I feel like this is a multi-million dollar excuse stretched into a nearly two hour movie to show us why Ant-Man won’t be even near the MCU for a while.
This really kind of bothers me in the way they did it so I’ll save that for last but I want to bring up the theme of the movie because it feels like a MCU movie and I don’t enjoy it because of it. See for me, the most enjoyable MCU films are the ones that don’t feel like one. For example, my preferred MCU movies are The Winter Soldier, Ragnarock and Iron Man 3 and it’s because they aren’t superhero movies. Sure, they have superheroes in it but it tells a different story like in the case of Ragnarock, it’s a 80s buddy cop film but with Thor and Hulk filling in the roles. Iron Man 3 was more of a character piece on the character of Tony Stark and Winter Soldier was a spy thriller and that’s what I like. To me, this Ant-Man movie is simply like every other MCU movie which is a superhero movie with comedy and this is on top of how disposable the movie feels. This movie can just be completely skipped due to the fact that he does nothing to contribute to the current status of the MCU since this is all pre-Infinity War (excluding the end credit scene) and nothing really important that will contribute to future films (again, excluding the end credit scene). And you know what, I would of gave this a little more credit if the comedy was actually funny. I found nothing about this movie entertaining or funny which is weird because I usually would laugh at one joke in these movie but nope, I wasn’t even close to being mildly entertained because it was very cliche in places and it tried to use the same old MCU type of humour of subversion and wisecracks. I feel like this movie would be much better if they tried a different kind of humour for once. That’s about all the complaints I have for the story aspect (I’m saving the big one) so let’s talk about the more technical side of things.
Yeah, I know I’m wasting my time here but I need to pad out the review so just bare with me here. The CGI is of excellent quality as of expected by Disney. I mean, they threw around 30 Million at this throwaway movie because Infinity Wars made them an easy 2 billion and that was before the movie was released on DVD. These MCU movies are an easy way to generate cash for them now so they can easily throw a decent movie with a rather large budget because they know it’s going to make double the budget by the end of its run. There was some impressive fights as well like the intro fight for the Wasp was cool and showed how to do interesting fights. The ghost looked impressive but I kind of wished they had made her work more like shroggender’s cat so she can be all about the probability and not being made of unstable particles. You ask me, I think all the actors were kind of reeling it in at times. To its credit, it wasn’t all the time but I do feel like there was some quite stall moments from side characters and the “romantic bonding” scenes between Scott and Hope was also quite stalled and forced in my opinion. Apart from that, everything else is either decent or not worth talking about it so let’s move onto my biggest complaint and yes, I will be spoiling everything about it.
I hope this complaint I have can help provide my perspective on the MCU and how I feel about it because it’s scenes like this that ruin the MCU for me (including everything else I have mentioned before). The scene starts with the whole Pym family helping Scott shrink himself down via the now portable portal so they can particles to help out the ghost. Soon as he is done, he calls for them to reel him back up but they can’t because they have turned to ashes. Guess what I hate about this scene? Now really, try to guess why I hate this scene in the comments before you read on. I will wait. You done? Well I hate the part when they “kill” the whole Pym family and leaving Scott in that weird acid trip place. It’s not because I am invested in the characters and it’s only partially the fact Ant-Man is stranded there. For me, they have killed off the only reason why this whole movie happened. Remember, this film was about saving Hope who was the original Wasp before she got stuck somewhere. They “killed” Hope off 10 minutes after we saved her and we don’t know if it’s proper dead or not because Spider-Man got “killed” at the end of the Avengers and we know he is coming back after part 2 of Infinity Wars so who knows. This is when I start hating the idea of a shared universe. While as I have said earlier in this review, the shared universe does let there be knockback effects from earlier films affect the newer ones, it also just messes with the story like this did. How are we supposed to believe they are dead when we know their characters are going to come back and how are we supposed to believe that Scott is stuck there now EVEN THOUGH HE IS GOING TO BE IN THE NEXT AVENGERS FILM! It’s stuff like this which bothers me about the MCU because it’s stuff like this that removes all the tension and mystery in the MCU for me. It’s like they want their audience to both know what is the MCU but also be blind to that MCU at the same time so everything in their little universe works and you don’t have it both ways. Maybe if they kept it more close to their chests about future characters and sequels it could work but the fact they are so open with sequels before we have even seen the movie that comes before that is what kills it. That’s the silver bullet in the head for this whole universe gimmick.
I can continue with the rant but I know it would go on and on so I’m going to cut myself here. Should you watch this movie? Sure if you care about the MCU but it’s a solid 5/10 for me. It’s passable and that’s all it is. If you do watch it, don’t stick around for the end credit scene unless you want the whole universe ruined for you. Next week might be a game review or that manga review. I don’t know and I don’t care in what order they come out in. As long as I can post something next week, we should be fine. As per usual, links in the side bar to all the other stuff I offer as well as my steam profile for those who want to spam me with crap trade offers.
I can continue with the rant but I know it would go on and on so I’m going to cut myself here. Should you watch this movie? Sure if you care about the MCU but it’s a solid 5/10 for me. It’s passable and that’s all it is. If you do watch it, don’t stick around for the end credit scene unless you want the whole universe ruined for you. Next week might be a game review or that manga review. I don’t know and I don’t care in what order they come out in. As long as I can post something next week, we should be fine. As per usual, links in the side bar to all the other stuff I offer as well as my steam profile for those who want to spam me with crap trade offers.
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