Ant-Man and the Wasp: Quantumania

Y'see... in the first film, there was just one hero: Ant-man. In the 2nd one, there were two, him and the Wasp. Now, in the third...? There's three. See what they did there?

The astonishing Ant-Man and the winsome Wasp, otherwise known as Scott Lang and Hope Pym, are pulled back into the mysterious and super, super tiny Quantum Realm, along with Scott’s teenage daughter, Cassie Lang, as well as the original Ant-man, Hank Pym, and the original Wasp too, Janet Van Dyne, only recently returned to our world after having been lost in the Quantum Realm for decades. Upon arriving in this tiny, tiny other world, our heroes find a much stranger place than they expected, and also a very dangerous adversary, one that Janet had hoped she had left behind forever, trapped in the Quantum Realm…

Of the now 32 total MCU films—not counting the latest one, The Marvels, which is still in theatres at this time, so I haven’t seen it, because COVID isn’t over and you all are fools to go sit in that COVIDy reek for two hours—I would rank Ant-Man and the Wasp: Quantumania at number 21, which is the high end of the lower third.

My rankings are meaningless, obviously, completely arbitrary, and based solely on my own personal preferences, all of which are heavily dependant on a long, dark history with comic books in general, and Marvel comics in particular.

BUT…

I will die on the hill that even the “worst” MCU movies are at least as good, if not better than, the average off-the-rack one-shot random genre flick that we used to get more regularly, espcially the ones released in the summer and holiday seasons.

Ant-man 3 is no exception.

It’s fun. It’s a good time. And really, if “Farscape meets Tron with a bit of King Kong thrown in” doesn’t grab your attention, then why are we even talking here?

Ant-man 3 wraps up the franchise’s more dangling plot-points, notably, and sadly, lacking Michael Pena’s Luis this time out, whose synopsis skills were the franchise’s best gag. Focusing on Ant-man’s relationship with his daughter Cassie, as well as revealing what exactly happened to Janet while she was missing all those years, the big hook of the film is that when Ant-man and the gang do get pulled back into the Quantum Zone, they find Janet’s missing past waiting there for them.

That past is a man known as Kang the Conqueror.

Kang is but one of the many names used by a man who might have once been known as Nathaniel Richards.

A time-traveling warlord from the far-flung future, he is constantly at war with anyone who challenges his supremacy of Time Immortal, but most especially with the myriad variants and past and future versions of himself, men with names like Pharaoh Rama-Tut, Immortus, Scarlet Centurian, Victorex Prime, Chronomonitor 616, Iron Lad, and Qeng Gryphon, among others. He may also be a descendant of Reed Richards of the Fantastic Four, of the villainous Dr. Doom, and also maybe Tony Stark too, or he’s lying about that, or perhaps some or all of it is ture, but only in certain realities.

Time, time, time, see what’s become of me…

Created by Stan Lee and Jack Kirby, the character first appeared in Fantastic Four #19, published in October 1963. In this issue, he was introduced as the pharaoh Rama-Tut, a time-traveling criminal from the year 3000 who had conquered ancient Egypt, and who was implied to be a descendant (or a possibly future incarnation) of the Fantastic Four villain Doctor Doom. His second appearance as Rama-tut was in September 1964 in Fantastic Four Annual #2. In the same month, he also appeared in The Avengers #8, but this time in the familiar purple and green outfit of Kang the Conqueror. This issue established that Rama-Tut was actually a younger version of Kang. A decade later, in Feburary ‘75 in Giant-Sized Avengers #3, Immortus, a character originally introduced in 1964 in The Avengers #10, was retroactively established as the older and ultimate version of Kang, and that character then went on to become Kang’s most hated rival.

They just did whatever they wanted to back then.

Like, for instance, Kang the Conqueror loves him some invisible bean bags. Loves them. Although, much like his blue face mask, which at times seems like it’s either a blue visor, a skin-tight blue mask, or maybe just some blue face paint, it’s never quiet clear if these bean bags are invisible, or inflatable, or perhaps filled with water…?

Anyway, Kang is THE Avengers villain.

So, in the movie, Kang and Ant-man have some disagreements, there’s some punching, and ultimately, the MCU as a whole is set on a new collision course, and waiting at the end of that line is Kang. He has taken the Thanos Spot, and is now the Mega-Franchise’s Big Bad.

Which is exciting… for me, at least.

Entertaining as it is, and as welcome of additions that Ant-man and Wasp are in the MCU in general, especially because Ant-man is played by Paul Rudd, this particular franchise has never been a real barn-burner in the MCU, and has always been more of an also-ran. Also, Ant-man the character has never really been a favorite of mine, so I’m not going to stand here and try to tell you that the film’s actually great, and that you’re a snobby fool for not liking it. This one is definitely for the people who like this shit, period. If you don’t like this shit, kick rocks, my friend, because it’s not for you.

Me? Obviously I like this shit.

But the film is by no means perfect. It’s main problem, as I see it, is that it spends too much time on the characters who live in the Quantum Realm under Kang’s boots. Part of that is just the way the story goes, Ant-Man and the gang spark a revolution, so you need some revolutionaries to lead the rabble, but also… the time spent on these side characters is such a half-ass effort.

Yes, Celery Guy looked cool, and so did Flashlight Head. Also, the Blob Guy was funny, but they aren’t characters at all, and Main Rebel Girl was just a blank space Cave Girl Bad Ass Cliche. You can see where some scenes in the Rebel Camp were probably cut too, scenes that might have fixed this issue, but they’re gone, so you end up with this handful of unknowns instead—characters who may or may not have ever appeared in a comic book, but if they did, they certainly didn’t stick around—who are just taking up space that would’ve been better used by the main heroes, especially if you were to focus more on the strained family relationships between them all, and their attempts to reconnect with one another and reconcile their issues.

But they didn’t, so…

Additionally, there’s that major question hanging over Marvel/Disney’s head as to what to do with Jonathan Majors. The allegations are bad enough that the Hollywood rats have already jumped ship, but the studio has been silent. I assume because they can be. Ant-man 3 and Loki S2 are all out. They’re probably just waiting to see what happens, secure in the knowledge that if they needed to...

A. They could recast and pretend like nothing changed. It wouldn’t be the first time they’ve replaced an actor mid-stream. They did it with Hulk. They did it with Rhodey. The actress playing Cassie has changed at least twice, in fact. Also, Kang’s backstory allows for an easy switch out, as previous versions can be dismissed as Variants, and now the “true version” of Kang has shown up.

B. They could replace Kang with Dr. Doom. Make it a whole thing about Doom seizing power as he kills off all the many versions of Kang, like the movie The One, but y’know… good.

Or C. Stay the course. Keep Majors. Keep Kang. Move on. Why not? If someone like Mel Gibson can still get cast in shit, then reasonably, what problem do we have with anyone, right? Of course, Majors is black, and America is America, so…

So, we’ll see.

As the ending of this film showed… there are endless possibilities. But, as I said earlier, when it comes to the end of this film, if you happen to like the MCU, then you’ll probably walk away having enjoyed this. If you don’t like the MCU, then I’d bet that you really won’t like this one either.

A couple of odds and ends…

I love how this poster is like Ant-man! The Wasp! And… Cassie! Her superhero name is Stature. You couldn’t work that in?

That having been said, MODOK was such a welcome piece of classic comic book lunacy. Corey Stoll looked absolutely wonderful and completely ridiculous and also comic-accurate. I loved it. Plus, hearing Bill Murray say “a mechanized organism designed only… for killing” was a delight I didn’t know I needed.

Just one of the greatest things ever.