Ant-Man
I know; it wasn’t my idea.
+: fun, funny, exactly the right length
-: occasional clichés, no Wasp
Ant-Man took about eight years to make and ends with the word “yes”. As far as I’m aware, the similarities to James Joyce’s Ulysses pretty much end with those — although, at the time, some Edgar Wright fans seemed ready to have the film banned on grounds of obscenity.
In the end, as has been the case for at least the first ten years, the MCU swanned through it all unscathed — a $520m haul for a $130m film (the cheapest, although 7 years of advances in CGI helped to mask this) and a general critical thumbs-up.
So for the most part, Ant-Man pulled it off. There are little moments — like when Darren Cross walks into Hank Pym’s apartment, forcing the latter to roll up blueprints on the table — that carry a slight stink of earlier, lesser superhero films like Fantastic Four (2005). Overall, though, it’s a fun ride, albeit one that feels like a detail added to Phase 2, not something fundamental. It’s perhaps for this reason that Ant-Man seems to be overlooked a little, trapped between the two monster instalments either side of it.
It’s also perhaps because it doesn’t take huge risks, either. Darren Cross would be another case of the Marvel Villain Problem were it not for Corey Stoll, who elevates Yellowjacket into being a real shitbag from the off. Even before he wipes Frank off the bathroom floor, there’s a sinister air to his whole composure; everything about him is off, even his promo video with its euphemistic phrasing — “elimination of obstructions on the road to peace”, anyone? You could also argue that Paul Rudd’s Scott Lang is an everyman character lacking from the MCU, except the film goes ahead and tips us off to the forthcoming existence of a Spider-Man film anyway. For some reason, the one character who gets the most definition is Cassie Lang, with her oddly specific combination of interests (trains, ugly things, the colour pink).
Ant-Man doesn’t truly hit its stride until the break-in at Pym Tech. There, the Honey I Shrunk The Kids (1989) gimmickry gives over to action, which in turn escalates without causing the sometimes-too-common city destruction of other superhero fiction. A model of the Pym building getting shot at turns into Age of Ultron mayhem at this scale (there’s even a barrel-rolling car for Ant-Man to run away from Captain America-style). From there it tips again, giving hint to the forthcoming weirdness in Doctor Strange. Ant-Man gets bold, but a little too late to make the film a classic.
Would Edgar Wright have made a difference? Maybe, at the edges. The direction in Ant-Man is often kinetic without quite being punchy (possible exception: the Death Star run along the server stacks). Even so, Marvel hadn’t quite cracked open the full possibilities of this particular corner of their universe. They’d come much closer once Phase 3 rolled around.
High Points: Michael Pena steals most of his scenes — especially when he has to explain something. The final fight scene, and the ‘quantum realm’, also.
Low Points: less what happens than what doesn’t happen. Marvel seemed pretty aware of it, too — Ant-Man and the Wasp was announced not too long afterwards. Also, at the time of writing, Michael Douglas has been caught up in the whole #MeToo business.
Curios: the Triskelion lasted 25 years as a viable building, barely more than Pruitt-Igoe. Captain America is one wasteful bastard.
Flagrant Product Placement: Baskin Robbins is the obvious one, although they’re clearly counting on the association with the film — the place itself is a crossfire zone between some kind of chummy Orwellian dictatorship from the management and Idiocracy from the customers.
Connections to Elsewhere: a whole lot of references to Age of Ultron, nods forward to Civil War, and a cameo from the Falcon. Like Helen Cho, Cassie Lang might prove to be another long-game inclusion.
Stan Lee Cameo: Stan Lee tends the bar, and concurs that Anna Akana is — doubtless exact quote here — “crazy stupid fine”. (7/10)
End Credits: two: first, the Wasp gets set up for the sequel — OK, but the final line (“it’s about damn time”) just raises more questions, instead of lampshading anything. (6/10) Second, it’s the return of Actual Footage — the Falcon and Captain America discuss the Winter Soldier and otherwise speak in then-cryptic terms about the situation. Serves its purpose as setup, though. (9/10)
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Next: Captain America: Civil War (2016)
