Ant-Man Quantumania is trying really hard to be a fantastic movie but it ends up being relatively tame. I have to say that the special effects were out of this world.
This review contains spoilers.
Ant-Man Quantumania premise
Ant-Man/Scott Lang, played by the never aging Paul Rudd, starts off with Scott enjoying his life. He has saved the world alongside The Avengers and has become a successful book writer and is hugely popular in San Fransisco. He doesn’t have to pay for his coffee and during book signings, everyone’s in awe of his book reading.
Hope van Dyne / Wasp, played by Evangeline Lilly, is running a successful charity and even has time to spend time with Scott as they go on a picnic on the Golden Gate Bridge.
That’s how good life is. And it pays off to control flying ants and have wings to get on top of said bridge. I would love to have that as well and a pill or hypnosis session to get rid of my fear of heights.
Then there are Hank and Janet Pym. They both live full and prosperous lives. Hank is fiddling with his inventions and Janet is hanging around. Up until their granddaughter, Cassie Lang, played by newcomer Kathryn Newton, is imprisoned for helping out during a demonstration. She also has a suit, much to Scott’s surprise.
There is tension at the dinner table because of Cassie’s recent imprisonment but after the dinner, Cassie wants to show her new Quantum Realm scanner. But as soon as she turns it on, Janet panics and wants to turn that device off. And it does but it starts itself back up and swallows everything in the shed. Including the ant farms, Janet, Scott, Cassie, Hope, and Hank.
They all end up in different places. But what’s weird is that Janet immediately hides while whenever Scott says Janet, the people get angry. The question is, what happened in the Quantum Realm while Janet resided there for 30 years? Kang the Conqueror happened. He was banned and locked away in the Quantum Realm.
As punishment, Kang’s ship was completely trashed and without a power source, the ship can’t do much. Janet, believing she did the right thing, helped him out to make a new power supply unit. But just as they boot up the ship, the neuro kinetics shows the history and past of Kang.
Janet destroys the power supply using Pym Particles. And Kang has been looking for ways to return the power supply back to its’ normal size. All he needs are Pym Particles and now he has Hank, Janet, Hope, Cassie, and Scott who can give them to him.
Along the way, there are two warring factions, one who fights for Kang and the other against him. Scott and Cassie have fallen into the hands of the rebellion while the Pyms ended up in Kang territory.
The Pyms are deep into Kang territory in the Quantum Realm
Janet contacts old friends and among them is Lord Kryn, played by the legendary Bill Murray and it turns out that Janet had a relationship with him. The romantic/sexual kind. Much to the dismay of Hank, who’s only been with one woman in the 30 years that the couple was separated.
But as the conversation progresses, it becomes clear that Kryn has sided with Kang and is out to capture the Pyms. The family manages to get away but not unscathed.
The Langs are captured by the rebellion
The Langs are captured by the rebellion led by Jentorra. She is out to overthrow Kang but when she hears the name Janet van Dyne, she looks up in anger. Apparently, it’s Janet’s fault that the world is taken over by Kang. But as I said before, that was after she found out that Janet powered the engine of the ship and allowed Kang to become the fearful conqueror.
When Scott is forced to undo the damage Janet caused he refused. But when Kang threatens to kill Cassie in front of him and make him relive that moment over and over Scott agrees but only if he leaves Cassie alone. Kang “agrees”, hey he’s the bad guy. What do you expect?
When Scott goes in he is overrun by versions of himself and it’s not until Hope saves him that he manages to fix the ship’s power core. Instead of releasing Cassie, Kang instead immediately goes for the core. Leaving Cassie to her fate and breaking his word to Scott. Which makes him very angry.
Defeating Kang in his Quantum Realm
While Cassie is on her way to a big tower to defeat Kang, she’s stopped by MODOK, which stands for Mental/Mobile/Mechanized Organism Designed Only for Killing. But he’s none other than Darren, also known as Yellowjacket, who seemingly survived his fight with Scott in the first movie.
He’s now a cyber organism just to kill for the sake of killing. Cassie tells him to stop being a dick and he returned to being a good guy.
Together with the Pyms and the Langs MODOK joins the big fight against Kang. With the help of the rebellion and the ants from the ant farm, Kang is once again defeated.
Ant-Man Quantumania analysis
The movie itself prides itself on its unique sense of humor and it shows that Scott and Hope have finally found a life for themselves. As the movie progresses, there is a severe lack of purpose in both of their lives.
How do you go back to normal life after you have gone through all of the events prior to that? The Blip, the loss of loved ones, the return of loved ones, losing years of your life (5 years total according to Avengers: Endgame) if it wasn’t for Cassie, Scott, and Hope would have still led empty lives with nothing to fight for. So I should really thank Cassie for bringing back the Ant-Man and Wasp.
Cassie Lang as the Stinger is excellent for the Marvel Cinematic Universe
By the way, in the comics, Cassie dons the identity of Stinger, and just like in the movie she is the daughter of Scott Lang. The Marvel Cinematic Universe version already has a suit but she doesn’t fly an ant like her father or has Wasp wings like her stepmother.
Her grandfather and mother did support her with the suit as becomes clear at the dinner table scene. I hope that she will eventually replace Scott Lang and Hope van Dyne, simply because I feel that their stories have been told.
We have watched them go from searching for their destinies to finding them and fulfilling them. What else could you possibly want more from them?
It’s not that I don’t like Scott or Hope at all but if there are more stories to be told then I’d love to see them but judging by the Rotten Tomatoes site, with an approval rating of 47%, it’s not likely that Marvel will make another story with them. Quantumania could be the last in the Ant-Man and Wasp series.
Stinger would be a great replacement plus it would be in line with the Marvel comics concept from the 1980s where instead of continuously using the same characters, they would refresh them or create new characters and start with a new slate so you wouldn’t be bound by the established continuity of said characters.
Janet and Hank Pym’s story isn’t over yet
The same wouldn’t go for Janet and Hank Pym. There aren’t many things established plus Cassie would need a soundboard. Janet is the only Marvel character we know who has ever managed to put up a fight against Kang so her knowledge of that plus her knowledge of the Quantum Realm would be very welcome in the upcoming Avengers movie.
Hank is needed for his inventions and I really really want to see Mr. Fantastic, Iron Heart (from Wakanda forever), Shuri, Cassie, and Hank in one room. And let’s not forget Dr. Banner. There should be a joke about that, something like 7 scientists walk into Avengers Headquarters [insert joke].
Kang and Quantum Realm and the Marvel Multiverse
The establishment of Kang and the Multiverse and all his variations in several other timelines is brilliantly done. And it is going to take a great effort from Marvel to establish a non-confusing story that uses time travel.
They managed to do that with the Avengers: Endgame movie but that wasn’t really set up the way the Multiverse was set up using the TV show Loki mostly and Doctor Strange: Multiverse of Madness and of course Wandavision, which dealt with altered realities through magic.
The setup is already there if you have followed the movies in phases 4 and 5 (that started with Ant-Man Quantumania), you just have to see it.
In fact, I can only name one movie trilogy that was successful with the concept of time travel and that is Back to the Future. Most of the other time travel or multiverse TV shows are tough to follow and I think that most of them are confusing. Simply because the concept isn’t clear enough from the get-go. This means that a lot of science-fiction writers don’t have a clear grasp of the story they want to tell. I hope that Marvel does have that.
Here is a list of Marvel movies and TV shows that you need to watch for Ant-Man Quantumania:
- Ant-Man part 1
- Captain America: Civil War (it is mentioned several times)
- Ant-Man and the Wasp
- Avengers: Endgame (it is mentioned several times but never by name)
- Loki, because that’s where Kang makes his first appearance but it also confirms the existence of the Multiverse.
Should you watch Ant-Man Quantumania
I would recommend watching the movie for the special effects, the story is ok but as I said before, it’s not amazing. That has also to do with the character. The exploration of the Quantum Realm however was very well done. Not just visually but storywise too.
Who wouldn’t want to see more cameos such as Bill Murray’s Kryn? Could we get Dan Akroyd the next time perhaps?
The issue I have with the movie is that it sometimes wants too much. Too many plotlines and some of them are pretty thin. For instance, the rebellion, where did they come from? They were just there….they must have a backstory, right?
The backstory of Kang and Janet was very well done. It establishes especially Janet as a fighter for what is right. Something we see back in Hope and Cassie. Whereas Hank fights back more indirectly through his inventions, Janet takes the enemy head-on.
I would highly recommend the movie if you are very invested in the Marvel Cinematic Universe. If not then I’d watch it with a big bag of popcorn.
