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Can you believe this is the twentieth (!) film Marvel has released? That’s a testament to just how much these films connect. Ant-Man and the Wasp was a film I was really looking forward to. Seeing Scott (Paul Rudd) working Hope (Evangeline Lily), as well as dealing with the fallout of Captain America: Civil War and Avengers: Infinity War was something that had me excited. Ant-Man has grown in esteem for me upon rewatches, so it doesn’t feel good to say that I was underwhelmed by Ant-Man and the Wasp.
After the events of Captain America: Civil War, Scott is now under house arrest after taking a deal. However, his brief journey into the Quantum Realm (from the first film) triggers a vision which leads Hank Pym (Michael Douglas) and Hope van Dyne back to Scott. As well as the FBI lead by Jimmy Woo (Randall Park), the mysterious and powerful Ghost (Hannah John-Kamen), and small-time gangster Sonny Burch (Walton Goggins).
The best thing about this film is seeing Hope as the new Wasp. She’s so cool in that suit and has some crazy moves. Evangeline Lily gets to do more with Hope as a character this time out other than being shrewish. She’s been hurt by Scott. As she tries to make her family whole again, she must contend with her conflicted feelings with Scott.
Paul Rudd is playing Scott as a doofus who is sick of being a doofus. Off the rip, once the movie starts, he regretful of how things turned out during Civil War, yet is still striving to do the right thing. Hank is like a surrogate father to him and just wants his approval again. Hope is someone he loves and throughout the film, he’s taking steps to show her the man he can be. He also acknowledges that Hope is more powerful than he can ever be and needs someone watching his back. Sure, he worked the whole first film to get back in Paxton (Bobby Cannavale) and Maggie’s (Judy Greer) good graces (which is adorable in this film), but he’s Ant-Man now. He needs Hope.
With all that said, the antagonists in this film are boring. FBI agent Jimmy Woo is not a villain, but he is a one-note antagonist who only serves to be the butt of the joke as well as to consistently hinder our heroes’ goals. Randall Park is a great actor and he deserves better than this thankless role. Honestly, once Kevin Feige can use S.H.I.E.L.D. again in the films, I’d like to see Randall play a S.H.I.E.L.D. agent who’s competent but still with comedic flair who’s not the joke.
Hannah John-Kamen does the best she’s given as the “villain” Ghost. I never found the character to be that much of a threat or connected with her tragic backstory. Take Hela from Thor: Ragnarok for example. As soon as she steps onscreen, you feel the danger and the drastic odds Thor is up against. Same goes for Killmonger from Black Panther and Thanos, the best part of Infinity War. All three of these villains were dangerous while still being like complex characters. Emotionally or viscerally I just couldn’t connect with Ghost outside the cool effects work of her character’s ghost trail.
Walton Goggins as Sonny Burch is more of a nuisance than a villain. He’s out to get Hank’s tech for reasons that are already escaping me and in the grand scheme of things, it really doesn’t matter. Goggins is always great, but man did it feel like killing time whenever he’s brought back into the picture. Time that could’ve been spent more on Scott and Hope’s romantic relationship, utilizing Laurence Fishburne more who plays a significant character from Marvel comics named Bill Foster aka Goliath, or getting Michelle Pfeiffer into the picture much earlier.
That’s the main problem here is that none of this comes together all that well. Yeah, Michael Peña is back along with T.I. and David Dastmalchian but even they feel extraneous. What made the first film work so well is framing the whole film around a heist. It felt more focused and urgent having unique set pieces that played with scale in cool ways. And while returning director Peyton Reed plays with scale again fun ways, it was never anything as great as the first. There are lots of sight gags here that cost a lot of money which could’ve made the set pieces pop a little more. I mean the coolest thing Scott does the entire film is riding a flatbed truck like a scooter. That’s a shame as in Civil War when he was Giant-Man, he got a lot more to do there than he does in this film. His malfunctioning suit was only so funny for so long.
Is this a fun movie? Yes. But it’s just not as strong as the first film. It sort of feels as if we’re killing time until Captain Marvel drops in March. I want to see more of Scott and Hope as a team, just with a more focused story and a better villain. You could do much worse and Marvel has done much, much worse (Thor: The Dark World). Stick around for two end credits scenes that had my audience shocked. ------------------------------------------
America from 9:00 on: https://youtu.be/GUwLCQU10KQ
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