Film Review — Ant-Man and the Wasp: Quantumania
MARVEL HITS ROCK BOTTOM
The Marvel Cinematic Universe spins its wheels at full-tilt with the muddled, lethargic Ant-Man and the Wasp: Quantumania. Jettisoning the fleet caper energy of its predecessors for more tedious teases of what’s coming next, the launch of the MCU’s Phase Five lands with an uninspired whimper. Jonathan Majors as Kang carries this lumbering sci-fi epic with suitable menace, but Quantumania forgets everything special — and charming — about its titular hero. Minor spoilers ahead…
The Ant-Man movies have long been the red-headed stepchild of the Marvel Cinematic Universe. Routinely lost among the mythos-shattering scramble of Infinity Stones, space gods, and multiversal threats, Scott Lang’s stand-alone shrinking adventures have always played in the sidelines. But the sidelines - outside of his ironically pivotal role in Avengers: Endgame - have also been where Ant-Man and his Pym Particles thrived most: providing fleet, energetic reprieves from the crushing burden of carving out an interconnected comic book universe. No one pretends they’re high art, but the Ant-Man series’ refreshing self-awareness of its brand of light entertainment has always been its biggest strength. So what happens when it’s all ejected to make it the lynchpin of the MCU’s next galaxies-spanning threat? Well, it certainly feels like replacing the low-stakes caper energy of the Ant-Man movies with tedious, wheel-spinning teases of what comes next is a grave miscalculation.
Scott Lang (Paul Rudd) is in a rut. Despite being one of the Avengers that saved the universe from Thanos, he’s been stuck hocking his memoir and going through the motions. His partner Hope van Dyne (Evangeline Lilly) has transformed Pym Technologies into a philanthropic powerhouse, while his daughter Cassie (now played by Kathryn Newton) has taken on the mantle of “looking after the little guy” with her own brand of activism. Desperate to make up for lost time, with his daughter now five years older having never been “blipped,” Scott takes an interest in Cassie’s secret science project: building a Quantum Realm beacon with Hank Pym (Michael Douglas) much to the dismay of Janet van Dyne (Michelle Pfeiffer). It isn’t before long that Janet’s fears of tampering with the Quantum Realm - where she was stranded for decades before the events of Ant-Man and the Wasp - become reality: a wayward signal triggers a laboratory mishap that sucks the entire group of heroes into the strange, dangerous netherworld. Newly marooned, Scott and his family navigate the inhospitable environment while grappling with Janet’s secret past, itself inextricably linked to the MCU’s newest big bad: a multiversal tyrant named Kang (Jonathan Majors).
“… it certainly feels like replacing the low-stakes caper energy of the Ant-Man movies with tedious, wheel-spinning teases of what comes next is a grave miscalculation.”
With Quantumania, it shouldn’t be a surprise that Marvel’s signature, assembly-line CGI is front-and-center. Inexplicably dim and muddy, Ant-Man’s very own journey into mystery is a far cry from the weird, eye-popping exercise in bombast it should be. An entire zany world reduced to brown and dark orange hues, it’s Marvel’s stubborn allergy to color and contrast writ large. Even worse, Quantumania’s turgid visuals only highlight one of its biggest problems: Scott Lang in the Quantum Realm just isn’t that interesting. The coolest thing about the Ant-Man movies is when they recontextualize the scale of everyday objects that we’re all familiar with. Collisions with Thomas the Tank Engine, running alongside the edge of a kitchen knife, being swept away by a bathtub’s faucet - Quantumania’s predecessors understood the simple pleasures of a shrinking and growing superhero in relatable spaces, but when you change Ant-Man’s environment to sludgy, indecipherable alien CGI, it all becomes meaningless and - even worse - boring.
Narratively, Ant-Man and the Wasp: Quantumania never quite has a handle on what it wants to be. Overstuffed with tired performances from Paul Rudd, Michael Douglas, and even newcomer Kathryn Newton, its story doesn’t have the conviction to decide among its myriad paths: Its family drama, uninspired rebellion yarn, and Phase Five burdens stretch it past its breaking point. And while nothing really adds up inside this Quantum Realm adventure, it’s Jonathan Majors who carries the entire film on his back; playing in an entire league of his own, he puts on the big boy villain pants with a pained pathos and genuine menace. Janet’s hidden past with Kang - glimpses of which are all too fleeting - is hands-down the best thing about the movie, but even Majors’ tour-de-force buckles under the Marvel mandate to tease the future. By the time Quantumania’s third act fizzles away with yet another big beam battle, Phase Five already feels like a tiresome treadmill, and even the words "Kang will return” don’t muster much optimism.
