11 Days of Marvel: Ant-Man

Welcome to our 11 Days of Marvel bonus round! In this project, Bill and Erin went through every sin­gle extant film in the Marvel Cinematic Universe and wrote their reac­tions to them! The project start­ed here, with Iron Man, or you can click here to see all the arti­cles in the project. Today is about the lat­est movie in the MCU, which has been out for less than 24 hours:

Ant-Man (2015)

THERE ARE SEVERAL SPOILERS IN THIS POST. THERE ARE A BUNCH IN THE WHOLE PROJECT, AND IT FELT WEIRD TO REFUSE TO SPOIL THIS ONE. BUT STILL, IF YOU ARE GOING TO GO SEE ANT-MAN AND DON’T WANT ANYTHING SPOILED FOR YOU, READ THIS LATER.

Erin’s Response: 

Spoiler alert! The good guys win! Evil (or some­thing like it) is van­quished! The Avengers, much to Paul Rudd’s dis­ap­point­ment, are not called!  That being said, this was a sur­pris­ing­ly fun movie. To be fair, I have not yet seen it twice (unlike the other movies in this series) so per­haps the sec­ond time around the jokes will run flat and the action scenes will be bor­ing. At this moment in time, how­ev­er, I am will­ing to say that Ant-Man is real­ly quite funny and not too full of itself. Which is impor­tant, because this movie had to be part camp. There is no real world where Ant-Man is nec­es­sary when you have Iron Man, Thor, or the Hulk.

What I enjoyed most about this movie is its play­ful sense of space and tim­ing. The scenes don’t play on too long, gags are not overused (although, like all good brick jokes, they are ref­er­enced enough to make you feel like an insid­er), and Ant-Man’s use of his small and large self is refresh­ing and fun. Overall, this movie is fun. I am not sure that it feels in any way like the rest of the MCU so far, and I am okay with that. I am okay with the stakes being a fall­en hero’s daugh­ter and not much else. I am okay with the largest emo­tion­al attach­ments being between daugh­ters and their fathers. And I am def­i­nite­ly okay with Evangeline Lilly becom­ing the Wasp (although she was still not enough of a badass female sci­en­tist. Where are they, Marvel?!?).  I actu­al­ly felt sad when Ant-Man’s ant-steed died, and if a movie can make the death of an ant feel impor­tant, then I think they have raised the bar con­sid­er­ably.

All in all, this movie make me remem­ber why a super hero movie might appeal to the child inside of me. While it sets up for other movies, it is basi­cal­ly a heist movie, and that is actu­al­ly fun and fine with me!

Favorite Moment: I real­ly enjoyed the per­son­i­fi­ca­tion mixed with util­i­ty that seems to be an inex­tri­ca­ble part of Ant-man’s ant com­pan­ions. Whether they are build­ing beau­ti­ful lat­tice struc­tures or becom­ing a pet for his daugh­ter, the ants are never a grotesque other.

Worst Moment: This vil­lain is dumb, and I am with Hope Van Dyne: why isn’t she the Ant-Man to begin with?

Best Pre-positioned Tank: SPOILER: There is a sur­prise tank, and it is beau­ti­ful, funny, and per­fect in every comedic sense.

Erin’s Rankings:

1. Captain America: The First Avenger

2. Iron Man

3. Captain America: The Winter Soldier

4. Avengers: Age of Ultron

5. The Avengers

6. Ant-Man

7. Iron Man 3

8. Thor

9. Guardians of the Galaxy

10. The Incredible Hulk

11. Iron Man 2

12. Thor: The Dark World

Bill’s Response:

So, yes­ter­day I said that I thought Ant-Man, which is tech­ni­cal­ly the end of “Phase 2” of the MCU, would be more pre­dic­tive of the future of the fran­chise than Ultron. Accordingly, I felt like a lot was rid­ing on this movie: if the MCU could intro­duce a new (and fair­ly goofy) super­hero in a way which felt both fun and unique, it might still have some life in it, 12 movies in. If, how­ev­er, Ant-Man was a train­wreck, either too crowd­ed with ref­er­ences to other movies to be an end-in-itself or too much like the other solo movies, that might imply that the MCU had run its course.

Ant-Man’s trou­bled devel­op­ment (goof­ball comic direc­tor Edgar Wright had been attached to direct it for almost a decade before bow­ing out a week or two before pro­duc­tion start­ed) and some­what unin­spir­ing trail­ers left me more than a bit wor­ried, and so I went into the the­ater with sev­er­al con­cerns.

First, I wor­ried that the movie (which was clear­ly attempt­ing to be more of a com­e­dy) would spend its whole run­ning time apol­o­giz­ing for the silli­ness of its con­cept. The trail­ers loved to show other char­ac­ters react­ing to the name “Ant-Man” as though it was some­how offen­sive, and noth­ing can kill a super­hero movie like try­ing to apol­o­gize for its comic book roots. These super­heroes only work if they are played more or less straight: as soon as the movie starts wink­ing at you and rolling its eyes, every­thing falls to pieces.

Second, I wor­ried that Paul Rudd’s Scott Lang would just be yet-another snarky white guy, more or less indis­tin­guish­able from Tony Stark and Peter Quill. We don’t need anoth­er gener­ic goof­ball in the MCU, and if Scott can’t estab­lish his own iden­ti­ty, there’s no way he can hold his own against Robert Downey, Jr. Particularly not since his super­pow­ers are infi­nite­ly goofi­er than the Iron Man suit.

As it hap­pens, I needn’t have wor­ried. Ant-Man is actu­al­ly a pret­ty fun time.

It’s def­i­nite­ly the clos­est thing to a straight com­e­dy in the MCU at the moment: even Guardians of the Galaxy has a small­er jokes-to-other-things ratio. Director Peyton Reed has a lot of fun with size-based visu­al humor, switch­ing from up-close bom­bas­tic action to dis­tant shots which reveal every­thing in the pre­vi­ous shot was only an inch tall. Ant-Man’s weird size-changing shuriken-things allow him to shrink or embiggen var­i­ous house­hold items, to both comic and tac­ti­cal effect, and the trail­ers thank­ful­ly don’t spoil all of those jokes.

The biggest prob­lem with this movie is Corey Stoll’s Yellowjacket, who is a supreme­ly gener­ic vil­lain who is given almost noth­ing to do. There’s some gob­bledy­gook about how the Pym par­ti­cles have been dri­ving him crazy, but there’s no depth there: he’s a des­ig­nat­ed vil­lain, a canned Evil Corporate Scientist, and poor Corey Stoll deserves bet­ter. Yet it prob­a­bly doesn’t mat­ter very much, because the movie isn’t about him: unlike Guardians of the Galaxy, which need­ed a believ­able vil­lain to unite the team, and fails because it doesn’t have one, Ant-Man is a heist movie, and is thus more about the team and the fun they are hav­ing than about the vil­lain they are rob­bing. And at least he doesn’t want to destroy the world, which is refresh­ing as heck.

Scott Lang is not the most inter­est­ing char­ac­ter we have seen, but Rudd actu­al­ly brings a fair amount of com­plex­i­ty to what could have been a very one-note per­for­mance. Sure, most of his lines are jokes, but there’s a real sad­ness in his eyes that dri­ves all of his actions. He’s doing this to main­tain a rela­tion­ship with his daugh­ter, and he knows that the rea­son that rela­tion­ship is in dan­ger is his own fault. He gen­uine­ly wants to be a hero, if for no other rea­son than because his daugh­ter thinks he can be one. That’s a very dif­fer­ent moti­va­tion than we have in the rest of the MCU, and I think Lang’s dif­fer­ent per­spec­tive (as an ex-con who still most­ly hangs out with lov­able crooks) will be wel­come in the MCU.

Erin and I have been watch­ing Brooklyn Nine-Nine late­ly, and I think it’s one of the fun­ni­est shows I’ve seen in years. But I real­ized most of the way through Season 2 that almost all of the wacky hijinks the 99th Precinct gets up to are fair­ly pre­dictable: you know more or less what’s going to hap­pen in the episode by the five minute mark. If a char­ac­ter says he will absolute­ly not do a thing, you bet­ter believe that he will be doing that thing ten min­utes later. It doesn’t play with the sit­com for­mu­la, or sub­vert it, but rather dwells in it, mak­ing no apolo­gies for what it’s up to, but nev­er­the­less excelling with­in the for­mu­la. Ant-Man feels a bit like that: sev­er­al of the story beats are telegraphed fair­ly early on, but I don’t care. It’s funny, and a good time, and has its heart in absolute­ly the right place, and I don’t actu­al­ly know what else we want from this sort of thing.

Favorite Moment: Chekhov’s Tank. Erin called it about ten min­utes before it hap­pened, and I was thrilled when she was right.

Least Favorite Moment: Darren Cross killing the mis­cel­la­neous gov­ern­ment guy early on in the movie. There had to have been a bet­ter way to estab­lish that he was a BAD DUDE rather than ran­dom mur­der. It killed any chance at com­plex­i­ty he might have had. I was most wor­ried about this movie right after this scene.

Bill’s (Provisional) Rankings: (I reserve the right to adjust these after see­ing Ant-Man a sec­ond time and get­ting a clear­er pic­ture of its qual­i­ty or lack there­of.)

1. Captain America: The Winter Soldier

2. Captain America: The First Avenger

3. The Avengers

4. Iron Man

5. Iron Man 3

6. Avengers: Age of Ultron

7. Ant-Man

8. Thor

9. The Incredible Hulk

10. Guardians of the Galaxy

11. Iron Man 2

12. Thor: The Dark World

And Now, A Conversation

Erin: I like your com­par­i­son to Brooklyn Nine-Nine. You are cor­rect: one does­n’t have to re-invent the wheel to still make a very enjoy­able movie!

Bill: I think that’s impor­tant to remem­ber: most of these movies are not going to be earth-shattering life-changers, and that’s fine. I do think a lot of folks were dis­ap­point­ed when Edgar Wright was­n’t direct­ing, and thus pro­ject­ed that dis­ap­point­ment onto the movie. (I’ve been read­ing some reviews in an attempt to get some per­spec­tive.) It’s not a super-satirical sub­ver­sion, and I think that dis­ap­point­ed some folks. But, like, it’s a real­ly fun movie, and I think its gen­uine­ness is part of why it’s so much fun.

Erin: Also, it is nice to see some sit­u­a­tions where a small­er hero might actu­al­ly be the way to go. My only real com­plaint is how utter­ly dumb “going sub­atom­ic” is. SO DUMB.

Bill: Yeah, that was pret­ty what­ev­er. It’s def­i­nite­ly not a per­fect movie. But it’s a lot bet­ter than I was expect­ing. I did like all of the run­ning gags with his ex-con crim­i­nal pals. And I’m glad we got to see a lit­tle more of the Falcon.

Erin: Indeed. I think my only com­plaint with is side­kicks was that they are a bit racial­ly (and by a bit I mean a lot) stereo­typed.

Bill: Yeah, I noticed that as well. Maybe not great, par­tic­u­lar­ly since I think Luis might be the first named Hispanic char­ac­ter in the fran­chise so far. x_x Oh well. Baby steps, at least.

Erin: Well, I am not sure if that is an answer, and I am not sure if you need to be the one to answer it. But I don’t par­tic­u­lar­ly like only cast­ing minori­ties as lov­able thieves. They could have eas­i­ly been Jesse Pinkman and that would have been bet­ter.

Bill: Well, this brings us to the end of our MCU project. Do you have any thoughts on the fran­chise as a whole, past or future?

Erin: I am a bit dis­gust­ed that there are so many more movies, and the Black Widow is still not up for her own.

Bill: Heard that.

Erin: It makes me mad at the whole fran­chise. How about you?

Bill: I don’t know: the fact that Ant-Man was pret­ty good makes me think that this silly fran­chise might have anoth­er few years left in it before it inevitably comes crash­ing down, which is heart­en­ing. I like most of the movies. I’m not sure how to judge the value of the fran­chise as a whole, though, even now. I mean, sure, I enjoy it, but that does­n’t nec­es­sar­i­ly mean it’s a good thing. Do we real­ly need eight thou­sand super­hero movies? I don’t know. I’m not sure I know what the alter­na­tive would be, though, and so I can’t say whether this is bet­ter. I will say that, although exec­u­tive med­dling runs ram­pant through the entire fran­chise, I do feel like a lot of actors and artists real­ly do give it their all in these movies, and I can respect that.

Erin: I am sad that so much cap­i­tal goes into things that are prob­a­bly never going to be, like, art. That hurts me a bit. I am not sure that it is any worst than most action films, but I do think that many other movies do a much bet­ter job of being inclu­sive and giv­ing women actu­al things to do. This is a very, very, very white fran­chise. And I don’t know how much more of that we actu­al­ly need. I think that is my main con­cern — what isn’t get­ting made because these actors and this money aren’t being chan­neled into other things? Although then the dirty cap­i­tal­ist in me says “Milk the mass­es for all they will give you.” It is very dis­con­cert­ing.

Bill: Well, I sus­pect the answer to “what isn’t get­ting made” isn’t, like, super-diverse and thought­ful art about the human con­di­tion. It would prob­a­bly be pirate movies or yet more spy movies or more (white) his­tor­i­cal epics. I do hope that the fran­chise gets more diverse, if only so we can tell the char­ac­ters apart when we see them in huge track­ing shots. x_x

Erin: I just think at least with a pirate movie you don’t have a whole cul­tur­al group climb­ing all over them­selves to dis­cov­er every­thing before the movie even comes to the­aters. There is a strange desire to pre­dict every­thing that I find odd. It becomes more about a cul­tur­al inside joke, a way to tell the true believ­ers from the hea­then non-comic fans.

Bill: Yeah, I’m not super fond of that desire to dis­sect every sin­gle frame of every trail­er. io9 has a whole fea­ture where they post indus­try rumors and leaked scripts, and that’s pret­ty gross. I hear some of that sort of thing since I live on the Internet, but I try to avoid most of it.

Erin: It’s like if I worked Kant into every­day con­ver­sa­tions and then gave flack to every­one who did­n’t remem­ber minute ref­er­ences to the Prolegomena.

Bill: Indeed. Well, thank you very much for join­ing me on this ridicu­lous project! I hope you enjoyed it!

Erin: I enjoyed myself a lot! But I don’t think you’re going to get me to see a super­hero movie for a while.

 Final Rankings and Awards:

Worst Hair Award: (Erin)

This is a toss up between Scarlett Johansson’s orig­i­nal red hair (ouch, couldn’t they have made sure it was the same color through­out all of film­ing?) and Evangline Lilly’s extra severe, aging-her-15-years black bob. Not cool Marvel, not cool.

Cutest Kid Award: (Erin)

Ant-Man’s daugh­ter is adorable. I have the hor­ri­ble feel­ing that they might have pulled her front teeth specif­i­cal­ly for this role, and a dark side of me is total­ly fine with it because she was SO STINKING CUTE.

Characters We Needed Much More From: (Erin)

• Gamora
• Jane Foster. She ought to be the bad­dest of the bad ass female sci­en­tists. If Portman was too expen­sive to use as much as they’ve used Erik Selvig, they should have cast some­one else. (She nei­ther adds nor detracts from these movies.)
• Hawkeye/Black Widow. If they don’t do a pre­quel with these two doing some kind of spy thing, Marvel are idiots!

Bill’s Super-Scientific Major Villain Ranking

1. Obadiah Stane/Iron Monger, Iron Man

2. Ultron, Avengers: Age of Ultron

3. Loki, Thor

4. Alexander Pierce, Captain America: The Winter Soldier

5. Aldrich Killian, Iron Man 3

6. Johann Schmidt/The Red Skull, Captain America: The First Avenger

7. Loki, The Avengers

8. Ivan Vanko/Whiplash, Iron Man 2

9. Emil Blonsky/The Abomination, The Incredible Hulk

10. Darren Cross/Yellowjacket, Ant-Man

11. Ronan the Accuser, Guardians of the Galaxy

12. Malekith the Accursed, Thor: The Dark World

Well, folks, that’s it for the 11 Days of Marvel project! Here’s hop­ing you enjoyed our silly ram­blings. Comment below if you have any thoughts, and we may do some­thing like this again, if peo­ple seem to enjoy it!