Movie
Ant-Man And the Wasp Quantumania reminds me allot of the ‘classic’ Flash Gordon movie from 1980, but without the awesome soundtrack from Queen.
Ant-Man And the Wasp Quantumania is an old school silly science fiction romp of a movie set in the Marvel Cinematic Universe. The story of Ant-Man And the Wasp Quantumania is fairly simple. The main crew of Ant-Man ( Scott Lang, Hope Van Dyke, Hank Pym, Janet Van Dyne and Cassie Lang) are accidentally sucked into the quantum realm and they must reunite, and get back home. In some ways it feels very similar to Disney’s 2022 animated movie Strange World. While in the quantum realm the Ant-Man crew discover Kang the Conquerer. Kang wants to escape the quantum realm and he puts Scott Lang in an impossible situation to either save his captured daughter Cassie or to save the multiverse. This is your standard marvel formula just set in an old school science fiction epic.
Kang is the new major villain in the Marvel Cinematic Universe, and he is portrayed by Jonathan Majors. Johnathan Majors is fantastic as a menacing conquerer. Kang is a terrorizing man from the future who is also stuck in the quantum realm. I was surprised how scary Kang was presented in this movie. Kang is given a good amount of screen time and back story. Kang is probably the best new character in the movie and I found his performance to be dark and charismatic.
The quantum realm presented in this movie is a character onto itself. Sadly this character is extremely underdeveloped and not fully explained. The quantum realm has been teased in several previous marvel movies, but this is the first movie where the majority of a movie is set in this location. The quantum realm is a one very strange place. The quantum realm has diverse unique environments and an interesting population. The quantum realm even has some ‘probability storms’ that will mess with your mind. Kang has conquered the quantum realm, and the beings that exist in this realm are fearful of him. We really don’t know anything substantial about the creatures that exist in the quantum realm. How was the quantum realm before Kang conquered it? Do these creatures understand that they microscopic? Did these creatures previously shrink or have they always been this tiny? The movie has dozens of characters and we know only the superficial aspects of them. I don’t even remember the names of the various tiny characters and I watched the movie last night. The quantum realm just doesn’t make much sense and it’s frustrating. I’m willing to go with crazy sci-fi concepts but this realm was not nearly fleshed out like I wanted. I have so many unanswered questions and it left me angry and wanting more.
Ant-Man And the Wasp Quantumania is a frustrating movie for many reasons. The movie only lightly explains what is going on. When the movie finally explains itself, it just leaves you with so many more unanswered follow up questions. Many aspects of the lore are just exposition dumps and they don’t feel like natural story telling. Why do some many creatures in the quantum realm look humanoid ? How small can Ant-Man shrink to? How do they breathe with being smaller than oxygen atoms ? Why exactly does Kang need Ant-Man when his technology should be far superior? The movie shifts tones quickly from being wacky to dark, and its jarring. The ending of this movie just feels odd. The last act has many fake endings. How everything wraps up feels too easy and cheap. How many damn bridges exist in Kang’s city? The movie doesn’t fully satisfy my curiosity, and it feels like this could have been a five season TV show, but it is just summarized as a two hour movie.
Despite its many flaws I still enjoyed my time with Ant-Man And the Wasp Quantumania. I was frustrated by the narrative, but I was never bored. This a fun sci-fi adventure. I love sci-fi and I am intrigued by all the weird concepts presented in this movie. I think Kang is a very interesting and compelling character. The action sequences and visuals are fascinating to watch. The humor works well, and I just love Paul Rudd in this movie (and everything that he does). For me the good aspects outweighs the bad aspects, but just barely. Ant-Man And the Wasp Quantumania has two post credit scenes, one scene is mid credits and the other scene is after the credits. I enjoyed both scenes and I feel like both scenes are important to the future of the marvel cinematic universe. One scene directly references events of this movie, and the other scene directly references another related Marvel TV show. I guess they learned their lesson from Ant-Man and the Wasp, and that stupid ant playing the drums post credit scene.
Ant-Man And the Wasp Quantumania is one odd pulp science fiction movie. I liked this movie, but I can understand why many people won’t be amused by it.
Final Verdict: 6/10
