Ant-Man and Ant-Man and the Wasp
Sep. 27th, 2018 06:54 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
shallownessAnt-Man came out at a time when, due to family circumstances, I couldn’t go and see it in the cinema. When Ant-Man and the Wasp first came out this summer, I wanted to go see it to support the fact that a female Marvel character had finally made it to the title (took you long enough for that, GUYS), but I really wanted to see the first film first. Some friends said they’d lend me a DVD, and eventually they did.
So, here’s what I made of Ant-Man (as seen on DVD). I have never seen a film so obsessed with punching. It was entertaining enough, even fitfully great, although I’d still take Guardians of the Galaxy over it. I was also left tantalised by what the Edgar Wright version might have been like. As one of Ant-Man’s abilities is to get ants to do his bidding and work as an army, it embraces the silliness, and Rudd and Douglas do a good job with the offbeat humour.
The film is obsessed with father-daughter relationships, as Scott tries to go straight from his Robin Hoodish criminal activities for his daughter Cassie. Hank Pym tries to get him to carry out a heist to save the world, while he’s rebuilding his relationship with his adult daughter Hope. But the film mainly sees these relationships from the fallible father’s perspective, which I wasn’t fully on board with. I was deeply frustrated that it took until the mid-credits scene for Pym to let his clearly gifted adult daughter ‘put on the suit’. Even if he wanted to protect her after losing her mother, she’s a grown woman and would probably have been more capable than Scott overall.
The baddie is played by Corey Stall, who I mainly associate with playing henchmen, and doesn’t do much to help with Marvel’s villain problem. Michael Pena and his character’s van are funny, Judy Greer is underused (Evangeline Lilly is fine, but no more, although you can make ‘she’s an Elf’ jokes.)
I was a bit confused about where it fit into the whole MCU timeline, and I now realise there were nuances I missed about Ant-Man’s appearance in Civil War that I’ll pick up on when I see the movie again.
So I was all set to see Ant-Man and the Wasp at the cinema. There must have been a note saying ‘Enough with the punching’.
The action worked better on the big screen for me. Getting to see The Wasp do her thing was very exciting, MARVEL and meant I was no longer at loggerheads with the heart of the film.
From the title, you think that the film is going to be about Scott and Hope, but it’s also very much about Hank Pym and Janet Van Dyne as Ant-Man and The Wasp (mark 1). I don’t think I could cope with a whole film of CGId young Douglas and Pfeiffer, though. This means that the father-daughter dynamic is joined by a mother-daughter dynamic.
If the first film was a superhero-heist movie, this is a film about a rescue. Hank and Hope need Scott to help them to rescue Janet, and having let them down by going to help ‘Cap’, he owes them, although it might come at personal cost to him and Cassie. But he particularly wants to make it up to love interest Hope. There are other characters who want Pym’s technology for their own, less noble, purposes, which mostly works better than World-Destructing Eeevil.
The fact that Scott’s new suit doesn’t always work properly leads to a lot of laughs at his expense. I rocked with laughter at a scene where Janet takes over his body, so Rudd was channelling Pfeiffer, because I’m one of the few people who saw the film where they were playing a couple. It featured Tracey Ullman as Mother Nature and Graham Norton doing acting. It was weird. (It’s I Could Never Be Your Woman.)
Michael Pena continues to be hilarious as Luis. It uses the San Fransisco location more. We also see a tantalisingly evolved Janet.
Overhanging it all was the question of when all this takes place given Infinity War, but you have to wait for the mid-credits scene for the answer. After the immediate shock of Hope, Hank and Janet vanishing – thanks, Thanos! – leaving Scott hanging in the Quantum Realm, I did think that even mad scientists might have paid attention to the news and thought that this might not be the time for such a dangerous venture. Although maybe they were thinking the healing whatsits from the Quantum Realm/Dimension would help?
Add Hank Pym to the list of Marvel men who think they’re really SMRT who should meet Shuri.
So, here’s what I made of Ant-Man (as seen on DVD). I have never seen a film so obsessed with punching. It was entertaining enough, even fitfully great, although I’d still take Guardians of the Galaxy over it. I was also left tantalised by what the Edgar Wright version might have been like. As one of Ant-Man’s abilities is to get ants to do his bidding and work as an army, it embraces the silliness, and Rudd and Douglas do a good job with the offbeat humour.
The film is obsessed with father-daughter relationships, as Scott tries to go straight from his Robin Hoodish criminal activities for his daughter Cassie. Hank Pym tries to get him to carry out a heist to save the world, while he’s rebuilding his relationship with his adult daughter Hope. But the film mainly sees these relationships from the fallible father’s perspective, which I wasn’t fully on board with. I was deeply frustrated that it took until the mid-credits scene for Pym to let his clearly gifted adult daughter ‘put on the suit’. Even if he wanted to protect her after losing her mother, she’s a grown woman and would probably have been more capable than Scott overall.
The baddie is played by Corey Stall, who I mainly associate with playing henchmen, and doesn’t do much to help with Marvel’s villain problem. Michael Pena and his character’s van are funny, Judy Greer is underused (Evangeline Lilly is fine, but no more, although you can make ‘she’s an Elf’ jokes.)
I was a bit confused about where it fit into the whole MCU timeline, and I now realise there were nuances I missed about Ant-Man’s appearance in Civil War that I’ll pick up on when I see the movie again.
So I was all set to see Ant-Man and the Wasp at the cinema. There must have been a note saying ‘Enough with the punching’.
The action worked better on the big screen for me. Getting to see The Wasp do her thing was very exciting, MARVEL and meant I was no longer at loggerheads with the heart of the film.
From the title, you think that the film is going to be about Scott and Hope, but it’s also very much about Hank Pym and Janet Van Dyne as Ant-Man and The Wasp (mark 1). I don’t think I could cope with a whole film of CGId young Douglas and Pfeiffer, though. This means that the father-daughter dynamic is joined by a mother-daughter dynamic.
If the first film was a superhero-heist movie, this is a film about a rescue. Hank and Hope need Scott to help them to rescue Janet, and having let them down by going to help ‘Cap’, he owes them, although it might come at personal cost to him and Cassie. But he particularly wants to make it up to love interest Hope. There are other characters who want Pym’s technology for their own, less noble, purposes, which mostly works better than World-Destructing Eeevil.
The fact that Scott’s new suit doesn’t always work properly leads to a lot of laughs at his expense. I rocked with laughter at a scene where Janet takes over his body, so Rudd was channelling Pfeiffer, because I’m one of the few people who saw the film where they were playing a couple. It featured Tracey Ullman as Mother Nature and Graham Norton doing acting. It was weird. (It’s I Could Never Be Your Woman.)
Michael Pena continues to be hilarious as Luis. It uses the San Fransisco location more. We also see a tantalisingly evolved Janet.
Overhanging it all was the question of when all this takes place given Infinity War, but you have to wait for the mid-credits scene for the answer. After the immediate shock of Hope, Hank and Janet vanishing – thanks, Thanos! – leaving Scott hanging in the Quantum Realm, I did think that even mad scientists might have paid attention to the news and thought that this might not be the time for such a dangerous venture. Although maybe they were thinking the healing whatsits from the Quantum Realm/Dimension would help?
Add Hank Pym to the list of Marvel men who think they’re really SMRT who should meet Shuri.
