ANT-MAN AND THE WASP: QUANTUMANIA – Review by Valerie Kalfrin
Ant-Man and the Wasp: Quantumania sends Marvel’s size-defying heroes on their biggest adventure beyond assisting the Avengers. Yet by teeing up another giant villain for Marvel’s ongoing cinematic universe, the film shrinks some of the duo’s quirky charm and relatable, everyday appeal.
Directed again by Peyton Reed of the first two Ant-Man films, Quantumania explores what one character calls “a secret universe beneath ours.” Where Ant-Man (Paul Rudd, Only Murders in the Building) and the Wasp (Evangeline Lilly, South of Heaven) previously dealt with heists and misdirection, this time they encounter a subatomic world reminiscent of Star Wars or The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy.
Granted, the effects team makes it stunning in parts, with constantly shifting colors and vistas. We see forests of “trees” like video game mushrooms, giant flying mantas, neon skies, creatures with heads resembling broccoli florets, and living buildings that fly and blast lasers. Nevertheless, I missed the previous films’ creative simplicity, where the heroes resize not just themselves but objects such as salt shakers, PEZ dispensers, cars, and buildings while an army of helpful ants provides backup.
As the film opens, Ant-Man, a.k.a. Scott Lang, enjoys life in San Francisco with his sweetheart, Wasp, and his daughter, Cassie (Kathryn Newton, Big Little Lies), now a young adult. While Wasp, a.k.a. Hope van Dyne, uses technology that her father, Hank Pym (Michael Douglas, The Kominsky Method), invented to supersize food and resources for those in need, Scott tools around San Francisco, promoting his memoir, Look Out for the Little Guy. Rudd’s affable charisma and comic timing are their own superpowers, but here, he also shows sweetness as Scott, an ex-con, relishes being a legitimate hero.
Scott appreciates having a breather after helping the Avengers restore to life the people that the villain Thanos blipped from existence during the Infinity War/Endgame saga. However, Cassie urges him to do more. She gets arrested while helping the homeless, then shows off how Hank has been encouraging her to build a device that maps the quantum realm.
For the uninitiated, this space was where Janet van Dyne (Michelle Pfeiffer, The First Lady), Hank’s wife and Hope’s mother, disappeared for thirty years, only to be rescued in 2018’s Ant-Man and the Wasp. The script by Jeff Loveness (Rick and Morty) annoyingly has Janet keep quiet about her time in this realm until it’s too late to warn anyone about the powerful and dangerous being she met there.
After Cassie’s device zaps her, Scott, Hank, Janet, and Hope into the realm, we learn more about Janet’s earlier adventures and the being she met—a traveler named Kang the Conqueror (Jonathan Majors, the upcoming Creed III). Kang can manipulate time, and his kind exiled him to this realm because of the worlds and timelines he destroyed. Soon Janet and the others learn that he’s made his prison an empire—and now plots how to escape.
Majors plays Kang with a curious mixture of menace and pathos. Although the script is thin on his motivations (no doubt for Marvel to dole out in other films), it gives him an intriguing philosophical bent. Time is a cage that can break you, he muses: “It’s not until you’re free that you see how small it really is.”
Meanwhile, the Langs and van Dynes meet up with various residents living under Kang’s rule. These include a ragtag band of rebels with a kick-butt warrior (martial artist Katy M. O’Brian), a psychic whose forehead glows (William Jackson Harper, The Resort), and an enthusiastic pink blob with squid-like arms and a domed helmet voiced by David Dastmalchian, who plays one of Scott’s ex-con buddies in the earlier Ant-Man films.
The actors’ interplay makes for some amusing and absurd moments, such as when a creature marvels at Scott’s mouth and wonders how many holes he has. (Rudd’s reaction as he does the math is priceless.) When one of Janet’s old flames turns up, a jealous Hank reveals a few things that make Hope want to cover her ears and hide.
Some viewers might have a similar reaction to a former adversary who appears in an unfortunate CGI form. That aside, it’s a treat to see veterans Pfeiffer and Douglas get plenty to do this go-around. Adding the eager and headstrong Cassie to the mix gives Rudd additional depth to play as a proud yet protective parent.
Ant-Man and the Wasp: Quantumania leaves some unanswered questions, and its action scenes rely more on fisticuffs than clever size-shifting props and fight choreography. It’s still a fun outing with likable characters, just not a fantastic voyage.
