Just a few months after Marvel sent the world on an emotional rollercoaster with Avengers: Infinity War, they return with a much more lighthearted affair- Ant Man and the Wasp. The original Ant Man was a very enjoyable movie. It's not one of my favorites in the MCU, but it's a fun watch. And after watching Infinity War and finding Scott Lang and company completely absent from the film, I wondered what they were doing the entire time. This movie gives us insight on what exactly happens while the rest of the superheroes are battling it out to save the universe. Was it worth the watch? Sure. However, I don't think I'm going to remember much from this one. It's not that this movie is bad, it's just highly average. Spoiler alert: that's a word I'm going to be using a lot in this review. Average.
After the events of Captain America: Civil War, Scott Lang, played by Paul Rudd, is placed under house arrest. However, after a certain event, he is recontacted by Hope Van Dyne (Evangeline Lilly) and Hank Pym (Michael Douglas) to help them on a special mission to get their mother back. They are after specific technology that other villains are after as well, including businessman Sonny Birch (Walton Goggins) and the quantum realm effected Ghost (Hannah John-Kamen). And during all this, Scott must avoid being caught breaking house arrest.
This is one of the toughest Marvel movies to talk about critically. Why? Because this is one of the most average films in the entire franchise. It doesn't do a lot that's outright bad, even though there are a couple things. However, everything else is so average, that I don't have a lot to talk about.
The acting and characters are fine. Paul Rudd is charming as Scott Lang, although he's pretty much playing himself. I found his character to be entertaining, although not as strong as in the first one. He seemed to be a lot more clueless in this film, when he was portrayed as quite intelligent in the original. He was constantly overshadowed by Hope throughout the entire film. I didn't mind that much, but the fact that Lang's intelligence was brought down a lot bugged me. Evangeline Lilly was good as Hope, Michael Douglas was good as Hank (even though I could tell he was phoning it in a bit), and Michael Pena is always a delight. All the other actors were fine. There's not much to say about them. There's not much to say about any of these characters either. They're not the most interesting characters in the MCU. However, there are a couple characters that I can easily single out, but we'll get to that later.
The story is average. It has entertaining moments, but overall, it's bland, predictable, and forgettable. There wasn't anything that stuck out. I know, this movie wasn't made in the same vein that Infinity War was, but the story still did not leave an impact. The movie felt safe. I found the story of the first Ant Man film to be much more entertaining and interesting. This one didn't have the writing or the story to keep me invested.
The directing is, what a surprise, average. The shot composition is all very basic. There are no camera techniques or angles to make what was displayed on screen interesting. The special effects were fine, but I've seen it all in the original. I would dare say that the effects were better in the first one. The size shifts that are shown throughout the film felt too similar to the original, but with fewer surprises and unique uses of the size changes. It was not used to the fullest of its ability, and many of the action scenes suffered as a result.
All of what I stated was underwhelming, but nothing that I would call outright bad. In my opinion, the only things that I did not like were the villains. Now, the Marvel Cinematic Universe is no stranger to weak villains. In fact, most of the films in the franchise suffer from such a cause. However, Marvel has stepped up their bad guy game in the past few movies. Killmonger was the best part of Black Panther, Vulture was fantastically menacing in Spider-Man: Homecoming thanks to Michael Keaton's performance, and Thanos in Avengers: Infinity War is the most compelling villain that the MCU has ever had. And now we have Ant Man and the Wasp, offering us some of the most forgettable villains in the entire franchise. We have Sonny, played by Walton Goggins, who acts as the stereotypical southern businessman. He has no personality other than bad guy, and he's incredibly boring to watch. And we have Ghost, played by Hannah John-Kamen. She has a backstory that tries to be interesting, but it's executed in such a flat and emotionally vapid way. Plus, her character is bland and not remotely entertaining. I'm not sure if it's the writing or the acting, but Ghost did not do anything for me.
Ant Man and the Wasp is one of the most average movies of the entire franchise. That doesn't mean the movie is outright bad. It is, however, completely forgettable. There were some fun action scenes and the family aspects were nice, but overall, I wasn't impressed with this film. This film is among my least favorite of this franchise, which honestly, is pretty impressive. With a franchise this extensive and having one of the worst being merely okay is a feat that must be recognized. With all that said, I doubt I will remember Ant Man and the Wasp for very long.
Final Score: 5/10 (Average)
Comments