*Warning contains spoilers.
Ever wondered what the world would look like from the view of an Ant?
Fifty-foot high blades of grass, tornado vacuum cleaners to water pipe rivers. Marvel’s newest movie in their cinematic universe Ant-Man, allows you to venture into an exciting macro environment.
Ant-Man revolves around Hank Pym and his revolutionary Pym Particles, which allows a subject to decrease or increase in size. Played my Michael Douglas, Pym is the original Ant-Man. Devastated over losing his wife Janet Van Dyne, the Wasp whilst on a mission, Pym decides to hide his identity as Ant-Man and the technology away from the world fearing it would only bring destruction.
True to superhero movies, there is a main antagonist in the film. This is Darren Cross (played by Corey Stoll) a protégé to Pym for many years, he is suspicious of the rumors behind Ant-Man’s existence and identity and works tirelessly to seek him out and create the same technology. Pym’s daughter Hope played by Evangeline Lilly, now aligned back with her father after a tenuous relationship is working from the inside to help bring down Cross, so that the technology her father created does not fall into the wrong hands.
Enter Paul Rudd as Scott Lang. If you are familiar with the Marvel comics, Lang is the 2nd generation of Ant-Man, following Hank Pym (there is actually a 3rd Ant-Man who in the comics is Eric O’Grady).
The movie introduces Lang, a recently freed criminal from incarceration and he is on the road to redemption. With a failed relationship and daughter who he doesn’t have proper visitation right for, he is determined to get his life back on track – until he meets Pym.
I am an avid Marvel fan, so whenever the comics are adapted to film, there is a hope and excitement that the characters will be bought to life in the most epic way and as true to comics as much as possible. I went in to Ant-Man with a reservation. I mean how could you fair against Captain America, the Guardians, Iron Man or Thor as the main character in a solo movie. These movies are amazing and to be ranked among them was going to be hard.
When the last after-credit scene rolled (every Marvel fan knows to stay right till the end) I was blown away, I absolutely loved it, but for other reasons rather than why I usually love Marvel movies.
- This movie starts small but grows to be large – ironic?!
- It wasn’t about all explosions and fast-paced action sequences. Whilst I usually like these, it was nice to have a slower build.
- Paul Rudd – I never saw him as that great of an actor. I certainly never saw him as a superhero. However he seemed to carry the dialogue and action when not in the suit well and bought comedy (something Marvel loves to do) to this movie.
- Continuity – we all know the Marvel universe is connected, but this film saw so many references, from characters (Howard Stark, Peggy Carter, Falcon) to buildings (Avenger HQ) and teams (Avengers and S.H.I.E.L.D). This is just another way that Marvel intertwines things, whether subtlety or obviously.
- Macro-environment – This was a whole new perspective. Where all the other Marvel movies relied on large scale galaxies, cities, weapons and powers to create the story, Ant-Man relied on a much smaller scale. It was awesome.
The thing one has to realise when you are faced with a comic book character adaption, whether it is to TV or to film, is that there is a fine line between being true to the character vs not going overboard and making them unrealistic and fake. This will ultimately turn the viewer off and the movie would not garner any success – Green Lantern with Ryan Reynolds is a perfect example.
Ant-Man in my opinion is a winner. It may not have the grandeur that a lot of the other Marvel movies have, but it certainly has shone a spotlight on a character that may be small in size but is huge in the Marvel Universe.
I look forward to seeing Ant-Man again!
Ranter & Banter 