Random Thoughts About Ant-Man And The Wasp: Quantumania
So the big story last week was the critics on Rotten Tomatoes absolutely annihilating Ant-Man And The Wasp: Quantumania
Now usually I wouldn't care what some stuffy movie critic in his three piece suit had to say about a movie (likely while smoking a fancy pipe) since the audience reviews are a much better gauge of how my dumbass is going to enjoy a movie. But Robbie Fox and I were lucky enough to get a sneak peek earlier this week at the screener.
I don't know if we got critic brain from seeing the movie early, I was grumpy that I didn't have time to get popcorn, or the movie simply wasn't that good, but I agreed with a good chunk of what the critics had to say (To be honest, the popcorn stuff is probably a huge factor as you can tell by looking at me once). The movie came out on Thursday and audience reviews have been better clocking in at 84%, with my score somewhere in the middle around a 68 or so.
I didn't mind that it wasn't a typical Ant-Man movie full of action and light-hearted humor. I also didn't mind that it wasn't an epic Marvel movie that would setup the next MCU phase, even if we were kinda led to believe that would be the case.
What I did mind was the good chunk of the movie that felt like it was in the Star Wars galaxy. Not just alien looking creatures, larger than life outfits, and really weird drinks.
:shudder:
But that entire galaxy felt like the Star Wars universe, with some parts seemingly caked in space dust along with the always present group of rebels, even though I think this group of Quantum Realm rebels is much closer to the sequel trilogy rebels than the GOATs of Luke, Leia, Han, and Chewie.
In fact, I wouldn't be surprised in the least if word comes out that Mickey Mouse spilled some water on an unreleased Star Wars script that was sitting on top of the Ant-Man 3 script, which led to a good chunk of Quantumania.
- I understand why Luis wasn't in this movie, but damn his little Luis recap of everything that happened would've led to the biggest laugh of the movie, even if it happened in a post-credits scene since Luis dropping tales on us like Aesop were always some of the best parts of Ant-Man movies.
- Quantumania definitely had its highlights. Jonathan Majors did a great job making Big Daddy Kang look like he is going to be a great next Final Boss in the MCU (RIP my dog THANOSE), even if this iteration of Kang did get washed by an ant farm and a B-Tier Avenger since he didn’t have all his fancy toys. This may be the Big Purple fan in me talking, but the fact remains that...
Thanos was taken down by the greatest collection of heroes on Earth:
While Kang was taken down by a smarter version of this:
- I am choosing to believe that Exiled Kang was without a good chunk of his powers without his tech being fully operational, even though it felt weird he was force choking motherfuckers in the beginning and getting beaten up by Ant-Man at the end. Regardless, I'll chalk all this up to us getting a Rookie level Kang for his first movie.
- I liked the Janet storylines, even if seeing Hank Pym's heart break as he found out his wife got freaky with Bill Murray and what I imagine was an orgy worth of aliens was hard to watch. I'm not talking old, weirdo, shows up at random sporting events Bill Murray either. I'm talking younger, in his prime, suave as fuck Peter Venkman Bill Murray.
I imagine this is how a lot of nights ended in the Quantum realm for Janet and a bunch all the other freaks at the Casa de Krylar.
- I didn't love a lot of the Cassie stuff, which felt a bit forced and rushed from the suit to her using the powers to Kang's guards having absolutely no answer for her.
- For someone who is in the goddamn title of the movie, we sure as shit didn't get a lot of Wasp, which was very weird. She did have a big moment coming back for Scott which landed.
- We did get a lot of Paul Rudd, his dreamy eyes, and his sense of dread when he treats Kang's warning like someone trying to remember if they left the oven on.
The whole "Missing time with his daughter" was a key part of the movie even though they really didn't hammer on it at all due to the blip or his time missed in jail, which I thought was weird.
- MODOK was as weird as fuck, just as any character that looks like this will be in a live action movie.
I liked the twist that he was Darren along with Darren realizing he was a giant dick. But it still felt like he was more a cameo and a joke than an actual Mechanized Organism Designed Only for Killing that couldn't even hurt let alone kill a kid.
- The trailers ended up giving away a tonnnnn of the movie, which remains weird to me. I would ignore them if I didn't get paid to talk about them. Hopefully Marvel tightens that up in the near future.
- Of course, as is the case with a lot of MCU movies, the mid and post credits scenes did as good a job hyping things up than Travis Kelce yelling about a 1-seed team being disrespected after a Chiefs playoffs win. We are going to have Jose Youngs in the basement with us this week to explain all things Kang about all the Kangs. Or at least as much as my pedestrian brain can handle.
- I am still genuinely excited for Kang Dynasty, Loki Season 2, and whatever other shit Kevin Feige has up his sleeves since it's #TrustTheFeige forever. But I do have a tinyyyyyyyvoice in the back of my head that's a little nervous about this phase just based on how we were introduced to it.
- As for the MCU, I have a feeling James Gunn will save the day like he always does with Guardians 3, which I would bet my life will be the best Marvel movie of the year.
Robbie and I broke down everything we liked, hated, and felt indifferent about on this week's My Mom's Basement in much more detail than this poorly written blog so check it out here and let us know what you think about it in the comments.