I will be honest. When this movie was first announced, just like with the first movie, I thought this was a reach by Marvel. Be honest, who really cares about Ant-Man? Even if he is being portrayed by the charming, Paul Rudd. Well, I ended up liking the first movie more than I thought I would. I am happy to report that I liked this movie even more.
There are a number of things I think this movie did better to correct the problems of the first. Most importantly, there is not a mustache twirling villain in this movie. Ghost, who we can say is the main antagonist, is not so much a villain as someone that is in a terrible circumstance. He/She will do anything to correct that. The motivations are crystal clear and he/she is a sympathetic character.
Scott Lang (Paul Rudd) is still a sometimes bumbling Ant-Man, but I think he has more heart in this movie. You can see that reflected in the relationship with his daughter, which is really sweet. He means well, but keeps messing things up when he is trying to do the right thing.
I feel like Hope Van Dyne (Evangeline Lilly) was a lot less ice queenish in this movie than in the last one. She was clearly hurt by Scott Lang's actions in Captain America: Civil War and that relationship is strained at the beginning of this movie. Also, we get to see her do a lot more (action wise) and she is awesome. I love the strong female representation we are seeing in more of the Marvel films. That definitely wasn't there much at the start.
I would be remiss if I didn't mention Michael Pena. If there is one guy that steals the show in each of these movies, it is him. I liked that they didn't give us TOO much of him, otherwise it would be overpowering.
Now that I've talked about the actors I liked, let's get into the movie itself. Like the first movie, it is self contained. It references and is affected by the events of the past couple of Marvel movies, but it lives in it's own space. I have repeatedly said in the past how I like movies like this. Here, Scott Lang is serving out his home arrest due to a plea deal he took as part of his actions in Captain America: Civil War.
There are honest belly laughs in this movie. The premise is handled with the appropriate amount of humor. There is a lot of science going on in this movie, but it doesn't get completely bogged down in it. We don't need to know how the science works. It just does. Move on. Rudd and Pena provide most of that humor, but it also comes from some of the other supporting characters. There are a couple of callbacks with some of the jokes, which I love. I would love nothing more than to give a few examples, but I don't want to spoil it. Well, the one thing I will spoil is you get another Michael Pena narrated flashback in the same manner that you did in the first one. This is a device that is still very funny to me.
I almost forgot that this movie is really about finding Hank Pym's wife, Janet in the "Quantum Realm". I think that search is handled as well as it could be from a plot perspective.
The special effects in this movie were pretty good. I really don't like the de-aging technology a lot of movies are using in flashbacks (they use it here for Michelle Pfeiffer and Michael Douglas). I find it distracting. Just cast younger version of the characters themselves. This is unrelated to the special effects, but I came to the conclusion in this movie that I just don't care for Michael Douglas. At all.
I really don't have anything else I want to say about this movie other than you should go see it. It is a fun and enjoyable film. If Marvel keeps this up, my top ten movies will be in a constant state of flux. You watched all the OTHER Marvel movies, so go watch this one too!
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