After two epic Marvel movie releases this year, that were heavy on drama, with Black Panther and Avengers: Infinity War, Ant-Man and The Wasp brings us a smaller movie. While it is indeed a smaller film, it also no less important to the Marvel Cinematic Universe and will pave the way into next years Avengers 4.
This will be some spoilers in this review.
Ant-Man and The Wasp picks up a few years after the events of Captain America: Civil War. We learn what Scott Lang (Paul Rudd) has been up during that time. And as Ant-Man's involvement in any of the Marvel films has shown us, Ant-Man is most enjoyable when he is surrounded by others much more capable than he is. The main goal of the film isn't even Ant-Man's but something that he is simply helping with.
The lightheartedness of Ant-Man and The Wasp is the breather we needed after such heavy drama in the last two Marvel films. The humor hits on so many levels whether it is character interaction or even in the action sequences.
We start off in the past as Hank Pym (Michael Douglas) retells the sacrifice his wife Janet van Dyne (Michelle Pfeiffer) makes in a scene we saw in Ant-Man. Hank believes that there is a chance that his wife is still alive since Scott returned from the quantum realm when Hank originally didn't believe that anyone could return from there. Scott is recruited to help get Janet back but he is on house arrest as part of his plea bargain he made for his role in Germany that was a direct violation of the Sokovia Accords.
Randall Park is FBI Agent Jimmy Woo who is trying to keep tabs on Scott while also trying to find Hank and Hope who are fugitives from the law for creating the tech that helped Scott become Ant-Man. Meanwhile Hank and Hope are busy putting together a "quantum tunnel" to find Janet. Here the plot thickens as both black market dealer Sonny Burch (Walton Goggins) and Ghost (Hannh John-Kamen) want the tunnel for their own purposes. Also, Hank's one time colleague, Dr. Bill Foster (Laurence Fishburne) comes into play to help Hank with the tunnel. Plus, Luis (Michael Pena) and the rest of the crew are back for an added level of humor as well.
The men get the majority of the better one-liners here but the women steal the show. Ghost is a stunning and at times terrifying villain, Janet shines in her brief on-screen time and The Wasp shows that she is worthy of being in the title of a Marvel film.
The action is fast and fierce. The sight gags of being able to have people and vehicles change sizes at the most unexpected times will keep you on your toes. The chemistry between Scott and Hope brings us the buddy/romantic comedy genre into the MCU fold. And not like I need to tell you to stay through the credits but one of the two post-credit scenes will leave you counting down the days until you can see Captain Marvel and Avengers 4 next year.
