The latest chapter in the Marvel/Avengers cinematic world is of one of the lesser known characters, Ant-Man. Well a household name to the general public to us comic book geeks we know that the original Ant-Man was a founding member of the Avengers team and also one of its most tragic members at well.
While I love all things Marvel when it comes to movies I like my wife will go in with lesser expectations (for her its zero as she thought it was a joke when she heard the title) but I feel that this movie will surprise a lot of people including myself. If you remember back in 2008 people were poo pooing Iron Man and look what happened. All that said I don't think this will be as good as a Captain America movie or the Guardians of the Galaxy flick but I hope it's better than the Hulk films.
Highlights :
- Paul Rudd as Ant-Man brings the same perfect casting as all the other Marvel heroes to have graced the screen,
- Michael Douglas as Hank Pym aka the original Ant-Man
- Ant-Man and his little pocket of the Marvel Universe fits right in with everything else that is going on.
- Easter eggs for the comic and movie geeks alike.
- Corey Stoll as the main villain Yellowjacket just didn't do it for me. Something seemed "missing" from his performance.
- This being an origin movie the 1st 45 minutes or so of set up dragged in places.
Like all 1st appearance of Marvel characters in their cinematic universe Ant-Man had to have his origin story told with multiple people to dawn the mask in comic books they easily not just told one origin but two. One for Hank Pym and another for Scott Lang.
Like most of the actors to portray one of the Marvel characters Paul was the perfect choice for Ant-Man as he brought the perfect every man essence with a hint of trouble to the screen. He like all of us is not a perfect person but is trying to be a better man for his daughter who still sees him as a "superhero". His "entourage" are the perfect foils to his semi-seriousness with Michael Pena being the funniest. Even though Ant-Man is not yet an Avengers (he is one in the books) he tangles with one in this film and walks away leaving quite an impression
Yellowjacket is the big baddie and was always one of my favorite characters in the comic books. For those that don't know Hank Pym becomes Yellowjacket in the books but that is not the case here as Yellowjacket happens to be the successor to Hank's business once he was voted out years earlier. Obviously some grudges do not fade away and that is the case here as Yellowjacket is not Hank's pride and joy and must somehow avenge a wrongdoing in his eye.
Typical of the Marvel universe this is but one chapter in Ant-Man's storyline as this sets up his future appearances in the next Captain America movie along with the Avengers 3. I enjoyed this movie more than I expected to and when it comes to ranking all the singular films I would have Iron Man and Cap as the top dogs Ant-Man next with Thor and Hulk way back behind them.
Final Grade : Solid B+
Thank you for reading and have a blessed day.
-Penguin
As a comic book kid also, I've learned to set everything aside when I go into a Marvel movie, otherwise I spend too much time trying to pick out what isn't from the actual books. Once I learned to do that, I've loved pretty much every film. That being said, I was super happy to learn that Marvel was going to run with the Scott Lang character rather than Hank Pym. I always thought Pym was a real pansy that didn't have the heart or guts to be a superhero. Much to my surprise, Michael Douglas played up to that opinion perfectly. All said, I loved it.
ReplyDeleteAll great points as Hank is a class A dick beating up on his wife in the books but at the same time I liked him as YJ and his tragic story at the time and really wasn't a fan of his when he was Giant Man or Ant Man or even worse just plain ole Hank Pym. Remember back in his West Coast Avengers aka Wackos days when he wanted to commit suicide? Ugh, hated that period. Again, like you said, push all that away and it was pleasantly a very good movie. Looking forward to Cap 3 and seeing what they will do with Black Panther
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