Ant-Man & The Wasp: Quantumania - I want my two hours back.
Ant Man and the Wasp: Quantumania is the latest MSheU movie and is supposed to be the official kick off of Phase five. Full disclosure, I had entirely no desire to watch this movie. Although I generally like the genre of superhero movies, and enjoyed comic books as a kid before they were totally woke…comics in the 80’s were about as cool as action movies in 80’s.
I thought the first few waves of Marvel movies were a ton fun, and although there were a few in the bunch that sucked between Iron Man and Endgame – for the most part, I liked them, and I really appreciated the bigger vision of bringing all of these films together…and I think they did a pretty good job of developing a character arch, for at least the big three: Iron Man, Thor and Captain America, though they crapped all over Thor in Love and Thunder.
All that to say, the Spirit left Marvel a long time ago…Anything that was fun about Marvel
movies or the Marvel brand has been crapped all over by leftist ideology, and because of that they have completely forgotten how to tell simple story, or develop a character, that anyone would care about that has any moral dilemma or has to overcome any adversity other than being a woman in a “male-dominated” world while being absolutely better at everything than a man…
Almost everything Marvel has put out recently with the exception of No Way Home has been embarrassingly bad…like I rolled the dice on a fart in public and it came out like Love & Thunder bad! – there is no escaping it, or blame shifting on that – it was loud and it stinks.
So, I was not excited to see another “Ant Man” adventure, suspecting it to be another pile of garbage, and I was not disappointed. As a watched the film, I couldn’t think of one good reason why this film exists. Other than to try and set up Kang as the new bad guy.
The movie starts with Ant Man, who is now a celebrity because he saved the world in Endgame, and he is an Avenger and stuff – he has written a book about his life and is pretty much coasting on his celebrity while the women in his life actually do meaningful work – like the Wasp running her father’s company and saving the world by feeding the hungry and fighting climate change…and his daughter (who is apparently a genius – creating the thing that brought them to the quantum realm in her garage…and now, also, an ant-person)
She is also busy saving the world, by shrinking cop cars and defending the homeless – who are good people and only homeless because rent is so high. Ant Man is just enjoying his life – how this little guy went from being an ex-con to being an Avenger…basically he is just enjoying his privilege: because he is white and a man, while the super-competent women in his life who are smarter and stronger than he is do all the meaningful work.
And then they go to the Quantum Realm and come back and that’s basically the
movie…Actually the vast majority of the movie takes place in the Quantum Realm but the whole thing just seems completely out of place. It feels like they just threw Ant Man in a bad Stars Wars spin off show…The scale doesn’t fit. Ant Man was this blue-collar, kinda everyday day, normal guy – in the first two movies which are local and the threats are smaller, which fits the character…but then you put him in this massive alternative universe in the Quantum realm where he is the lead and just doesn’t fit.
Not only that…the whole quantum realm doesn’t make any sense within this universe…as far as Michele Phiefer’s time there, for thirty years and Ant Man’s time previously spent there at the end of Ant Man 2 and Endgame…It’s just stupid and inconsistent, which could maybe, be over looked…if they did a really good job developing the world of the quantum realm (which just, by the way, sounds like a bad sci-fi movie from 1988), but they didn’t.
You have generic CGI good guys and generic – literally faceless CGI bad guys, with the
exception of MODOK who is literally a giant CGI face and is there only for comic relief - The dialogue sucks, all the jokes fall flat, there are no character arches at all, and none of the main characters are ever really threatened.
The only character that was cool was Kang, who I guess is supposed to be the new big bad guy like Thanos – However, I found myself routing for him the whole time – but even he feels completely out of place in this movie. Not only that, he loses at the end of the movie to Ant Man – literally the smallest superhero…really to the Wasp who saves Ant Man…how big of a threat can this guy actually be?…
That’s basically it…after they kinda destroy the magically muguffin they transport themselves back to the normal realm…which, apparently they can just do now. The movie ends right where it began…With Ant Man walking through the streets of gay San Francisco enjoying his privilege.
Man Test
So, does this movie pass the man test? That is, can I tell my man friends that I watched this movie without feeling gay? Answer: NO
Christian Worldview
What about worldview? As a Christian, is there anything redeeming in this film? Nope not all. As far as a social commentary, it’s basically everything that you’ve come to expect from a Marvel movie – all the men are second rate to the women…even in the leader of the resistance in the quantum realm was a woman…even though she was all juiced up and looks like strong woman Heather she is still a woman.
Marvel has to make sure that women are always in the lead, and then, there was the completely awkward and outplace statements about the merits of socialism, and the police and the homeless and so on, not to mention all the PRIDE propaganda in every shop in San Francisco.
There are no redemptive themes in this movie whatsoever…no character arches, weak male leadership, no fall from grace, no redemption, no sacrificial love, no real justice or punishment for the evil doer, coupled with weak, stupid and out of place political and social commentary…not to mention the absurdity of the quantum realm in general. The whole thing was stupid and pointless and I want my two hours back.
Overall I give this movie a D-. Marvel should repent in sackcloth and ashes, not just for this movie but also for being generally awful and destroying everything good the previous generation accomplished – which is a pretty good social commentary in-and-of-itself.
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