Fish and Cherries Productions

Summary: Following the events of Civil War, the current Ant-Man, Scott Lang (Paul Rudd), has been serving house arrest time that’s only livened up by visits from his daughter Cassie (Abby Ryder Fortson) and his friend and business partner Luis (Michael Peña). But he soon finds himself tangled up with Hope Van Dyne (Evangeline Lilly) and her father, the brilliant but bitter scientist and previous Ant-Man, Hank Pym (Michael Douglas). They believe that Scott may have encountered Hope’s long-lost mother Janet (Michelle Pfeiffer) when he went to the Quantum Realm — a strange plain of reality that exists on a sub-atomic level — and they think he can help get her back after 30 years of being trapped there. Nothing is ever simple, though; a strange figure called the Ghost (Hannah John-Kamen), who can move through solid objects, is after Pym with a vengeance to get her hands on the Quantum Tunnel they’re building to send someone to extract Janet. With this threat on their heels, Scott is back as Ant-Man and he’s not alone — Hope Van Dyne is on the scene as the Wasp!

Review: Ant-Man and the Wasp was rip-roaring fun from start to finish. While I’ll admit to missing the heartbreak and pathos found in other MCU films, I’ll never say no to a roller coaster of a time. I can’t even call this a “dumb action movie” — there’s so much creativity on display that you will never look at size changing as a lame power ever again. It truly is a “marvel” of a movie (joke trademarked, do not steal).

I’ll admit to being very harsh in my review of the first Ant-Man movie, which admittedly had a lot going against it, including radical shifts in creative teams partway through and being part of Marvel’s mostly subpar Phase 2. None of my complaints carry over to the sequel which has a unique and compelling villain and also fleshing out Scott’s character as the best dad in the MCU. The chemistry between Rudd and Lilly is stronger too. But the most welcome changes are Luis getting more screen time (complete with the return of a beloved running gag) and Hank Pym himself (Hank Pym-self, if you will) being the most prickly, sarcastic grouch and providing both drama and comedy gold.

The climax manages to one-up the previous movie in every way and as a Bay Area transplant, I love the ways they used San Francisco as the battleground. Ant-Man and Wasp’s size-changing powers combined with Ghost’s intangibility make for great fights throughout the movie, but the final battle really takes the cake. On top of that, the conflict’s resolution is very unique in the MCU and a welcome change to the norm. Frankly, I think that’s spoiler-y enough, so I’ll move on now.

I almost forgot to mention the sub-atomic Quantum Realm, which I just discovered is the movie equivalent of the comics’ Microverse. This movie takes the idea of a microscopic world and makes it both breathtakingly beautiful and terrifying. The colors on display put you in awe, while it and the shifting visual effects make you empathize with whoever’s inside as they go slowly mad. It also gives them a nice excuse to include tardigrades, which I really appreciate. Seriously, if you don’t know what those are, look them up — they’re fascinating creatures.

At the end of the day, the movie’s biggest selling point is that it’s pure, concentrated optimism. In the year of heavy Marvel movies like Black Panther and Infinity War, Ant-Man and the Wasp’s light-heartedness is just what we needed (though there is something that ties it to Infinity War, but I’ll say nothing more). I hope they make another because I need to see more of Scott and Cassie being adorable together, though more Cassie in general would be great. Corny as it is, great things really can come in small packages.

Fun Tidbit: We have two Marvel-DC crossover actors in one movie, folks. In the more recent area, we’ve got Laurence Fishburne, who played Perry White in Man of Steel and Batman v. Superman, playing Bill Foster in this movie (not to mention that he was the Silver Surfer in the Chris Evans Fantastic Four movies), but we’ve also got a veteran in Michelle Pfeiffer who plays Janet Van Dyne here, but famously played our favorite feline femme fatale Catwoman in Batman Returns. Hey, Marvel and DC, it’s not too late to rebuild bridges and cross your cinematic universes over. Just think of all the in-jokes you could make!