Sci-fi/Action/Adventure

ANT-MAN AND THE WASP

CAST: Paul Rudd, Evangeline Lilly, Michael Douglas, Michael Pena

DIRECTION: Peyton Reed

3 stars

 

 

‘Ant-Man and the Wasp’ contin­ues the chronicles of Marvel’s lightweight and insect-sized superhero Ant-Man. In this edition we see Scott Lang (Paul Rudd) wear­ing his Ant-Man suit that enables him to both shrink and supersize, to pass through cracks and tricky spaces to help his mentor Hank Pym (Michael Douglas) and Hank’s daughter Hope aka The Wasp (Evan­geline Lilly) in their quest to bring back Hank’s wife (Michelle Pfeiffer) who has been trapped in a different quantum reality for 30 years. 2015’s ‘Ant-Man’ went through many production hiccups that, among others, saw director Edgar Wright walk out before shooting even began. Wright was replaced by Peyton Reed. But Reed and lead actor Paul Rudd were able to prove the skeptics wrong through an enter­taining movie with a funny and lik­able underdog super-hero. Three years later, Reed and Rudd try to replicate the same magic. Amid the large universe-saving exploits of the rest of the Avengers, the Ant-Man saga is yet again strung together with a scaled down personal adventures. And the results are mixed this time. We get knocked out by the amazing and smart fight scenes and snappy dialogues but the science-heavy story feels messy and crisscrosses at lightning speed between parallel sub-plots.

At one point of the movie, Hank and Hope have a jargoned discus­sion about quantum dimensions, and a perplexed Scott asks, “Do you guys put ‘quantum’ in everything?” This is a question that many audi­ence members would constantly ask while watching ‘Ant-Man and the Wasp’.

Speaking of the villains, the movie has one evil-minded businessman Sonny Burch, played with effort­less sleaze and a cowboy drawl by actor Walton Goggins. Burch is after Hank’s high-tech science lab that can be easily shrunk into a rolling suit­case. Bruch wants to get his hands on the lab to strengthen his weapon business. Meanwhile a mysterious super-villain Ghost (Hannah John-Kamen) is also after Hank’s lab for her own needs. Burch and Ghost create hurdles for Ant-Man and his team in their plan to safely rescue Hank’s wife.

When the story’s not spinning your head with long chatty scenes about ‘quantum’ stuff, the support­ing characters draw you in with their hilarious gags. In particular, Michael Pena as Scott’s expendable buddy and Abby Ryder Fortson as Scott’s feisty pre-teen daughter get to shine. But the show belongs to the 49-year-old funnyman Paul Rudd, who appears to be in his mid-30s in the movie. Unlike, say, Deadpool’s caustic sarcasm, Rudd’s Ant-Man benefits from the humor that ema­nates from his Average Joe likability and humanistic views. His scenes with his on-screen daughter are the film’s most poised and heartfelt ones, which in turn make up for his slack chemistry with Evangeline Lilly’s Hope.

Their performances nearly iron out the narrative excess of ‘Ant-Man and the Wasp’. It’s definitely a good outing at the big screen but I wouldn’t stress that this movie shouldn’t be missed.

 

Who should watch it?

Even without cameos from other superheroes from the Marvel Cinematic Universe, loyal Marvel fans would derive a lot of pleasure from Ant-Man this time as well. As for those who prefer large scale adventure like the ‘Avengers: Infinity War’, they might be a little disappointed by the grounded approach of ‘Ant-Man and the Wasp’.