Ant-Man and the Wasp (2018) [Blu-ray]
Action | Adventure | Sci-Fi

Tagline: Real heroes. Not actual size.

As Scott Lang balances being both a Super Hero and a father, Hope van Dyne and Dr. Hank Pym present an urgent new mission that finds the Ant-Man fighting alongside The Wasp to uncover secrets from their past.

From the Marvel Cinematic Universe comes a new chapter featuring heroes with the astonishing ability to shrink: "Ant-Man and The Wasp." In the aftermath of "Captain America: Civil War," Scott Lang (Rudd) grapples with the consequences of his choices as both a Super Hero and a father. As he struggles to rebalance his home life with his responsibilities as Ant-Man, he's confronted by Hope van Dyne (Lilly) and Dr. Hank Pym (Douglas) with an urgent new mission. Scott must once again put on the suit and learn to fight alongside The Wasp as the team works together to uncover secrets from their past.

Storyline: In the aftermath of Captain America: Civil War (2016), Scott Lang grapples with the consequences of his choices as both a superhero and a father. As he struggles to rebalance his home life with his responsibilities as Ant-Man, he's confronted by Hope van Dyne and Dr. Hank Pym with an urgent new mission. Scott must once again put on the suit and learn to fight alongside The Wasp as the team works together to uncover secrets from their past. Written by Walt Disney Studios

Reviewer's Note: Reviewed by Jeffrey Kauffman, October 15, 2018 Whether you like your superhero movies dark and angsty a la Batman Begins or on the cheeky, humorous side a la Deadpool will probably determine how you respond to Ant-Man and The Wasp. This follow up to 2015's Ant-Man may make passing attempts to generate "meaningful" content about the importance of family, but at its core (thorax?), Ant-Man and The Wasp is just good old fashioned hokum (a technical term), in its own way as silly and even ludicrous as Them!, the "giant ant" escapade from 1954 that Ant-Man and The Wasp overtly references for a nice reveal very late in this film. Ant-Man and The Wasp is definitely on the Deadpool end of the spectrum alluded to above, even if it's nowhere near as raucous or even scabrous as the Ryan Reynolds enterprises have been. Instead, there's a kind of genial, shaggy dog charm running through the film that manages to travel surprisingly far on the kind of unaffected charisma of stars Paul Rudd, as Scott Lang, and Evangeline Lilly, as Hope van Dyne. Kind of interestingly, a lot of the emotional component in Ant-Man and The Wasp actually involves Hope's father, Hank Pym (Michael Douglas), and Hope's mother, Janet van Dyne (Michelle Pfeiffer). The film gives a little history of Hank and Janet, detailing their adventures as (more or less) Ant-Man and The Wasp, but also providing the "McGuffin" of this film, namely that Janet has sacrificed herself to the so-called "quantum realm" by going small enough to get inside a (nuclear tipped?) missile in order to defuse it. Hank reveals to Hope that he feels there's a good chance that Janet might still be alive "down there", and he's been working on a technology to provide a portal to the quantum realm in order to retrieve her. Meanwhile, Scott is dealing with a house arrest after the events of Captain America: Civil War, using the time to bond with his adorable daughter Cassie (Abby Ryder Fortson).

In just one of many patently goofy "pseudo-science" moments in the film, when Hank and Hope briefly open their portal to the quantum realm, a kind of psychic connection between Scott and Janet is activated, since (as Michael Douglas is able to say with a straight face) Scott and Janet have become "quantumly entangled" when Scott "visited" the quantum realm. Completely predictably, Scott ultimately joins forces with Hope and Hank on their quest to retrieve Janet, but just as predictably the horde of screenwriters assigned to this sequel set up a whole host of obstacles before that goal can be obtained.

Some of these are "earthbound", with one running gag being the frequent check-ins by FBI Agent and Lang parole officer Jimmy Woo (Randall Park) to make sure Lang is obeying his house arrest (which of course he isn't). The more serious hazard appears (intermittently anyway, and that's a joke for those who have seen the film) to be a character named Ghost (Hannah Johnson-Kamen), a girl with a past of course inextricably bound up with Hank and his research. A number of other sidebars also accrue, including a nice turn by Walton Goggins as Sonny Burch, a kind of bumbling crook who is out to get his hands on Hank's technology. Laurence Fishburne is also on hand as Bill Foster, an old cohort of Hank's from the S.H.I.E.L.D. days, but a character who is forced (due to some kind of sloppy screenwriting) to be both a villain and a hero at the virtual drop of various hats.

The emotional quotient of the film is chiefly one of families finding their footing. While the most notable example is of course Hank trying to find his long lost wife (guess how that one works out), there's also at least some attempt to make Scott's life as a divorced father bear some fruit, and a couple of his scenes with Cassie are very nicely done. There's also the obvious romantic subtext of a developing (or redeveloping, as the case may be) relationship between Scott and Hope, though this element is often played for comedy, with a sweetly bantering ambience between the two characters.

The film is awash in sometimes very funny special effects. Some of these have to do with a malfunctioning suit that Hank provides to Scott, which often leaves him in "Alice in Wonderland territory", often either too small or too big for whatever environment he finds himself in. A couple of outrageous sight gags are built out of this plot point. The more "serious" special effects are often quite well done as well, including Ghost's abilities to pass through solid objects, and the fun "enlarging" and "miniaturizing" of various objects courtesy of Hank's handy dandy remote. The portal to the quantum realm comes dangerously close to aping the old television series The Time Tunnel and Hank's journey to the quantum realm plays like a kind of hallucinatory mishmash of Fantastic Voyage and the already psychedlic climax of 2001: A Space Odyssey.

The Marvel Cinematic Universe is an increasingly crowded place, and it's kind of refreshing in a way that jokier enterprises like the still relatively nascent Deadpool and Ant-Man franchises are finding considerable audience support. There's nothing really very "new" or "innovative" about Ant-Man and The Wasp, but at the same time the film has absolutely zero pretensions about what it wants to be and what it aims to deliver. The film coasts a considerable distance on the combined charisma of Rudd and Lilly, and it's really wonderful to see Douglas and Pfeiffer in appealing performances as well. Technical merits are first rate, and Ant-Man and The Wasp comes Recommended.

[CSW] -3.7- The basic plot setup is actually quite simple - what gets complicated is the huge assortment of different groups and individuals trying to foil the plan (and Scott's old jail chums, who try to help, but can just as often screw things up). These constantly varied antagonists add up to a very funny non-stop pursuit of our heroes. All of the cast members are top-flight and delicious. And this is one you can take your grandmother to without worrying - Everything is in amazingly good taste for a super-hero movie! Light-hearted (well, except for Ghost), and as full of treats as a piņata!
[V4.5-A5.0] MPEG-4 AVC - D-Box really enhanced this movie.


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