Ant-Man et la Guêpe: Quantumania

No wonder all those "creative" people in so called creative businesses and crafts are afraid of AI - no doubt, in the not too distant future, AI will do the work - cheaper and better than humans can do. At least if Ant-Man and the Wasp: Quantumania and such movies (and books, comics, whatever, quantity beats quality these days - in all fields) are the best human mind can come up with. The first Ant-Man movie was a nice one, the second one was okay, but if you take away all the (finally by computer generated) visuals and effects, there is maybe enough story left in this third chapter to employ two or maybe three and a half brain cells of the viewer. The rest of the neural network goes quickly into stand by and sleep mode. I like the production and a few scenes, this is the only reason why this one does not crash totally. But in the end, this is at best mediocre and sometimes even really bad.

Visually quite stunning with delightful and creative designs, shapes, and forms while the storyline is less than original without much in the way of intellectual or emotional, ethical depth of other recent Marvel movies. Apparently this movie was focused on being acceptable to a broad audience range, including young people, Quantumania loses some of its sharp refreshing focus. The created living entities of the quantum universe are more anthropomorphic (human-based) perhaps to be more relatable to children does not reflect the diversity or original forms of life or new-life that would really make this film stellar. As even as special as the set designs and special effects make for a gorgeous setting, there is still room for more crisp, detailed and immersive design work. Some backgrounds end up being mere basic animation projections that do not come up to the level expected of contemporary Marvel productions. Yes, this movie provides an amazing backdrop or canvas and yet the substance and plot of the movie does not rise to the same level. What one ends up with is a movie with a lot of flash but less than satisfactory bite.

Marvel really has fallen and it can't get up. This is the third legacy character that they've absolutely wasted. In fact, for Doctor Strange, Thor and Ant-Man they not only wasted great established characters but superb casts. Add that they made Kang, the main villain out to be a chump and it appears Marvel has no plan moving forward. Not Kiang the conqueror but Kang the chump.

This movie adds to the malaise of poorly written disappointments that is permeated the MCU since Endgame. With one of the worst third acts of any movie in recent history. MODOK use and "dick" turn could be the dumbest thing I've ever seen and that's not even a spoiler. He also ended the movie as if they ran out of budget. What an absolute waste.

New Ant-Man is not a bad movie, but it's repeating current trend that been plaguing new Marvel productions. Main character is just an excuse to introduce few new characters that are definitely going to have their own stories. That makes Paul Rudd's character less important. You don't feel that this is his story. He is just there. And the story is not even that good. You can feel the lack of great characters from previous movies. They were setting the tone of story and we don't even know what happened to them after previous movie. It's hard to believe that the director is the same person who made two prior movies. Adding Kang definitely made this into Kang movie that have Ant-Man in it.

I enjoyed watching Quantumania. It's a mostly solid and fairly entertaining movie. But relative to MCU standards, it's a bit underwhelming and feels like more of a throwaway movie than something memorable I will keep coming back to.

My biggest issue is that I wasn't fully engaged for at least the first half of the movie. I was enjoying it but I wasn't locked in. The story was unfocussed. When the villain becomes prevalent, the movie jumps a level. But it doesn't completely make up for the much weaker first half.

The other thing that surprised me was not being mesmerized by the visuals. It's very creative and I didn't notice poor CGI like some others. But it didn't wow me like it frequently does. Maybe we're just getting spoiled with the visuals in movies like Doctor Strange 2 and more recently Avatar 2.

There is still a lot of good here. It's pretty funny but doesn't overdo it. This is the second movie in a row where the MCU seems to have dialed back on the "insert joke here" strategy. It's probably a result of the negative reaction from the cartoonish Thor 4. Also, I love the villain. I won't say who in case you're smart (and crazy) like me and don't watch trailers. But he's so damn awesome.

As someone who loves almost everything in the MCU, Quantumania is near the bottom of my MCU rankings. And it's making me a little nervous that it comes only two movies after Thor 4 which is below it (5 stars). But I still have faith and am not joining the MCU doom and gloom crowd. Phase 4 has three of my favorite entries in the entire MCU (Shang-Chi, Loki S01, No Way Home) and I only disliked two (Eternals, Thor 4). They just need to be more consistent while also not playing it so safe.

(3 viewings, opening Thursday IMAX 2/16/2023, IMAX 2/28/2023, 10/5/2023)