Ant-Man 2015

Fun movie!

As a comic book fan (and long-time reader/collector), I appreciated the nods to the comic version of the character, but like they did with all the other Marvel Cinematic Universe characters who've appeared on screen so far, the story is original and I think it can be followed and enjoyed by those who know nothing about Ant-Man before the movie starts.

I won't post any spoilers, but I will say I was satisfied how this character fits into the rest of the MCU and really enjoyed the special effects. The filmmakers did a good job of poking fun at some of the ridiculousness of tiny people fighting each other without it actually detracting from the story. The movie keeps a real sense of humor, which is one of the things I enjoy most about the Marvel movies. I'm interested to see how and what role Ant-Man will play in "Captain America: Civil War" next year.

Paul Rudd does a great job and is actually believable as a title character in an action film, (he's really come a long way from Clueless, huh?) and I love that bigger-name actors like Michael Douglas are all getting on board with these superhero movies. Evangeline Lilly, who already proved she can do action with the "Hobbit" movies, gets to kick some butt in this movie as well. I don't know anything about Corey Stoll, but he makes a pretty good bad guy.

Marvel seems to have figured out how to handle movies like this (ones where most of the mainstream audience knows little-to-nothing about the character.) Put them after most, if not all, the HUGE blockbuster movies of summer, but make them so fun that word-of-mouth will get people to come out. It worked with Guardians of the Galaxy last year, and I think it'll work with Ant-Man this year. For what it's worth, I liked Ant-Man better. I'd give this movie 3 out of 4 stars.

I'm clearly in the minority. It's really not the great shakes people are making it out to be. Not a patch on Guardians of the Galaxy (which it was compared to here in comments), not even close, at all. In fact its barely comparable to most of the Marvel films. It feels small in scope (absolutely no pun intended, not worth the effort) and more like an addendum to the MCU if anything. The off hand mention of the Avengers and the shoe horning of Falcon in a few scenes are the only real thing that made it part of the MCU. It could have stood completely alone with practically no effort and still been an ok film. Which is exactly how it started out so many years ago. That doesn't come from a longing of what could have been of Edgar Wrights film, I had no real interest in that either. If it wasn't for the post credits scene I'd have completely forgotten it was going to be furthered in the MCU and without the forced line (probably an additional shoot) "I know a guy" there was no reason for it to be the thing to promoted Captain America Civil War. It just followed suit of what had come before it.

It has some chuckles but certainly not "sore from laughing" nor full of "Non-stop wit"

I'm not sure what has made it "Marvel's most clever and ambitiously successful film". It was a very thin heist film with a simple hook.

The cast are serviceable yet could almost entirely be recast. Michael Pena hits the mark just by doing his thing which is almost just a young Luis Guzman.

It was fun, but nothing I'm clambering to see again.

Anything that reminds me of Richard Matheson's "The Incredible Shrinking Man" and stars Evangeline Lilly is pretty much gonna be a winner with me.

"Ant-Man" was a funny movie. I laughed plenty and often. Many cast members got into the comedy act. It wasn't just Paul Rudd or Michael Pena. Michael Douglas was a great Hank Pym, a complex character with skeletons in his closet and some well hidden emotional scars. But, like every other character, he was a source of many laughs.

There were also plenty of thrills and some great uses of 3D. More than any other recent 3D release than I can remember. When Ant-Man was ant-sized, the 3D really popped. I think it was because things in the background were over sized and slightly blurred. I also need to call out how much I liked the different types of ants and how cool they were used in the movie. The scene with Ant-Man fighting Yellowjacket on the train set was a highlight, too.

Even though this was a blast overall, "Ant-Man" featured a weak, uninteresting villain and had some story beats, like Scott Lang's daughter, that seemed forced and overly sentimental.

I'm hearing "Ant-Man" being compared to "Guardians of the Galaxy" and that's fair to a point. Both movies feature quirky, wise-cracking characters. It's not quite as un-"Marvel" as GotG was, but it's still not as cookie-cutter as the other Marvel Universe flicks.

Film 172 of 2024:

MCU (Film) Ranking (incl. Special Presentations): 28 of 35

It's crazy to see how much my rating has gradually dropped from a 4 star film upon initial viewing to eventually land as of today, on 3 stars. Granted, I think as I do this MCU rewatch on the way to Secret Wars - many of the films I once had a 3.5 stars will find their rating dropping. This doesn't bode well for the Phase 4 films.

It's not that Ant-Man is overly bad, especially in comparison to Ant-Man and the Wasp: Quantumania. It just feels standard. The strength of the Ant-Man film really is in it's lead 3 actors. Paul Rudd, Michael Douglas and Evangeline Lilly have great chemistry; it's thanks to them that the film is enjoyable. They're surrounded by a strong cast.

Ultimately Ant-Man falls due to it's inability to add any real stakes. Corey Stoll is an okay villain but even when he's aware of what's going on, there's never any real threat behind his actions. In Yellowjacket, we see another villain that is a mirror image of the hero - a trait that would become more frequent in the MCU.

Ultimately while Ant-Man is a decent film, within the larger Marvel Universe it's the first film in what would become the most forgettable trilogy.

An entertaining movie that’s better than the sequel with a better villain. Even if Corey Stoll is like Jeff Bridges’ villain in Iron Man. Butt hurt that his business partner or in this case former mentor won’t tell him his secrets of how he made a shrinking suit “or Iron Man suit in Bridges’ case.”
Is even bald like Bridges’ in Iron Man, just missing the goatee lol. Stoll is still an under-rated villain since he makes you want to punch him throughout.
While Paul Rudd’s casting works since he is his usual witty self but an action hero version. There was bitching that Hank Pym (Michael Douglas) wasn’t hero. He was an older, past Ant-Man instead.
As someone who doesn’t know much about Ant-Man comics, I think it works due to Rudd either way. Douglas is also fun as the past Ant-Man who recruits him. So I wouldn’t really want it to have been done any other way.
Bobby Cannavale is also perfectly annoying as his daughter’s cop stepdad. Who is pretty much waiting for him to mess up as an excuse to keep him away from his kid.
Evangeline Lilly is also good as Douglas’ daughter who is mad he won’t let her take over as an Ant hero instead of Scott. She also wants more answers from him on what happened to her Mother.
Michael Peña supplies the laughs more than Rudd as his crook friend. Who is trying to get him to steal again. By telling him a long winded story about a job her has for him.

I think this is the darkhorse movie of the MCU, because this film is so much better than what people thought it was gonna be and I still feel that it is a little bit underappreciated. Let's start off with Paul Rudd (Ant-Man), this is absolutely perfect casting as he brings his humour to the role but at the same time he builds the character to be a very likeable character and for what it is worth, I think all of the side characters are really great and likeable in this film with Michael Pena (Luis) being a great addition to the MCU and I want him to be in more of the Marvel films.

Also, the action in this movie is really great as making those moments where the character is actively changing size in front of you eyes and having action sequences where this is happening regularly cannot be easy to make and respect to the CGI team/director for that. I should also add that this film is one of the funniest in the MCU and even tops Guardians of the Galaxy for me in comedy.

This film only has one drawback which is the villain, it's just another bland evil version of the main character which if done right is fine but this was just a boring villain who I don't think anyone will remember. Otherwise, this is the most underrated Marvel movie and I urge fans to watch it and have fun.

Scott Lang/Ant-Man: "Hello. I'm Ant-Man. Haven't you heard of me? No, you wouldn't have heard of me."

The story to Ant-Man is about Scott Lang who has worked alongside his friend and mentor Dr. Hank Pym but has never truly asserted himself. Now, armed with a suit that shrinks him in size but greatly increases his strength, Lang, now dubbed Ant-Man, will have to find the hero inside himself in order to pull off a heist that may very well be the key to saving the world.

The tiny superhero himself Ant-Man was originally going to be directed by the comedy genius himself Edgar Wright. Everyone and I do mean everyone was hyped about his next upcoming movie since this is the same guy who brought us such films as Shaun of the Dead and Hot Fuzz. But one day we all got the sad news that Edgar left the protect due to Marvel and him not agreeing on each other. It was so disappointing because I wonder what the movie would be like if Edgar Wright directed it. The movie was originally going to come out in 2014 but got pushed to 2015 due to that big delay. Now after seeing the movie I was surprised of how fun it was and how it was a solid movie even with the behind the scenes problems it all payed well.

Since Edgar was out we got another director that stepped in and that's Peyton Reed who did such movies like: Yes Man, The Break-up and Down with Love. I was a bit worried but at the same time a bit interested of what Peyton Reed will do with Edgar Wright source material and after seeing the movie I can safely say that Peyton Reed did a great job directing this movie. He directed the action scenes and the whole movie pretty well since he never directed action movies before and this is he's first time and he did it good. Nicely done Peyton Reed.

I never thought that Paul Rudd would be great playing superhero character when he was cast as Ant-Man, but Paul Rudd absolutely nailed it as Ant-Man as he had the charm, the right set of humor to balance his character nicely and he was the perfect actor for this comedic character like Ant-Man.

The humor in the movie are the basic Marvel humor that you always see in there movies. Edgar Wright also wrote the movie and at times I can tell what jokes and humor was his, but some other writers change a lot of the script (That's what I heard) adding some of the Avengers characters in the movie and at the end credit scene which Edgar didn't want and I can see why. Now it is good to see one or even more of The Avengers in another Marvel movie just for a little cameo but you know why they there to only set up the future Marvel movies and that's it really. That's just want it is really just a set up for the next movie and not let it be a good stand alone movie without other Avengers coming reminding you about the future Marvel movies. But that's just me. It's funny how I kept bringing up Edger Wright in this review, but what can say the guy is awesome.

The action scenes in the movie are just so stunning to watch. The action was excellently shot and when the character Ant-Man shrinks to ant size and takes down loads of enemies it was just awesome to watch it and it was a very creative action scene. The CGI in this movie really helped those action scenes or just the scenes where he's in ant size and everything around him is a size of a giant. Those scenes in the movie are worth the price of seeing.

I also love how this movie brought up the one thing that people always say "Why don't they just call The Avengers". In this movie they explain that it only takes a small person to do this small mission so you really don't need The Avengers to do this one small mission. I just love how the movie brought that up as it's saying shut the f**k up to those who are complaining about that.

Evangeline Lilly, Micheal Douglas, Michael Peña and the rest of the cast all did great in the movie as they were funny and truly enjoyable to watch.

Now for the problems: The villain of the movie Yellow Jacket played by Corey Stoll was a pretty weak villain and was kind of a cartoon villain at times. I think Corey Stoll is a great actor and I mean he was good in House of Cards and Midnight in Paris, but here he was the cliche I'm evil to do bad things to people and to are my character. He wasn't awful in the movie but he wasn't such a good villain.

Most of the character's in the movie felt like plot device like Scott's daughter in the movie as I could tell for a mile away what she's going to do later on in the movie and it happened as I expected.

Overall Ant-Man is another Marvel movie that turned out great just like Guardians. I like how Marvel are taking unknown comics that people never heard of and making them into big hits and everybody loving falling in love with them. Ant-Man was a lot of fun to watch and I actually like Ant-Man a little more than Age of Ultron, yeah I went there. Never again can anybody doubt Marvel for they next upcoming unknown project as you all known your going to eat it up and love it as always. Ant-Man is worth checking out.

The least godly of all the Marvel heroes, Ant-Man is just a mildly intelligent, crafty guy, down on his luck but pure of heart, who catches the eye of a reclusive genius and becomes heir to his technological throne. It's not intergalactic like Guardians, it boasts no billionaire playboys like Iron Man, no political intrigue or mythological hijinx like Cap or Thor, and while all of those absences do make it feel like less of a heavyweight, they also give it a unique sense of relatable identity. This is the little guy (womp womp), one of the unwashed throngs, who dares to climb Olympus and greet the immortals. I can get behind that.

It's also a great showcase of the merry Marvel mojo, casually blending well-timed wisecracks with steep ideas, loud action sets and a heavy dose of world-building. That constant sense of a shared landscape, long a cornerstone of the comic book's universe, has begun to bear ripened fruit recently, and Ant-Man profits from the mere association. Truly, it's his interactions with the characters we already know, no matter how secondary they may be, that makes this seem like more than just another origin story.

Paul Rudd does a nice job of pulling off the leading role, not too wacky nor too straight-laced, and his essential chemistry with Michael Douglas (the aforementioned genius) carries the picture a nice, long distance. Great effects work gets us the rest of the way, with a whole armload of inventive, fascinating, smirk-inducingly cool expositionary scenes leading the charge. Think Honey, I Shrunk the Kids with more balls and a much bigger budget. It's not the best of the Marvel lot, but it's among them, and I can't wait to see where the character goes from here.

I have to say that I did not have great hopes for this movie. However, I found it surprisingly enjoyable. As can be expected from a Marvel super hero movie it is not the most intelligent plot around but instead rather heavy on special effects.

Having said that the plot is not bad given the context. I have never read any of the Ant-Man comics so I had no idea what to expect. The little expectation I had was of some guy turning into some ant like creature smashing things left right and center. So it was somewhat of a surprise to me when I found out that the guy was actually shrinking himself to ant size. Actually I went a bit “what the f…” when I first realized this and felt that this was going to be boring.

However, in the end, I felt it worked out quite well. If it would have just been about some guy shrinking himself then it would indeed have been somewhat boring but the added coolness of this guy being able to command armies of bad-ass ants really helped stave of the boredom.

As I wrote above it is a Marvel super hero movie so it is heavy on special effects and, personally, I felt they where quite okay. There is of course quite a bit of action in the movie as well as a bit of humour. I quite liked the parts where the Ant-Man and his nemesis slugged it out in a children’s room and a giant size Thomas the Tank Engine was thrown through the roof and into the garden. Maybe I liked it because Thomas the Tank Engine is a TV show that my kids liked to watch when they were smaller. There where of course a few of the usual Hollywood silly, brain-dead stunts like the tank scene. It could have been so cool but it was really ruined by the total lack of intelligence in the stunt following the cool revelation.

I really liked Michael Douglas as Dr. Hank Pym as well as Evangeline Lilly as Hope Van Dyne. I was not too impressed by Paul Rudd but on the while I guess he was not too bad. It is a bit of a shame though that when Hollywood feels they need to throw in a bit of family drama they always have to throw in a divorce. It is rather depressing for us that have lived through such a tragedy after all.

Bottom line, this was a surprisingly enjoyable movie. Far better than quite a few of the super hero movies that Marvel/Hollywood have produced like for instance the abysmal Spiderman movies although that is of course a personal opinion.