Ant-Man and The Wasp - Review

Aaaaah, Ant-Man and The Wasp, my shining beacon in the darkness that Infinity War left not only for me. Mostly because it meant that this wasn't the end for forgettable me completely ignoring Infinity War being promoted as a two-part film already, and it also meant that the next step was something funny and somewhat light (even within the MCU which is very humoristic at all times anyway to begin with).

Well, the thing is: Ant-Man and The Wasp is set a little before/during Infinity War and not, as my no-trailers-watching ass thought, shortly after it. I really need to get across to myself that the MCU is not linear at all. (Wibbly-wobbly timey-wimey, I have to add as someone currently re-watching Doctor Who).

The movie starts with a flashback to Hopes childhood and the day her parents left for work (apparently, at that point, young Hope doesn't know about them being super heroes) and only Hank coming back. This flashback beautifully doubles as an introduction of Janet, The Wasp, being a warm-hearted, loving mother and wife which I like a lot to begin with - because she is all of that, all this things traditionally tied to a very feminine role, and at the exact same time she is also a hero, a fighter, courageous, bad-ass, all things that within traditional gender roles and traditional gender coding in fiction get mutually excluded with the role of the emotional care-taker. I just really like that at this point we seem to be beyond the point were female super heroes had to be all serious and cold and "one of the boys" to be heroic. At the end of the flashback we see Hank suggesting to Hope that, since Scott was able to come back from the Quantum Realm, Janet may still be alive and could be retrieved from there as well, and they start building a tunnel to do so.

Cut to Scott, who after Civil War and participating in trashing the airport in Leipzig (which I, as a person born and raised and living in Leipzig have a bit of hard feelings about as well) with Captain America and his team is on house arrest. He currently has his daughter Cassie over, they manage to have a lot of fun even without being able to leave the house and Scott is just being a great dad. You guys see this? Great role model. Just maybe without the crime and jailtime before that. We also get to see that the relationship to his ex-wife Maggie and her boyfriend Paxton got a lot better, they are all having a good big old patchwork family thing going on, and this warms my cold, empty heart after Infinity War and I really needed this, so thanks Marvel, you did well! (I will stop gushing mid-plot summary now).

After Cassie leaves, Scott takes a bath and has a vision of Janet. He contacts Hank, even though he's not supposed to be in contact with him and Hope. Shortly after he gets stung by an ant, faints and wakes up in a car with Hope. Turns out, she and Hank are very angry at him for going to Germany without saying anything, but since Hank sees the vision as a sign that Janet is still alive, he wants Scotts help to relocate her. Willing to make the tunnel more stable, they try to get a part from a black market dealer called Sonny Birch, who turns out wanting to get into their business and trying to blackmail them into it. When Hope aka the new Wasp figths him and his team, Ghost turns up and steals the shrinked lab.

As you can see, summarizing the plot without telling to much is a bit of an issue because theres a lot of stuff going on with two antagonists, several storylines and just a lot happening in general, but somehow, when you see the full movie, it doesn't get confusing at all - it's just like real life, just a lot going on simultaneously. What we get is a lot of character developement happening, a lot of plot to begin with and theres still plenty of room for the typical Ant-Man humour (both old fan favourites like Luis, everyones fucking son, taking veeery wide stretches to re-tell stuff, and new running gags as well) and nicely done action sequences. It's just overall a pretty well-made movie in my opinion, just the right mix of everything that makes Marvel movies special.

I already gushed on a lot about how much I love the character introduction of Janet and the portrayal of Scott as a dad, but I also want you to know that I adore ghost - her character design reminds me of a post-apocalyptic dystopia and I am always here for that, and she has a very interesting back story.
Of course, we don't know how and if the Ant-Man series will continue after Infinity War (and that makes all of this very frustrating let me tell you!) but I really hope it does because let's be honest - Ant-Man is kind of my comfort place right now. Even with personally being really apalled by ants.