Ant-Man and the Wasp (a movie review post)

 

MCU #20

You can see my original review here. It's still completely valid, though I am going to say some other things in this one, things that may seem counter to my original review, though they really are not.

This movie is a lot of fun, whatever else may be said about it.

That said...

I think this movie is a little... sloppy. As I've said before (including my previous review of this), I love Walton Goggins, but his character, Sonny Burch, feels superfluous at best. That whole plotline seems to be there just to provide a reason for the car chase. Which is a lot of fun, but...
And there's the whole truth serum bit...
    "If it walk like duck and talk like duck... it's truth serum."
Or something to that effect.
And that scene is hilarious and I love it, but...
The whole Sonny Burch thread could have been eliminated and nothing that matters would have been lost from the movie. Unless the "boss" he referred to is going to be important, but that hardly seems to be significant enough for what feels more like filler, at this point.

Of course, they may have been going for a Mad, Mad, Mad, Mad World vibe with everyone after the shrunken office building, but they really needed more people after the building if that's what they were trying to do.

Things I love in the movie:

-- The truth serum joke.

-- The Hot Wheels car carrying case.
--Giant-Man
--Michael Pena

The thing is, there isn't anything I don't like about the movie. It's a lot of fun, and I enjoy it. I enjoyed it no less this time than the last time I saw it. But, looking at it from a storytelling viewpoint, the plot could have used some tightening.

Or maybe not. I mean, if it's fun and people enjoy it, what's the problem?
Yes, you could say that I have internal conflict over this stuff. 

It's a good movie, but I think it could have been better. I guess that's what I'm saying.

I guess not all of the sequels can be better than their predecessors.

Well...
Let's get it ranked.

1. Captain America: Civil War

2. The Avengers
3. Captain America: The First Avenger

4. Avengers: Infinity War

5. Spider-Man: Homecoming
6. Captain America: The Winter Soldier
7. Iron Man

8. Black Panther

9. Doctor Strange

10. Ant-Man

11. Thor: Ragnarok
12. Thor: The Dark World
13. Thor

14. Guardians of the Galaxy

15. Ant-Man and the Wasp

16. Avengers: Age of Ultron

17. Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2
18. Iron Man 3
19. Iron Man 2
20. Incredible Hulk (Edward Norton can't use Pym particles. It would cause a singularity and destroy the Earth.)

Ant-Man and the Wasp (a movie review post)

It's probably fair to say that Ant-Man is the least of the Marvel movies.
But this isn't all about size.

Seriously, though...

As far as Marvel movies go, the Ant-Man movies are a bit of lighthearted fun. Which is not to say that they don't deal with some serious topics, but humor is rather more infused in these movies than in the rest of the offerings from Marvel. Even more so than the Guardians movies.

This is not a bad thing. Really, it means that Marvel provides something for everyone.

Except a rom-com. You could probably make a case for the first Ant-Man filling the rom-com slot, but it's a heist movie and doesn't really hit all the rom-com notes. Man, now, I think Marvel needs to do a rom-com. Maybe with Dazzler once they get the X-Men back from Fox.
Yeah, I'm into this idea...
But I digress.

This movie has Boyd Crowder!!! Um, I mean, Walton Goggins! Have I mentioned before that I love Walton Goggins? Well, I do. Because Justified, the best TV show ever.
Um, where was I...?

In Marvel, actions have consequences, which is one of the best things about the MCU so far (something that Warner Brothers/DC still haven't picked up on), and we pick up with Scott Lang suffering the consequences of getting caught while helping Captain America in Civil War, which also serves as an ongoing conflict throughout the movie: When do you do something because it's the right thing to do even when it's breaking the law? A good thing to be thinking about in our current political climate, I think.

Mostly, though, the movie is a lot of good fun, full of people stealing things back and forth. While the good guys try to rescue Janet Van Dyne from the quantum realm.

The cast, as continues to be the case in all of the Marvel movies, is perfect and amazing. I love Paul Rudd and Michael Pena, and they are great together in these movies, though there's not quite as much of them together in this one as the last one. Did I mention Walton Goggins? WALTON GOGGINS! Randall Park is a lot of fun, too.

Possibly, actually, the weakest casting Marvel has had so far was Corey Stoll in the first Ant-Man movie, which has nothing to do with this one, but it's the only bit of weak casting I can think of in the whole franchise so far.

Anyway...

The movie is a lot of fun. It's probably not quite as good as the first one, but I can't say that with certainty. If you liked the first one, there's no reason you shouldn't like this one and, if you haven't seen the first one, you don't quite need to to see this one, though I would say you should anyway, just for the FUN of it. Oh, and, yes, there is a bit of lead up and crossover with Infinity War, which is not quite a spoiler, but it's something to be aware of if you're into the Avengers but dissed on Ant-Man. It's not like you'll need to see this one before the next Avengers movie, but, again, you probably should. Just for the fun of it.