This time around Scott Lang (Paul Rudd) has been on house arrest since his capture in Captain America: Civil War. Having only three days left on his house sentence, he suddenly has a vision of the Quantum Realm, sending Hank Pym (Michael Douglas) and Hope van Dyne (Evangeline Lilly) back into his life. Hank and Hope need what’s in Scott’s head, so they can reach Janet van Dyne who has been lost in the Quantum Realm for 30 years. So, until they get the information from Scott’s head, they’re all stuck together. But of course, there’s evil lurking just out their periphery.
Enter Ghost, (Hannah John-Kamen) a super human that can phase in and out of our dimension, allowing her to walk through walls and people. Needing the tech that’s being built to save Janet, Ghost and our heroes begin a deadly game of cat and mouse, all while staying ahead of the FBI and the annoying low-level criminal Sonny Burch (Walton Goggins) who wants all of Pym’s tech for his own personal gain. Which of course all comes together in one amazing car chase/action sequence on the streets of San Francisco. What could have been just one more Marvel film, ends up being a great fun ride to enjoy.
Evangeline Lilly’s Wasp steals this movie. She is amazing from the word go, in the most satisfying turnaround for a character thus far in the Marvel movie history. They strip away the hardened bitter business woman we saw in the first film, now having blossomed into a full-fledged, take-no-prisoners superhero. She’s such a good superhero it makes you wonder why Hank had Scott to begin with when Hope is clearly the better choice. After being told no by her father for so many years, here she is now allowed to shine. And shine she does. She so damn good at being a superhero. Make way for the Wasp solo movie!
Rudd, Douglas and Michael Pena are all fantastic. Their chemistry is a lot of the same from the first film. If it’s not broken, why fix it. They add Laurence Fishburne to this film for a small role, but an important one, especially for long time Marvel comic fans. He plays Bill Foster who in the comics is known as Goliath, another hero who can change his size and stop crime. Just one more great nod to the fans and the history of Marvel comics.
Also new to the franchise is the incredible Michelle Pfeiffer, playing the long-lost Janet van Dyne. The whole movie is about getting her back, so unfortunately Pfeiffer is a third act character, but her presence is felt throughout. She is perfection. Only a few negatives about this movie and one of them would be the need for more Michelle. But when she does come in you feel the weight of her performance and importance of her character to the Pym’s.
The only real negative towards the film would be the villains. Ghost is solid, but only due to the fact they give her a small backstory and reasons to why she does bad things to get what she wants. But Goggins has no real purpose other than to annoy our heroes. He’s so under developed it begs the question: why bother with him instead of spending more time on Ghost? He’s well-acted and gives some good humor to the movie, but at the end of the day he has no reason to be there.
I have said it before and I’ll say it again: Disney/Marvel have a damn time machine! They obviously went back in time and pulled Douglas and Pfeiffer from Wall Street and Batman Returns and placed them in our time to film their younger versions for flashbacks. The special effects on them is stunning. The de-aging effect is getting way too good! In fact, all the effects hold up for this flick: The size changing, walking through walls and the CGI ants all looked incredible.
Over all this is a great movie. Like the first one, it feels apart from the regular Avengers movies but also stays true to what those films have set-up. And it goes without saying, stay at the end of the movie. The stinger is gasp worthy and worth everything!
