Ant-Man And The Wasp: Quantumania review: A bonkers Star Wars reboot with bugs

For better and for worse, the Marvel Cinematic Universe has opted to introduce its new “big bad” to cinemagoers within its goofiest series of films, those of Ant-Man and the Wasp. Following the conclusion of the Infinity Saga (and Phase Three) with Avengers: Endgame, the greater MCU has been biding its time in Phase Four, largely ushering in a hoard of new characters and wandering down CGI-laden rabbit holes rather than concentrating on a cohesive narrative arc. With the arrival of Ant-Man And The Wasp: Quantumania, however, the mega-franchise pivots to focus on its new antagonist, Jonathan Majors’ Kang the Conqueror. In some multiverse iteration, it will be Kang who presumably faces off against the Avengers in the Phase Six duology, Avengers: The Kang Dynasty and Avengers: Secret Wars. Kang, who appeared briefly in the finale of Loki, is a deathly serious, multiverse-jumping war lord who spends his time obliterating entire dimensions and pontificating on temporal philosophy. It therefore makes total sense (read: it makes no sense at all) that Kang would get his grand entrance in a film alongside aliens that look like broccoli and recurring butthole jokes.

From its opening montage (set to the Welcome Back, Kotter theme song) in which Scott Lang/Ant-Man (Paul Rudd) reads from his memoir (Look Out For The Little Guy) and receives an award at Baskin-Robbins, the film, like its two predecessors, is jokey. And that doesn’t really change when the whole Lang/Pym/Van Dyne clan is sucked by a mysterious force into the Quantum Realm that’s incidentally just a wackier version of the Star Wars universe. (Although, given the infinite multiverses, the real Star Wars does probably exist somewhere within the MCU.)

Our insectile family is split in half during their quantum journey with Team 1, comprised of Ant-Man and his daughter Cassie (now played by Kathryn Newton), landing in a more sloppily created version of Strange World while Team 2, made up of Hank Pym (Michael Douglas), Janet van Dyne (Michelle Pfeiffer), and the Wasp (Evangeline Lilly), crashes on Tatooine in the desert. Team 1 meets a Mos Eisley Cantina Band-esque hoard of alien freedom fighters including William Jackson Harper (from NBC’s The Good Place) and his glowing forehead, a chatty blob of Jell-O, and a more muscular version of the Pixar lamp. Team 2 is met by Tusken Raiders sand nomads and taken to the Quantum Realm equivalent of a Delta Sky Club lounge where they find Janet’s old bestie Krylar (a fun celebrity cameo we won’t spoil). It’s here we learn that Janet and Kang were stranded together in the quantum abyss, trying to escape for many years in Kang’s ship before Janet realized Kang loved genocide and destroyed his power source. Now Kang has sucked Team Ant-Man back into the Quantum Realm in order to finally escape from his purgatory. Of course Lando Calrissian Krylar quickly betrays our heroes, who are hauled off to Coruscant a massive city to face off against Kang and his Stormtroopers henchmen while he tries to launch his Death Star giant, spheric, universe-destroying battleship.