Rating summary

Movie		3.5
Video		4.5
Audio		5.0
Extras		2.5
Overall		3.5

Ant-Man and the Wasp Blu-ray Movie Review

Reviewed by Jeffrey Kauffman October 15, 2018

Whether you like your superhero movies dark and angsty a la Batman Begins or on the cheeky, humorous side a la Deadpool will probably determine how you respond to Ant-Man and The Wasp. This follow up to 2015’s Ant-Man may make passing attempts to generate “meaningful” content about the importance of family, but at its core (thorax?), Ant-Man and The Wasp is just good old fashioned hokum (a technical term), in its own way as silly and even ludicrous as Them!, the “giant ant” escapade from 1954 that Ant-Man and The Wasp overtly references for a nice reveal very late in this film. Ant-Man and The Wasp is definitely on the Deadpool end of the spectrum alluded to above, even if it’s nowhere near as raucous or even scabrous as the Ryan Reynolds enterprises have been. Instead, there’s a kind of genial, shaggy dog charm running through the film that manages to travel surprisingly far on the kind of unaffected charisma of stars Paul Rudd, as Scott Lang, and Evangeline Lilly, as Hope van Dyne. Kind of interestingly, a lot of the emotional component in Ant-Man and The Wasp actually involves Hope’s father, Hank Pym (Michael Douglas), and Hope’s mother, Janet van Dyne (Michelle Pfeiffer). The film gives a little history of Hank and Janet, detailing their adventures as (more or less) Ant-Man and The Wasp, but also providing the “McGuffin” of this film, namely that Janet has sacrificed herself to the so-called “quantum realm” by going small enough to get inside a (nuclear tipped?) missile in order to defuse it. Hank reveals to Hope that he feels there’s a good chance that Janet might still be alive “down there”, and he’s been working on a technology to provide a portal to the quantum realm in order to retrieve her. Meanwhile, Scott is dealing with a house arrest after the events of Captain America: Civil War, using the time to bond with his adorable daughter Cassie (Abby Ryder Fortson).

In just one of many patently goofy “pseudo-science” moments in the film, when Hank and Hope briefly open their portal to the quantum realm, a kind of psychic connection between Scott and Janet is activated, since (as Michael Douglas is able to say with a straight face) Scott and Janet have become “quantumly entangled” when Scott “visited” the quantum realm. Completely predictably, Scott ultimately joins forces with Hope and Hank on their quest to retrieve Janet, but just as predictably the horde of screenwriters assigned to this sequel set up a whole host of obstacles before that goal can be obtained.

Some of these are “earthbound”, with one running gag being the frequent check-ins by FBI Agent and Lang parole officer Jimmy Woo (Randall Park) to make sure Lang is obeying his house arrest (which of course he isn’t). The more serious hazard appears (intermittently anyway, and that’s a joke for those who have seen the film) to be a character named Ghost (Hannah Johnson-Kamen), a girl with a past of course inextricably bound up with Hank and his research. A number of other sidebars also accrue, including a nice turn by Walton Goggins as Sonny Burch, a kind of bumbling crook who is out to get his hands on Hank’s technology. Laurence Fishburne is also on hand as Bill Foster, an old cohort of Hank's from the S.H.I.E.L.D. days, but a character who is forced (due to some kind of sloppy screenwriting) to be both a villain and a hero at the virtual drop of various hats.

The emotional quotient of the film is chiefly one of families finding their footing. While the most notable example is of course Hank trying to find his long lost wife (guess how that one works out), there’s also at least some attempt to make Scott’s life as a divorced father bear some fruit, and a couple of his scenes with Cassie are very nicely done. There’s also the obvious romantic subtext of a developing (or redeveloping, as the case may be) relationship between Scott and Hope, though this element is often played for comedy, with a sweetly bantering ambience between the two characters.

The film is awash in sometimes very funny special effects. Some of these have to do with a malfunctioning suit that Hank provides to Scott, which often leaves him in “Alice in Wonderland territory”, often either too small or too big for whatever environment he finds himself in. A couple of outrageous sight gags are built out of this plot point. The more “serious” special effects are often quite well done as well, including Ghost’s abilities to pass through solid objects, and the fun “enlarging” and “miniaturizing” of various objects courtesy of Hank’s handy dandy remote. The portal to the quantum realm comes dangerously close to aping the old television series The Time Tunnel and Hank’s journey to the quantum realm plays like a kind of hallucinatory mishmash of Fantastic Voyage and the already psychedlic climax of 2001: A Space Odyssey.

Ant-Man and the Wasp Blu-ray Movie, Video Quality 

Ant-Man and The Wasp is presented on Blu-ray courtesy of Disney Buena Vista with an AVC encoded 1080p transfer in 2.39:1. The IMDb lists both Arri and Red cameras as having digitally captured the imagery (at a variety of source resolutions up to 8K), with everything being finished at a 2K DI. This is another appealing entry in the Marvel line, with most of the visual "oomph" coming courtesy of some of the more hyperbolic effects sequences. The sudden appearances and disappearances of various characters in virtual puffs of smoke look great, and some of the "ghosting" effects of, well, Ghost are also very well done. Fine detail tends to be excellent on such things as the kind of ribbed and (dare I say) rather Deadpool- ish looking Ant-Man outfit. One really interesting bit of effects work has to do with flashbacks involving Douglas, Pfeiffer and (a bit later) Fishburne, all of whom have been "digitally youthened" (if I may coin a term) to surprisingly natural looking effect. The "everyday" scenes with Scott as a father are occasionally a little drab looking, and there's one very brief instance of banding early in the film when Scott is playing with Cassie and points a flashlight directly at the camera. The big windup involving Hank traveling to the quantum realm is perhaps intentionally soft looking, to the point that it almost looks like Hank has wandered into a slightly tweaked version of What Dreams May Come. The palette is quite appealing throughout the film, especially in that climactic quantum realm sequence, where pinks and purples predominate and really pop with considerably vividness.

Ant-Man and the Wasp Blu-ray Movie, Audio Quality 

I've heard from some fans that they have at least occasionally been disappointed with the audio on some of these Disney Marvel releases, but I found Ant-Man and The Wasp's DTS-HD Master Audio 7.1 track to be consistently immersive and often quite impressive not just in terms of good placement of effects, but the forcefulness of LFE. This is obviously an effects laden film, and there are huge bursts of low end in scenes involving the quantum portal, as well as often quite fun (and even funny) panning effects as Ant-Man and The Wasp flit hither and yon. An opening fight scene involving The Wasp taking out a bunch of Sonny's henchman also provides a glut of discrete channelization for sounds like bones crunching and various restaurant appurtenances getting smashed to smithereens. Dialogue is always rendered cleanly and clearly and the entire mix is well prioritized, offering a very enjoyable listening experience.

Ant-Man and the Wasp Blu-ray Movie, Special Features and Extras 

• Making of Featurettes (1080p; 22:30) include a quartet of pieces whose focus can be easily discerned from their titles:

  Back in the Ant Suit: Scott Lang

  
  

  A Suit of Her Own: The Wasp

  
  

  Subatomic Superheros: Hank & Janet

  
  

  Quantum Perspective: The VFX and Production Design of 'Ant-Man and the Wasp'

• Gag Reel and Outtakes (1080p; 3:47) is kind of interestingly split into the following sections:

  Gag Reel

  
  

  Stan Lee Outtakes

  
  

  Tim Heidecker Outtakes

• Deleted Scenes (1080p; 1:38) offer optional commentary by director Peyton Reed.


• Audio Commentary features director Peyton Reed.

Ant-Man and the Wasp Blu-ray Movie, Overall Score and Recommendation 

The Marvel Cinematic Universe is an increasingly crowded place, and it's kind of refreshing in a way that jokier enterprises like the still relatively nascent Deadpool and Ant-Man franchises are finding considerable audience support. There's nothing really very "new" or "innovative" about Ant-Man and The Wasp, but at the same time the film has absolutely zero pretensions about what it wants to be and what it aims to deliver. The film coasts a considerable distance on the combined charisma of Rudd and Lilly, and it's really wonderful to see Douglas and Pfeiffer in appealing performances as well. Technical merits are first rate, and Ant-Man and The Wasp comes Recommended.