6.8 | / 10 |
Users | 3.8 | |
Reviewer | 3.5 | |
Overall | 3.5 |
As Scott Lang balances being both a Super Hero and a father, Hope van Dyne and Dr. Hank Pym present an urgent new mission that finds the Ant-Man fighting alongside The Wasp to uncover secrets from their past.
Starring: Paul Rudd, Evangeline Lilly, Michael Peńa, Walton Goggins, Bobby CannavaleAdventure | 100% |
Action | 99% |
Comic book | 89% |
Sci-Fi | 83% |
Comedy | Insignificant |
Video codec: MPEG-4 AVC
Video resolution: 1080p
Aspect ratio: 2.39:1
Original aspect ratio: 2.39:1
English: DTS-HD Master Audio 7.1 (48kHz, 24-bit)
Spanish: Dolby Digital 5.1 (640 kbps)
French (Canada): Dolby Digital 5.1
Portuguese: Dolby Digital 5.1
English SDH, French, Portuguese, Spanish
Blu-ray Disc
Single disc (1 BD)
Digital copy
Slipcover in original pressing
Region free
Movie | 3.5 | |
Video | 4.5 | |
Audio | 5.0 | |
Extras | 2.5 | |
Overall | 3.5 |
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).
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.
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.
- 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
- Stan Lee Outtakes
- Tim Heidecker Outtakes
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.
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