It’s quite telling that the Marvel Cinematic Universe describes every sequel of theirs as highly anticipated because the idea of three ‘Ant-Man‘ movies is genuinely not what anyone thinks of as necessary. While the title is admittedly amazing, ‘Ant-Man and The Wasp: Quantumania‘ is as befuddling to comprehend not just as a third movie for this unspoken trilogy but as a movie on its own. Despite the overwhelming hatred aimed towards this movie, I went in with a semi-open mind and I can’t say I came out of it hating the movie, I am just so genuinely confused as to why this movie exists. It’s a box-office failure, panned by fans and critics and the worst part is, that all of this money, energy and time went into something that is just incredibly unnecessary and irrelevant.

major spoilers for ‘Ant-Man and The Wasp: Quantumania‘ are featured in this review.

While the first two ‘Ant-Man‘ movies aren’t my favourite from this franchise, I can understand their appeal, in fact, I have good memories attached to both so I can’t really look at them negatively. Paul Rudd is a global treasure that needs to be protected and I genuinely like Christoph Beck’s theme for the character. I loved how they felt like MCU movies but they still had their own individual tone and feel to them, they were action comedies first and that’s why they stand out. They had a core group of characters with a story that developed quite nicely in the 2018 sequel, even if I didn’t care for it. What ‘Quantumania‘ does is strip the majority of that story and character development in favour of a CG-heavy dumpster truck disguising itself as a movie where the beloved style of humour is gone and the fan-favourite characters are gone rendering this third entry genuinely useless. Scott Lang doesn’t progress as a character, Hope Van Dyne is barely utilized and older Cassie is so poorly established that I don’t really know who she is as a character. They got Michael Douglas looking confused at a green screen saying “Ants!” every couple of lines. The movie finishes as it starts. It is truly bizarre just how much of a mess this script actually is.

The biggest issue with ‘Quantumania‘ is probably the fact that the events that happen here have absolutely no consequence not just in the MCU but for its characters and this trilogy. It felt so bizarre spending a whole movie inside the Quantum Realm just for nothing. It felt like an inconvenience to the characters and to the audience. The entire introduction of Kang the Conqueror felt inconsequential. Whatever monologue or threats he made here has already been made in the Season 1 finale of ‘Loki‘. It’s a genuine headscratcher as to what the point of this movie is. Is it meant to be this visually stunning ambient sci-fi adventure with deep character moments and levity throughout? That can’t be considering how this movie has some of the worst CGI and special effects ever put to a major blockbuster and the script has as much depth as a ‘Power Rangers’ episode. M.O.D.O.K is an abomination, it is actually insane that he’s even in the final product. Did they think he would become a meme and get really popular on Twitter? Is he even supposed to look like that? So many questions for something that has zero relevance to the plot.

Jonathan Majors’ Kang is actually not at all what I was expecting. His performance honestly felt like it was two in one. One being this menacing and all-powerful force and the other this whiny, monologuing, tantrum-throwing villain. I really don’t know how to feel about him yet. The reason why Thanos worked very well was because he was always taken seriously whereas Kang was defeated by a hoard of ants and actually killed. It’s bizarre really that this is supposed to be the next major antagonist of the MCU and that this is his first cinematic outing. The Quantum Realm itself is just weird, it doesn’t look particularly pleasing and the world-building isn’t at all engaging. I am actually a massive fan of movies and franchises exploring these off-beat places where everything works differently and The Quantum Realm just did not do it for me at all. Why are they humanoid people living there? Why are Jackson William Harper and Bill Murray wasted with these throwaway characters? It is truly baffling, just how much potential they’re wasting. Even with the ending, I was expecting the camera to pan over to Kang eating at a different table at the restaurant but he’s never there. It’s not even a movie at this point.

It’s actually fitting that this is one of the shortest reviews I’ve written in a while because there truly isn’t much to be said about ‘Ant-Man and The Wasp: Quantumania‘. The cast isn’t utilized well, the visual effects are murky, the plot is non-existent, and the characters don’t go through any development. It quite literally is a waste of time. I don’t like hating on movies, in fact, if anyone enjoyed it, I am happy that they got something out of this mess but as for me and my opinion, well my appreciation for this movie might just very well be shrunken down to the Quantum Realm. Paul Rudd, you deserve better.

‘Ant-Man and The Wasp: Quantumania‘ is now showing in cinemas.