But that’s the point you’re missing. Nobody cares if they tell us it’s magic. In this universe and in this movie we can accept that it’s magic. Or in Thor’s case, it’s so future tech were not going to bother explaining. And that’s fine! He’s a goddamn superhero. We don’t need an explanation.
But they did explain. And that explanation made no sense within the very story they created. It’s like Superman drawing his power from the yellow sun. Why? I don’t know. I don’t care either. They said he’s powerful with a yellow sun and that’s a good enough explanation. So suppose he visits a planet with a red sun and still has powers, and they offer no explanation. Would you enjoy that story? Or would you question why they bothered to say anything about a yellow sun and get annoyed by people who say “dude, relax. It’s just a fantasy movie. It’s not real.”
The problem they’ve got with this movie is, they want to have this tiny little dude jumping around and knocking out regular sized people, because it looks cool. But you’ve got to put something in there to explain why a guy who’s about a millimeter tall can lay out a guy who’s six foot six, otherwise the audience is never going to swallow the premise.
“When you shrink, you keep the same mass. You have all the strength of a fully grown man and all the momentum as well.”
“Whoa. That’s cool. Hey, Dr. Pym, what happens if you reverse it? Could I grow to 300 feet? What would my mass be like then?”
“You know, I’m really not sure. I stopped researching this thing 17 years ago when I left Stark Industries. But we’re trying to conduct a covert operation here, so maybe don’t do that in this movie. I’m sure you’ll get a chance in Ant-Man 2. Isn’t that right old guy who looks a lot like Stan Lee?”
“Excelsior!”
I’m not clear what was inconsistent about the physics that were introduced. It was stated that he shrinks to the size of an ant but retains the strength of a 200 lbm man. That this isn’t really physically possible–there is no way such a small creature could have the same mass and inertia as a full sized human being without a whole bunch of other effects–is kind of a minor squall of inconsistency in a tropical storm of complete impossiblities.
I see many things inconsistent, but to say just a few:
His retained strength allows him to jump across a regular sized room and kick someone in the face but he needs ants to give him a lift to reach the top side of 6-inch water main.
He can punch a full sized human and send them across a room but holds on for dear life to an ant, having no idea what is going on so it isn’t like he’s carefully restraining himself, and doesn’t hurt it.
He falls from the second story of a building onto a car and dents the roof but falls from all kinds of other things in the movie without any damage to whatever he landed on.
We’re told he gets smaller by reducing the space between atoms and then takes his untold atoms, reduces the space between them, and gets smaller than a single atom.
We’re shown that Pym can control ants from great distances, without easy visuals, and doing very complex tasks but then later told that the reason someone needs to wear the suit is because they need a leader to follow.
Again, the movie entertained you and pulled off the trick of turning off your suspension of disbelief. That’s awesome, I’m honestly glad you enjoyed it to that level and am not trying to convince you you’re wrong to have done so. It didn’t do that to me and you are trying to convince me I’m wrong for it not having done so. I love all kinds of movies that are horribly inconsistent or illogical but made me overlook that, but when the issues are pointed out I don’t deny they exist.
The annoying thing about this debate is they could have bypassed all this completely by having Ant-Man do what he did in the comics - shrink-fu, where rather than hitting people while he was tiny, he grew to full size while he swung at young and shrunk out of the way before you could hit him back or shoot him (this also would have made the keyhole training bit make sense, since shrink-fu is all about growing and shrinking accurately while on the move). Having him do that means you don’t have to explain how a guy who masses 200lbs even when he’s tiny can ride a flying ant, walk on fragile computer parts, etc.
What’s Scott Lang like in the comics?
I think the only reason I liked him in the movie was because Paul Rudd is just so darn likeable. Really, Hank Pym is by far the more interesting character. Scott Lang is just a slightly more capable Greatest Amercian Hero in that it’s the suit that makes the superhero.
Bruce Banner got his powers by accident but his heroics are in his integrity learning to control the power and limiting its use.
Steve Rogers was a “lab experiment” but it’s made clear that he was chosen because he is a good man who will stand up for what’s right.
The movie doesn’t really show me much “hero-ness” in Scott Lang. He’s a basically good guy, but that’s the extent to which you could really praise him as a man. He does accept the responsibility that comes with power, but really his life had been in a downward spiral and he didn’t really have much in the way of options. So, when a brilliant scientist comes to him and says “Hey, I’ve got a job for you” it wasn’t necessarily nobility that made him take up the mantle. Sure, being basically a good guy, he uses the power for good but you can only give so much credit to a guy for not being evil. After all, we’re all supposed to not be evil.
Not so much of a problem for me in this movie. This was the introduction movie. Each of the Marvel Universe movies has shown more character development in the sequels once we’ve already gotten the full explanation of the basic concept. I’m just curious about who this guy is as a character in the comics. Is Scott Lang an interesting and complex character in the comics? Does he display a sense that he is a true hero at heart?
He gave up a promising career, his family and his freedom in order to bring down a corrupt company. He was reckless and stupid in the way he did it, but it shows he had a drive to make wrongs right before he got the suit.
In the initial intro, Lang was simply a high tech thief who stole because he was something of a thrill-seeker who went straight solely because prison - not so fun. His daughter needed experimental heart surgery and the only surgeon that could save her was being held captive by a reclusive Evil Billionaire. Lang stole the suit fron Pym to infiltrate the lair and free the surgeon, and was eventually successful. Unknown to him, Pym had seen him break in, followed him to see why he wanted the suit, and told him to keep it and use it. Lang decided being a superhero was a more constructive way to channel his thrill-seeking urges and became Ant-Man II (at the time, Pym was Yellowjacket).
Yeah, I guess that’s a good example of why “Show, don’t tell” is such popular filmmaking advice. We’re just told about his cyber-Robin Hood heist and, ultimately, it just didn’t stick with me. I mean, I didn’t forget that it had been mentioned it just didn’t really have a strong effect on my take on the character.
Thanks, epbrown01!
Hmmmm, pretty good but not great (he only takes an interest in freeing the surgeon because there’s a benefit for himself/daughter). Does the character develop well over time? How would you rank him as an interesting character?
See, Hank Pym invented the technology. That makes him immediately more interesting. His “superhero power” is his brilliance, the suit is just an extension of that. For someone else to use the suit, that’s kind of “standing on the shoulders of giants” territory. I wouldn’t put down Rhodey in the same way, his distinguished military background makes War Machine a hero distinct from Iron Man. Yes, Rhoadey is using Stark’s tech but it’s a tool and he’s established expertise in making use of such a tool.
Again, I did actually like movie Scott Lang well enough but I think that has a lot to do with Paul Rudd’s likeableness. Also, I think that having an older Hank Pym was a really great idea for adding texture to the wider Marvel Cinematic Universe- it really gives a sense that just because we haven’t seen it in a movie doesn’t mean there isn’t a whole lot more going on shaping this fictional world. So, I think older Hank Pym with Scott Lang as active Ant-Man worked for this movie and can be good going forward.
I’m just saying his next appearance really has to develop him more or I’m going to lose interest.
Still interested in hearing more from people who know the comics!
Thanks again, epbrown01!
One thing about that I didn’t quite follow. From his description of what landed him in jail, and his interactions with his ex-wife, it sounded like he was a regular white-collar guy who found out that his employer was corrupt, and decided to do something about it. But his interactions with his crew, with the Pyms, and the scene of him breaking into Hank’s home show him as a skilled and accomplished cat burglar and safe-cracker. I’m not sure how to reconcile these apparent differences in his back story.
He started out as a regular white-collar guy. After he got screwed after whistle-blowing he stole from his employer, and then other companies, then got arrested.
Red is indeed a color, and it would be fun to have someone point out to him that he’s a POC. (But I think the red is supposed to be blood, so he’d say that didn’t count.)
My husband laughed out loud at the line in the credits that says the cold stuff “is not intended for use in the manner shown in the film”.
And the thing that bothered me the most, which I see over and over again, is that species which are primarily female (like ANTS!) are always referred to as “he”. Because of course the hero can’t ride a heroic female animal! I was sure Hank Pym or especially Hope would point out that most ants are female. It would especially make sense in the scenes where she says she should wear the suit.
I just saw the movie. And I kept expecting a plot twist that never happened.
Early in the movie, it was established that Hank and Hope had been estranged for years. And it’s established that Cross is close to developing the shrinking technology but can’t get it to work on living beings. Only Hank has that technology and Cross can’t get his hands on it.
Then we see Hank recruit Scott and Hank tells Scott that Hope recently came to him and said that she was belatedly concerned about Cross and is now siding with her father. She keeps insisting that he should give her the suit. But when she finally realizes he won’t give her the suit, she helps him with his plans to have Scott break in to the lab. And she keeps reminding Hank and Scott about the deadline and how quickly they have to do the break in.
Right before the break in, there’s a scene where Hank finally tells Hope how her mother died. Hope cries and says “Why couldn’t you have told me this earlier?”
Do you see what I was seeing? I was certain that Hope was a double agent - she wasn’t working with her father to deceive Cross; she was working with Cross to deceive her father. Cross needed the technology that is in the suit. Cross and Hope’s initial plan was convincing Hank to give the suit to Hope. When that didn’t work they were helping Hank do the break in so they could trap Scott and take the suit.
So when Scott broke in and got trapped, I kept expecting at any second Hope would reveal her true allegiance. And I was thinking I’d be congratulating myself because I saw it coming an hour ago. (I also figured that after Hope’s betrayal was revealed, she’d realize Cross really was crazy and would switch back to help Scott and Hank for the finale.)
Now I’m annoyed because I think my idea would have worked better than the actual story.
One thing I liked was that expands the history of the MCU. Up until now, superheroes have been a recent phenomena. As far as we had seen, the history of the MCU was that Captain America (whose powers weren’t that far beyond human) died in 1945 and there were no more super-powered beings until Iron Man and the Hulk appeared around 2009. Now we see that there were super-powered people back in the eighties.
I even had the moment I expected them to do the reveal. When Cross had captured them and told his guards to shoot Hank. I expected Hope to object and say something like “That wasn’t our deal, Darren. You agreed not to harm them.”
Right up to the edge and … nothing.
This movie had essentially the same flaw Big Hero Six had; everything was just laid out and then people did it. (Although even in Big Hero Six there was a surprise reveal over the villain.) There was no character growth. It’s not like Scott started out as an absent father who had to learn to connect with his child or a thrill-seeking criminal who had to redeem himself and work within the law. No, his character and motivations were established in the first few minutes and never changed. Same thing with Hank and Hope and even Cross. They were brought into the story, it was explained what they were here to do, and they did it. The only character development in the movie was the change in the relationship between Scott and Paxton.