In 'Ant-Man and the Wasp: Quantumania,' Bigger Isn't Always Better

Image via Marvel

Those following the mighty MCU machine know Quantumania arrives with giant-sized expectations after a decidedly up-and-down Phase 4, which made me cautious about how Reed and writer Jeff Loveness (Rick and Morty) would balance the two different narrative masters. The answer to that lingering question is better than I anticipated but makes for some distinctive tonal variance. I reacted to the film similarly to how I reacted to last summer’s Thor: Love & Thunder; I desperately wanted that movie to be darker than it was, and I longed for Quantumania to lean more into its action-comedy roots.

The arrival of Kang into the cinematic side of the MCU (a version or variant of Kang appeared back in 2021’s Loki season finale) brings weight to it that the movie can’t quite support, as the sections featuring Majors come across as deeply serious and feel radically out of place in a film which skews toward silly Rick and Morty–inspired sensibilities (like a glob-like creature Scott and Cassie encounter early on in the Quantum Realm is obsessed with the number of holes humans have). It’s hard to know what we’re supposed to feel at a given moment, and it causes some of the jokes to fall flat or heavier moments not to land. 

It doesn’t help that part of the Van Dyne clan feels like they don’t have much to do. Once they land in the Quantum Realm, Hank and Hope fade into the background as Janet takes the stage. After being woefully underused in Ant-Man and the Wasp, returning an actor as captivating as Pfeiffer to the forefront is a smart choice; I wish she had more to do than just functioning as an exposition machine to fill in audiences about Kang’s history. Speaking of Majors, he elevates material that feels underwritten—especially for what’s supposed to be the next big bad of the MCU. Kang’s motivation doesn’t extend past wanting revenge, but Majors makes you believe that single-tracked fury and rage. Scott fares the best out of everyone, however, thanks to Rudd, who puts up a performance worthy of his beloved Patrick Mahomes; never is there any doubt about Scott’s motivations and Rudd manages to make even the most absurd moments work. 

Visually, Quantumania fares much better. While the CGI remains spotty in some areas, leveraging ILM’s StageCraft technology pioneered on the set of The Mandalorian makes the Quantum Realm feel appropriately vibrant. The production design evokes Star Wars, but it accomplishes its goal of feeling otherworldly and tactile in a way that Marvel sometimes struggles to achieve. Reed also fills the movie with some impressive set pieces, the standout of which is a mid-movie sequence featuring multiple Scotts that elegantly threads the needle between humor and heart in the way previous Ant-Man flicks did. It’s an immediately memorable highlight and reminds me a lot of the piano battle from Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness in its creative and visual execution. 

Some movies just don’t have the foundation to scale up, and that’s the core frustration of Quantumania, which just tries to accomplish too much, too quickly, and gets away from the heart of what’s made prior installments so special. The film serves as a firm reminder that sometimes, bigger isn’t always better. 

Ant-Man and the Wasp: Quantumania hits theaters on Friday, Feb. 17.