I’ve said it before, but Marvel Comics movies are now officially too big. Aside from the size of the individual movies – amplified by the Multiverse and now the Quantum Realm – there are simply too many things to keep up with.
When producer Kevin Feige launched the so-called Marvel Cinematic Universe in 2008, he managed to pull it off with just two films – Iron Man and The Hulk.
Photo: Marvel
Fourteen years on that has expanded into – last year alone – 10 brand new TV series on Disney Plus and four ridiculously enormous films, all pushing in completely different directions.
Who’s going to keep up with all those superheroes and plots?
The answer of course is Feige himself. He’s been reading comics for 40-plus years now and remembers everything. The rest just have to keep up the best we can.
Which brings me to Antman and The Wasp: Quantumania.
Comic book heroes used to be a bit vanilla – straight-arrow, “truth justice and the American way” sort of thing. The colourful characters were the exotic villains.
Pick a trait and give them a costume – The Riddler, The Ice Guy, the Flamethrower – and in the case of Kang the Conqueror, mastery of time. Then send them on their way.
But Marvel heroes were a bit different – they had flaws and made mistakes. They were often the point of the story – arrogant Iron Man, geeky Spiderman, fish out of water Captain America. There was even a chance characters might die.
Not any more though. No-one is so dead they can’t come back. Like Janet Van Dyne – 30 years in the lethal Quantum Realm.
Since Janet is played by the gorgeous Michelle Pfeiffer, you won’t hear me complain if they find a way to get her back.
Her main squeeze Dr Hank Pym - Michael Douglas - is the magician of the group. Imagine Gandalf with some tame giant ants.
Hank and Janet’s daughter Hope has taken inherited Mom’s wasp outfit.
And Hope’s boyfriend is Scott the Antman, played with his usual goofy charm by Paul Rudd.
The Antman’s superpowers are not only getting very small, but also getting enormous. He’s been letting his recent Avengers status go to his head.
He’s also in danger of being upstaged by his family - including his daughter, teenage eco-warrior Cassie.
Through a scientific cock-up – the source of most plots in the MCU – everyone suddenly whizzes through a hole in time and space into the Quantum Realm.
I know you don’t want to know this either, but the Quantum Realm is sort of the opposite of Marvel’s other unwanted bright idea, The Multiverse.
The Multiverse is a stack of more universes than you can possibly know what to do with, while Quantum involves shrinking to the smallest size imaginable. This allows Disney’s digital effects people to go nuts – in some cases, literally I believe.
Imagine every prog rock album cover blended with Pizza With Everything.
Belatedly we should meet the villain of Quantumania, the aforementioned Kang the Conqueror.
Kang is played by respected actor Jonathan Major, breaking new ground for villainy by being American. Generally, villains are played by British actors.
Still, to be fair, he does adopt a British accent throughout.
There are elements of all sorts of other movies including several references to The Wizard of Oz, as our heroes attempt to find the red shoes to get home with, while keeping Kang the Conqueror safely stuck in the Quantum Realm.
You want to tell the audience that no matter what happens to anyone, they’ll be back if Feige can squeeze another few million dollars from them.
