By Dan Aquino
Marvel has begun their summer blockbuster push recently with the new Ant-Man trailer, and a second trailer for the much anticipated Avengers: Age of Ultron. How I wish I could review both of these trailers at the same time, but there’s only so much time in the day. For now, I will focus on the newest addition to the Marvel Universe with Paul Rudd’s Ant-Man. Ant-Man, which some of you might not know, was one of the original Avengers, alongside Thor, Iron-Man, Hulk and The Wasp who might make an appearance in the movie. So how will Marvel treat one of their oldest heroes in his big screen debut?
The trailer opens with a voice over of Michael Douglas, who plays Hank Pym the original Ant-Man, explaining how he sees potential in Paul Rudd’s character, who plays Scott Lang. Scott is in trouble with the law it would seem and Hank is offering him a chance to redeem himself by taking up the mantle of the Ant-Man. The rest of the trailer is a montage of both action scenes and introducing the supporting cast which consists of Corey Stoll as the villain Yellow Jacket, and Evangeline Lilly as Hope van Dyne who as you may or may not know was The Wasp. We also get to see Rudd in the Ant-Man suit shrinking at various locations like a bathtub and on the street I think, it’s kinda hard to tell. But he does actually ride on some flying ants, so at least they’re staying true to the canon of the character.
Altogether this trailer doesn’t offer up much, which I guess is the whole point of a teaser trailer, but I was hoping to see a little more Ant-Man action. The one thing that I will give this trailer is that it seems to have some heart. Rudd’s Scott Lang is a flawed character, which is what has made every other Marvel hero intriguing and I think it will do the same for this pretty much unknown hero. We can also get a sense that this film won’t be so much an origin story as it will be a passing of the torch scenario with Hanky Pym handing over the Ant-Man suit to Lang. If that is the case, I think that can work out greatly for this movie since the hero is relatively unknown anyway.
I’m a big fan of Marvels new ideology of skipping the new coming characters origins stories to focus more on integrating them into future Avengers line ups. I would say judging from this trailer that Ant-Man won’t be Marvel’s best film, but I remember saying that about Guardians of the Galaxy and I don’t think I’ve ever been so wrong about a movie in my life. With the way Marvel has been cranking out hits lately it wouldn’t shock me at all if Ant-Man is a huge success, and I’m hoping to see more from their next trailer.
Dan Aquino is already standing on line for Avengers: Age of Ultron.
The Main Damie 