Loving the Little Guy: A Tribute to Ant-Man: With Ant-Man and the Wasp: Quantumania on the way, we want to celebrate Scott Lang.
Loving the Little Guy: A Tribute to Ant-Man
Poor Ant-Man. Despite being a staple of the Marvel Cinematic Universe for eight years now, it’s hard to think of a character more maligned than Paul Rudd’s pocket-sized hero.
Due in part to his overtly jovial nature, Scott Lang has long been the butt of many jokes, a scandalous under-appreciation that’s followed Ant-Man through two solo films (or, rather, one solo and one shared film), a Civil War, and an Avengers outing; and even as we approach the conclusion of his trilogy with Ant-Man: Quantumania, it still feels like he’s yet to truly receive his flowers.
It certainly doesn’t help things when you’ve got prominent directors proclaiming Ant-Man to be a “flavor of the week” unworthy of lacing Superman’s boots, yet, while few would argue that Scott Lang has anywhere near the fame or cultural impact of the Clark Kents of this world, despite his diminutive stature, the hero has quietly grown to become one of the most pivotal figures in the entire MCU.
Rewinding the clock back nearly a decade, Ant-Man’s development hell made it downright astounding that the film not only got released but was as thoroughly decent as it was. After Guardians of the Galaxy sold us on a talking raccoon and a bad-ass living tree, the against-all-odds success of a goofy, ant-riding superhero was the point Marvel proved how truly infallible they were.
Conceived at a time that pre-dates the behemoth Marvel Studios would become, and with Edgar Wright unceremoniously parting ways with the project, Ant-Man looked for all the world like their first major flop. With friction mounting and a relative unknown in Peyton Reed drafted in to direct at the last minute, surely Ant-Man would end up a total car crash?
Not quite. While the film was nowhere near the box office smash of many of its predecessors, Ant-Man bucked expectations to become the kind of small-but-mighty success story that perfectly reflected its hero and his place within the ever-expanding universe.
Since then, when Marvel has looked to ramp up the action and stakes, it’s become custom to deploy Ant-Man as some form of superhero palate cleanser. After Avengers: Age of Ultron dropped an entire city on its head, along came Ant-Man to cheer everyone up, and just three years later, the enormous consequences of Infinity War were swiftly followed by Ant-Man and the Wasp – the perfect superhero pick-me-up when a certain purple, raisin-chinned lunatic comes to town.
After such huge, universe-shattering stakes, it certainly makes sense to both literally and figuratively shrink things down. That’s Ant-Man’s thing after all. However, relegating the hero to mere palette cleanser status does him a huge disservice.
In pure character terms, the introduction of Scott Lang gave Marvel exactly the kind of underdog hero they’d been calling out for. In a heightened superhero universe populated by gods, aliens, tech billionaires, and super soldiers, the addition of a divorced ex-con who stumbles upon a shrinking suit while burgling an old man’s house is exactly the kind of lovable loser energy the MCU desperately needed.
Fully leaning into this, Marvel’s casting of everyone’s favorite everyman, Paul Rudd, was a master stroke, giving us an endearing, wholly relatable underdog that almost immediately altered the MCU’s dynamic, opening the door for more grounded, lower-powered heroes to have their time in the sun.
Sure, Guardians of the Galaxy offered up a ragtag collection of lovable losers just a couple of years prior, but as endearing and oddly relatable as Star-Lord and co are, Ant-Man’s world of Baskin Robins, ants, petty thievery, ants, Thomas the Tank Engine play sets, and more ants hits just that little bit different.
While of course a star like Spider-Man doesn’t really need anyone to prep for him, there’s no doubt the very low-key world of Ant-Man’s San Francisco has more than a little of Peter Parker’s New York to it. As such, there’s a definite through line from Scott Lang to Peter’s street-level heroics in Homecoming, and even further into Disney+ shows like WandaVision, She-Hulk, and Ms. Marvel.
Ant-Man/Scott Lang in his Giant-Man form (Paul Rudd)
Photo: Film Frame
©Marvel Studios 2018
Putting tangentially connected MCU stuff like Agents of SHIELD and all the Netflix shows to one side for a moment, the street-level corner of the Marvel Cinematic Universe has undoubtedly been its least explored. With so little of the franchise’s first few years spent on the ground, it was in danger of becoming too enormous for its own good, yet, in one fail swoop, Ant-Man not only altered that, but did so in its own wonderfully unique way.
The first couple of MCU phases were a great many things, but – perhaps Guardians aside – visually unique was not really one of them. However, much like the street-level side of things, the trajectory of the MCU as a visual commodity was turned on its head the moment Ant-Man landed.
Whether it’s the inventive shrinking/growing visual effects deployed throughout Ant-Man and its sequel or the little psychedelic dalliances we’ve had with the Quantum Realm, Scott Lang has had one of the most visually arresting journeys of any Marvel hero to date.
While it was clear that Marvel were willing to loosen up and let their freak flag fly with Guardians, Ant-Man ran with it, turning a potentially naff concept into an entirely new visual approach for the studio.
It’s probably fair to say that the years following Ant-Man’s release were among the most innovative and aesthetically striking of any MCU era, and while it’d be churlish to claim the excessive visual successes of films like Doctor Strange and Thor: Ragnarok were entirely down to one tiny hero, they certainly owe a debt to him on some level.
Ultimately, however, the true importance of Scott Lang, Hope van Dyne, Hank Pym, and all the other assorted members of the Ant-Man fam lies in the part they’ve played in the universe’s overarching narrative. On the surface, each Ant-Man entry appears to serve as some form of light relief, yet look a little closer and their significance becomes far clearer.
From the very concept of a Quantum Realm to its direct use in defeating Thanos in Endgame to the seemingly monumental repercussions of Quantumania as it launches us into Phase Five, the whole trilogy lies at the heart of what the MCU has built and what it aims to achieve going forward.
What those aims are precisely and what nefariousness Jonathan Majors’ Kang has in store for Scott Lang and the gang only time will tell. What is certain, however, is that no matter what his fate, Ant-Man can rest assured that, despite his diminutive size, the indelible mark he’s left on the Marvel Cinematic Universe remains enormous.
