Ant-Man Review

There's several references to existing Marvel properties in this film, and I'm not just talking about the Falcon vs. Ant-Man fight scene. The movie opens with the Triskelion under construction and Hank Pym tendering his resignation from SHIELD to Director Carter, Howard Stark, and Mitchell Carson. Later, the Ant team uses a version of Howard Stark's implosion warheads to destroy Pym Technologies. Also, when Scott suggests calling the Avengers, Hank says they might just drop a city on Darren Cross.

I noticed the camera followed Hank's key-chain just a bit too much for a trivial object. I figured there had to be something related to Pym particles in there, like a grenade or a spare suit. I didn't suspect it was just a shrunken down tank. Given how long Hank had probably stored it there, I'm surprised the fuel and battery didn't break down.

Now that we have the Wasp, or will have her in a future movie, we're shaping up to have a fair number of female Avengers come phase 4. By the end of phase 3, we'll have Black Widow, Scarlet Witch, the Wasp, Captain Marvel, Sif, Gamora, and Maria Hill. Add to that Pepper Potts as Rescue, Jane Foster as the new goddess of thunder, Kate Bishop as Hawkeye, and Jessica Drew as Spider-Woman and we'll have more than enough characters for an A-Force movie sometime around 2021. It'd be even better if Marvel migrated Skye, May, and Bobbi over from the TV side.

Another thing I noticed was that the color of the Pym particles matched the color of the suits. The Pym particles used by Hank and his Ant-Man suit were red, while Darren's matched the yellow of the Yellowjacket suit. I doubt the writers came up with any sort of the technical explanation for why this is. It's probably just something done in post to distinguish the good guys from the bad guys.

Mitchell Carson (the Hydra agent Hank punched in the '80s) took off with a sample of Pym particles. Since Agents of SHIELD seems to deal pretty heavily with Hydra, I'm guessing we'll pick up on the consequences of that in that show. Assuming FitzSimmons has the original SHIELD files on Pym particles they might be able to devise some sort of chemical agent to neutralize them. Alternatively, Coulson might to send in a team to blow up whatever samples they have. It's also possible this might tie into an Ant-Man sequel in phase 4, though that's awfully far off.

My dad noticed some flaws in the science behind Pym particles. The movie said they work by decreasing the distance between molecules. That means Scott should still weigh the same when he's shrunken down. That raises the question of how he was able to ride on an ant. Ants can lift many times their own weight, but the difference between an ant and a full grown human is huge. Also, it means Scott should only be able to shrink down so far as he's limited by the size of his molecules. He should not be able to go down to a subatomic size.