What Makes Ant-Man Worthy of a Solo?

[Shinobi Shaw]

I mean don't get me wrong, I enjoyed the first movie, enjoyed him in Civil War, but still I don't get what makes him the street level hero worthy of a movie in the MCU? Is it because he was one of the OG Avengers?

You have characters like Luke Cage (which everyone should really give season 2 a chance, despite what the critics say), Daredevil and even Iron Fist, all with a multitude of characters and supervillains that are so deserving of a good movie then you have Ant-Man. Who kinda pales in comparison when he doesn't have elements like The Hand, Kingpin, Misty Knight/Colleen Wing in his storyline. Yet he's not regulated to a Netflix show.

I just don't get it.

 

[TheVileOne]

Ant-Man wouldn't have been my first choice for a solo film either, unless it was Hank Pym. But they didn't make a Hank Pym movie. They made a Scott Lang movie, and Scott Lang is NOT an OG Avenger.

Edgar Wright wanted to make a Scott Lang movie from the beginning and that's apparently why they went with his take. Oh well.

 

[Milk Tray Guy]

Honestly, I don't know. I enjoyed Ant-Man and I liked the character in Civil War. Rudd is very entertaining and I thought the whole of the Ant-Man cast were very good. But why they decided to run with it in the first place I have no idea. That said, I'm glad that it turned out as well as it did.

 

[MasterCat]

Ant-Man is not a street-level hero. He's the MCU equivalent of Reed Richards, except less useless. He at least shares Pym particle technology with people he trusts, and I'm sure he'd sell it and so let the world advance into science fiction if the government wasn't untrustworthy. I mean he worked for SHIELD and SHIELD turned out to be controlled by Nazis, so you can see where he's coming from.
Why yes, I am a fan. The combination of the concept and Michael Douglas is great.

 

[Kahran Ramsus]

I never liked Ant-Man in the comics. Hank Pym was always a poor man's Reed Richards, basically around to be the "smart guy" on the Avengers. For the most part he was known as being the guy in the original Avengers lineup that nobody liked (kind of like MCU Hawkeye) and for beating his wife. That's about it. Scott Lang was a little better, but was more of a supporting character for the most part.

From what I understand, Ant-Man (and Scott Lang) was done because Edgar Wright wanted to do it. He then took forever and was eventually canned, but by that point they had progressed too far to just scrap it. Fortunately, it ended up working and the film was well-received. I actually ended up rather liking this take on both Lang and Pym. I thought they were far more interesting than their comics counterparts.

There is no way they could do Ant-Man on Netflix. He requires a ton of expensive special effects to do properly. Daredevil and Luke Cage don't.

 

[Kuwolski]

His powerset is cool and offers numerous possibilities. He is just far more interesting cinematically then Luke Cage, who is an absolute corny-a** bore on Netlfix.. I chalk much of that up to Loeb's leadership and the writing, but there you have it. Ditto for IF. At least we have an awesome Daredevil.

Plus, when Ant-Man makes 600 m for the sequel, his "worthiness" will be clearly apparent, whether you ever thought of the character as headlining a franchise or not.

 

[Ozbridge]

I mean don't get me wrong, I enjoyed the first movie, enjoyed him in Civil War, but still I don't get what makes him the street level hero worthy of a movie in the MCU? Is it because he was one of the OG Avengers?

I think it boils down to whether someone has pitched a character/ idea to Kevin Feige and whether he agrees to it. In Ant-Man's case Edgar Wright pitched it to him back in 2004.

In Defenders' case Drew Goddard pitched a Daredevil movie to Kevin Feige in 2013 after the right is reverted from Fox to Marvel Studios in late 2012. But Marvel wasn't interested in R-rated movies, and Goddard didn't want to make a watered-down version of Daredevil. It was then decided that the character is more suitable as a TV series.

If Goddard had agreed to a PG-13 Daredevil movie Kevin Feige might have agreed to greenlight it.

 

[MbJ]

I don't think outside of a few select A-listers, anyone is "worthy" of a solo movie. It's about what would work and what wouldn't, and clearly the people up top thought the pitch for Ant-Man would work.

 

[SPO2 Dalisay]

I don't think outside of a few select A-listers, anyone is "worthy" of a solo movie. It's about what would work and what wouldn't, and clearly the people up top thought the pitch for Ant-Man would work.

I agree when you break it down only Clark Kent and Bruce Wayne are "worthy" of a major motion picture due to their generational influence. Every other comics character gets a movie due to monatery rights and the right group having a vision to tell a story

 

[psylockolussus]

He is as deserving as She Hulk, Namor and Spider-Woman, all who have yet to get a solo movie. Anyway, I'm fine that he got a solo movie. He could have been just like Hawkeye, Vision and Black Widow without a single solo film.

 

[Spider-Aziz]

"Be glad you faced him full sized"
This quote from the opening scene of the movie sums up why he's worth a solo.

 

[writer0327]

I don't see why he wouldn't be worthy. If you have a good concept and a good script and a director who is talented and passionate about the project, literally anything can be worthy of the big screen.

 

[MasterCat]

"Be glad you faced him full sized"
This quote from the opening scene of the movie sums up why he's worth a solo.

That '89 opening scene was Peyton Reed's best directing of characters. Just perfect.

 

[ironwez20]

He only got a solo cause marvel doesn’t have most of its characters now. If they would of had xmen or ff he’d only make appearances in those movies

 

[Kuwolski]

It's actually a blessing, especially if they do obtain the other character rights. It proved to them that the past doesn't have to dictate the future. What was the less popular property can now be the more popular one for the next generation, etc.

 

[Spiderine]

Do you all remember the list of characters they were teasing to get solo films back in 2005 when Marvel launched this thing? Its literally all they had to work with at the time. They were still slowly gaining film rights to the current lineup of Avengers but they had to start working on some of those projects like Antman.

I am sure after the initial success of Iron Man to the Avengers they were a lot more comfortable doing it.

 

[warhorse78]

I mean don't get me wrong, I enjoyed the first movie, enjoyed him in Civil War, but still I don't get what makes him the street level hero worthy of a movie in the MCU? Is it because he was one of the OG Avengers?

You have characters like Luke Cage (which everyone should really give season 2 a chance, despite what the critics say), Daredevil and even Iron Fist, all with a multitude of characters and supervillains that are so deserving of a good movie then you have Ant-Man. Who kinda pales in comparison when he doesn't have elements like The Hand, Kingpin, Misty Knight/Colleen Wing in his storyline. Yet he's not regulated to a Netflix show.

I just don't get it.

Good question. I would rather see Netflix's DareDevil, Luke Cage or The Punisher have cameos in the Avenger movies instead of Ant-Man. I simply do not understand the appeal.

 

[Spider-Aziz]

That '89 opening scene was Peyton Reed's best directing of characters. Just perfect.

Perfect is a good word for it.

It's actually a blessing, especially if they do obtain the other character rights. It proved to them that the past doesn't have to dictate the future. What was the less popular property can now be the more popular one for the next generation, etc.

And Ant-Man grossed more than most of the X-Men team movies did.

 

[Spiderine]

Characters like Antman and Strange are opening the gateway to alternate dimensions and microverses so they are playing a more appropriate role for the MCU as it stands.

 

[Kahran Ramsus]

And Ant-Man grossed more than most of the X-Men team movies did.

Recent years have shown that how popular the comic books characters were doesn't mean much when it comes to films. The first Doctor Strange movie grossed more than the first Justice League movie.

 

[Spider-Aziz]

Recent years have shown that how popular the comic books characters were doesn't mean much when it comes to films. The first Doctor Strange movie grossed more than the first Justice League movie.

I'm going to cry in a corner over that fact.

 

[Thör-El]

I'm not a big Ant-Man fan either but it was a perfectly okay MCU b movie, Paul Rudd's great casting and it wouldn't have worked as a TV show so I guess they had to go all in. I can see how Edgar Wright pitching it would go a long way towards getting it off the ground too.

Daredevil, Punisher and Jessica Jones are all better characters than Ant-Man but they're almost inherently r rated/18+, their stories would have to be watered down to get film versions and they didn't really need a huge special effects budgets. The Netflix versions were awesome so I can cope without them getting solo films, shame they aren't crossing over with any of the films though.

I can see why they went with Netflix for Luke Cage as well, his prison experiment origin's fairly dark, he's street level, his villains are mostly gritty criminals and his powers don't need a big budget to show off.

Iron Fist is the main one that stands out to me as potentially better as a film than it has been as a show but my judgement might be skewed, the show could've been way better than it was. I guess they figured he was tied up with Daredevil/Luke Cage and that his origin and Kun'Lun have a lot of parallels with Doctor Strange and Kamar'Taj.

I guess they gave Ghost Rider to Agents of Shield because it's not that long since Sony made two films and they left their options open by only showing the Robbie Reyes version and leaving the mythos mostly unexplored.

 

[Chance Jackson]

I mean don't get me wrong, I enjoyed the first movie, enjoyed him in Civil War, but still I don't get what makes him the street level hero worthy of a movie in the MCU? Is it because he was one of the OG Avengers?

You have characters like Luke Cage (which everyone should really give season 2 a chance, despite what the critics say), Daredevil and even Iron Fist, all with a multitude of characters and supervillains that are so deserving of a good movie then you have Ant-Man. Who kinda pales in comparison when he doesn't have elements like The Hand, Kingpin, Misty Knight/Colleen Wing in his storyline. Yet he's not regulated to a Netflix show.

I just don't get it.

Someone(Wright) wanted to do an Antman movie and various scheduling considerations resulted in it taking until the end of phase 2 the super science world of Antman could use the big budget of a movie more than the grounded netflix shows

That said I agree season 2 of luke cage is great and deserves praise

 

[MasterCat]

Marvel Studios wanted Iron Man, Captain America, Thor, Ant-Man & a Hulk film so they could do a comics-accurate Avengers film where they're brought together to fight Loki. Edgar Wright was the first director they found who said "Ant-Man looks good!", but it got held up in development Hell. That's why they wrote in a scene of SHIELD having a frowning army man with a bow into the Thor script.

 

[Milk Tray Guy]

I'm going to cry in a corner over that fact.

Can I join you?