6.5/10

Rating: 6/10 (18 August 2015)

Even though this is a lesser entry in the Marvel Canon, "Ant Man" still isn't the failure Iron Man 3 is (at least in my opinion) and provides an average blockbuster with some interesting new visuals.
I feel a bit mixed on the cast. Rudd, Lily and Douglas are definitely the better performances here and even though none of these actors are on their true A game and fall in some missteps they do manage to come through and solidify their place in the MCU and open good possibilities for their future in it. The other side of the cast is really underwhelming in my opinion. I don't see what people are talking about when they mention Pena, I have never been a fan of his to start with but here he is just throwing lines and despite having two bright moments he was just dull for me. Worst of all is Corey Stoll whom I absolutely admire, especially for his brilliant work in House of Cards, but here his performance is one of the worst we have had from the MCU unfortunately.
Visually the film is as always with Marvel overfilled with CGI, yet it manages not to be so bothering and offers some wonderful moments at times. The shrinking sequences especially early on were certainly the best parts of the film. I also applaud the movie for managing to be organically involved in the MCU without ever feeling the need to push it, it stroke a perfect balance and it made for very good moments. Finally the movie isn't as funny as people have made it out to be, there are some laugh out loud moments, but there are many more that fall flat. Overall I almost always had a smile on my face, but I never gasper or rolled on the floor laughing. That smile on the face was definitely kept on it by a very good score, a fluent pace and something always interesting be it visually or story-wise happening on screen. On the other hand, the story is a messy and the characters are uneven, but it never reaches the level of being truly bothering, by the end of the film it does round up things acceptably.
I think that except for Iron Man 3, this is the least palatable film we have been offered by Marvel, it bears much of the same problems the previous films have, yet it doesn't have enough of what made those films really good despite those problems.