A teeny tiny little bit too safe...

Rating: 8/10 (20 July 2015)

Ant-Man - 7.5/10 Possibly my favourite Marvel film so far, not that i've seen them all yet. I'm sure everyone is well aware of the problems that they came across during the production of this movie with regards to Edgar Wright and Joe Cornish leaving the project due to creative differences. A lot of us were probably expecting a mess of a film which has lots of contrasting elements that don't really work. Well the end product here is as good as could possibly be expected considering the aforementioned problems.
The best things about this film are the things that (you imagine) Edgar and Joe contributed; Quirky comedy, sharp visuals and original set pieces. The other side of the coin would be the predictable plot, derivative villain and contrived links to the Marvel Cinematic Universe. It may sound like the 'corporate' direction of the film clashes with Joe and Edgar's original script creating a movie that is tonally all over the place, but that is far from the truth. The end product is a solid, if a little too safe, family friendly action film with a lot of jokes that work really well.
The ties into the MCU are tenuous and there really isn't any need for it but that doesn't let the film down too much. Rudd, Douglas and Péna are all superb especially the latter. Péna adds some much needed comedic flair to the Marvel world and i'm sure a lot of people will be hoping he pops up again in the future.
This is probably the first Marvel film i've watched, other than the X-Men films, that I haven't got really bored of halfway through and started clock watching. Guardians of the Galaxy had good moments but on the whole just bored me to tears. This is a much better quirky comedy attempt. Shame they didn't take more risks with it.