Below you will find a spoiler for Captain America: Civil War.
There a lot going on in Captain America: Civil War. There are so many characters to keep track of and so much happening that it’s amazing they did such a good job balancing everything. Somehow, however, they were able to create an amazing action sequence full of nearly every hero the MCU has ever seen. However, the biggest part of that almost didn’t happen. The Russo Brothers had to convince the studio to let Ant-Man implement his distraction.
Within the confines of the Marvel Cinematic Universe, Ant-Man is one of the comic relief characters. The original Ant-Man movie even poked a bit of fun at it’s own existence. It appears that some at Marvel thought that Ant-Man growing into Giant Man might also be viewed as more of a joke than a great action scene. Writer Stephen McFeely told iO9 that the Russo Brothers were convinced the sequence would work, because ultimately, this is all based on comic books.
The brothers had to fight for it. They had to go to the studio and say, ‘No it’s not silly, it’s cool.’ … It’s a comic book movie! In the grounded Winter Soldier, it’s Three Days of the Condor except in the middle there’s a talking robot that tells you HYDRA has been there the whole time. And a lot of people went, ‘That’s a little much.’ No, it’s a comic book movie! That’s okay. Same thing here, except it’s Giant-Man.’
We have to say, The Russo Brothers were right. Is Giant Man a bit funny? Sure he is, but that’s mostly because Paul Rudd is naturally hilarious. His own reaction, which is pretty much "holy crap, I can’t believe it worked," makes you smile and laugh a bit, but then Giant Man begins to kick some serious ass and you get drawn right back into the action. It’s exactly this balance that Stephen McFeely is talking about which Marvel is so good at. They can give you a grounded and serious story, but then populate it with absolutely insane moments, and get away with them, because we’re still dealing with a fantastical world. Thus, creating giants is no big deal.
We know that we’ll see Ant-Man again, as Ant-Man and the Wasp is currently set for a 2018 release. His heroics in Captain America: Civil War will certainly put him in something of a new light, though we don’t expect that will make him any less goofy. What did you think of Giant Man in Civil War? Let us know in the comments.
