Road to Infinity War: ANT-MAN Retrospective


Welcome to the Road to AVENGERS: INFINITY WAR. This is my own little retrospective of each of Marvel Studios' films every week of 2018 and by the time I am done looking back at all of the MCU movies, Infinity War will be releasing in theaters in the U.S. on May 4 worldwide on April 27. I've already talked about IRON MAN, THE INCREDIBLE HULK, IRON MAN 2, THOR, CAPTAIN AMERICA: THE FIRST AVENGER, and THE AVENGERS to conclude Phase 1.

Phase 2 has nearly concluded with IRON MAN 3, THOR: THE DARK WORLD, CAPTAIN AMERICA: THE WINTER SOLDIER, GUARDIANS OF THE GALAXY, AVENGERS: AGE OF ULTRON, and finally we have come to the Phase 2 epilogue with ANT-MAN...

The biggest news to come out of the pre-production for ANT-MAN is when Marvel Studios fired writer and director Edgar Wright — after nearly a decade of working on developing this movie —just a few weeks prior to heading into production. This came after Wright had already cast most of the movie, including actor Paul Rudd as the movie's title star. However, it was revealed how Rudd would not be playing Dr. Hank Pym and instead he would be a different comic book version of the tiny hero, Scott Lang. Of course many fans were annoyed at this news, but bringing on actor Michael Douglas as Pym did somewhat help ease the fans as they found out it was more of a passing-of-the-torch type of role for the Ant-Man mantle.

The film took several weeks off after Wright was fired, in a delay that saw the studio searching for a new director while bringing on writer Adam McKay to team-up with Rudd to re-write many parts of its script in order to get it more in-line with what studio executives wanted out of the film's story and tone. Wright still got a story credit for all his work, but so did McKay and Rudd.

It was alleged that Wright's wild, visual style was taking the film in a direction where its tone did not match up well in the overall tone of the Marvel Cinematic Universe. However, several years later and in retrospect and after the drastic tonal change seen in THOR: RAGNAROK, it almost makes a person wonder if that Wright's own style could have been a more refreshing take for the MCU and in ANT-MAN. We will never know, but this will also be discussed for years down the road.

What is done is done, though, and Marvel Studios brought on director Peyton Reed to take the helm and once its trailer was released the film's tone was an MCU match with a bit more humor throughout; courtesy of McKay and Rudd's more comedic tastes mixed with heist movie genre tropes.


Opening on July 17, 2015 to mostly critical acclaim (82% on RottenTomatoes), ANT-MAN is still the second lowest domestic opening weekend to this very day. It opened rather small (no pun intended) with $57 million. When its domestic run ended, ANT-MAN managed to make $180 million, which is only better than CAPTAIN AMERICA: THE FIRST AVENGER ($176M) and THE INCREDIBLE HULK ($134M).

Internationally, crowds went the their theater more so than in the U.S. as it made $339 million.

Worldwide, ANT-MAN took in a total of $515 million. This was on Marvel Studios' smallest production budget of $130 million, meaning it would make enough to get a sequel greenlit and ANT-MAN AND THE WASP would begin development in order to see a much larger role for actress Evangeline Lilly's Hope van Dyne when she dons her own superhero suit as the Wasp.

Written by Daniel Wolf, Founder & Publisher



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