Ant-Man and the Wasp was a big entry in the MCU, and its ending was critical to the entire saga!
2018’s Ant-Man and the Wasp was a sequel to 2015’s Ant-Man, which introduced Scott Lang (Paul Rudd), a former thief. He’d been recruited by former scientist Hank Pym (Michael Douglas) and his daughter Hope (Evangeline Lilly) to steal some technology. That involved Scott using a special suit and Pym particles to shrink himself down and communicate with ants.
In 2016’s Captain America: Civil War, Scott joined Cap’s side against the other Avengers supporting registration. That ended with Scott being arrested and put in jail but later freed by Cap. That all sets up this 2018 sequel.
What happens in Ant-Man and the Wasp?
While under house arrest, Scott accidentally receives a signal from what appears to be Hank’s wife, Janet (Michelle Pfieffer). She had seemingly been killed in a mission decades ago but Hank believes she’s alive and in the Quantum Realm, another dimension existing on a subatomic level.
Scott, Hank, and Hope try to get materials for a Quantum Tunnel device and reach out to black market boss Sonny Burch (Walton Goggins). That has Hope revealing her own shrinking suit that also gives her wings to fly and calls herself the Wasp. The trio is met by Ghost (Hannah John-Kamen), who was experimented on by SHIELD and causes her body to become intangible. She’s trying to reverse her condition, aided by Hank’s former friend Bill Foster (Laurence Fishburne).
What’s the deal with Janet?
In a funny scene, Janet is able to speak through Scott to tell Hope and Hank how to find her, but they only have a couple of hours to open the tunnel. Meanwhile, Burch talks to Scott’s buddies Luis, Dave, and Kurt to get Scott’s location with Ghost learning it as well. This leads the FBI to arrest Hank and Hope.
Scott is able to rescue the two as they get to the lab, and Hank enters the Quantum Realm to find Janet, who’s overjoyed to reunite with him. However, Ghost attacks and we get a wild car chase with them and Burch’s men to gain control of a miniaturized lab that takes them across San Francisco.
Thanks to Scott’s buddies and Scott once more growing to a huge size, Scott and Hope manage to stop Burch. Hank and Janet return from the tunnel, and Janet willingly gives Ava some of her quantum energy to stabilize her. Scott is able to make it home before the FBI does, and while agent Jimmy Woo is suspicious, without any proof, he has to free Scott from his release.
The mid-credits scene is a shocker
So all’s well that ends well, right? Not so much as the mid-credits scene has Hank, Janet, and Hope on a roof while Scott goes into the Quantum Realm to harvest more energy for Ava. He does so, expecting to be in there for just a couple of minutes, calling the others to pull him out…
On the roof, we see three clouds of dust as Thanos “snap” from Avengers: Infinity War has just hit. So the movie ends with Hank, Hope, and Janet all gone while Scott is trapped in the Quantum Realm, thus setting up his huge return to save the day in Avengers: Endgame.
After all the credits, we get one more short but chilling scene. The camera shows a San Francisco decimated by the “Snap” with a TV playing an emergency broadcast while the giant ant Scott left behind to fool the FBI is absently playing the drums.
So, while Ant-Man and the Wasp may have seemed a low-key entry, it turned out to be very consequential to the MCU and, thus, a must-watch.
Ant-Man and the Wasp streaming on Disney+.