Ant-Man And The Wasp

[Bartmanhomer]

I'm surprised nobody didn't make this thread yet. :eek:

The movie was perfect. It has everything. Action, excitement, comedy. The ending was unexpected but great. I'll give it 5 out of 5 stars. :smile

[Tvtyrant]

Antman is my favorite of the Marvel movie franchises, mostly because Paul Rudd is a treasure.

This was a great addition, Antman being light harded while also more grounded then other Marvel properties.

[Starbuck_II]

It was great. Loved the characters and story, they did a good job. Loved every moment.
But that after credit though. Wonder who survived...

[Rodin]

I'm surprised nobody didn't make this thread yet. :eek:



Part of it may be release weirdness. In the UK at least we aren't getting the movie until August, because we have to wait for the World Cup to finish and then for The Incredibles 2 to have a couple weeks so that Disney isn't fighting itself.

Avoiding spoilers is going to be hell. *flees thread*

[Darth Ultron]

I saw it, and it's a great movie. And it has Paul Rudd in it, and he is one of my favorite actors.


Ghost was...ok. She was a classic ''tormented'' villain. Though her back story does make me wonder....why did Hydra never recruit her?

The Ghost is a big change from the comic...and I really liked the ''evil company destroying ghost'' as he was a perfect anti Iron Man villain. But the MCU Ghost is a totally new character.

And surprisingly, again Michael Pina is just fine. I worry they might make a character too goofy and annoying...but again, they hit it right on the nose.

And FBI agent Jimmy Woo? Wow...someone dug that character up from nowhere. But then I'm still shocked someone remembered Hope Van Dyme from the MC2.

The size changing was...awesome. Really shows how powerful it can be...and lots of fun too.

And I'm glad they kept things like the silly ant names...right from the comics.

[Olinser]

It was decent but not fantastic. I enjoyed it but there were some pretty glaring inconsistencies and poor plot choices that kept it from being great (but didn't stop it from being good).

100% the weakest point of the movie was the villains.

Ghost was a weak character with an incredibly generic backstory, little development, and NO redeeming qualities. At the end of the movie when she said she was going to die I literally said to myself, 'so what? You're an ******* and deserve it.'

And the secondary villain was no better. I can't even remember Arms Trader With Ridiculously Fake Accent's real name, he was so generic and forgettable.

And they kind of sort of tried to use the FBI as a pseudo-villain but without somebody like Ross projecting an intimidating personality and slinging believable threats, they were just pointless filler. They turned the lead FBI agent into a punch line, not an actual danger to Scott.

The main problem with both of the villains was they weren't villains. They were plot devices.

But it was still a good movie. The only other nitpick I had was when Hope in particular was slinging around the cars I facepalmed and said, 'WTF? This isn't Black Widow, she has no personal combat superpowers outside the shrinking tech, and we've never been given any real indication that she's superhumanly trained or skilled. She's competent and certainly better than Scott in a fight, but the movie kind of took it to a ridiculous level.

Black Widow gets away with pulling moves like that because her backstory is she was trained from prepubescence to be a killing machine. Hope.... played hide and seek with her mom and kicked her dad out of his own company.

Like the first fight she was in was definitely the high point of the action, compared to the final action sequence

Coupling the shrinking tech with solid close combat moves and her blasters it was a pretty good scene. Ghost showing up kind of ruined it because Hope suddenly forgot how to competently fight, but up until then it was great.

But then at the end diving around, slinging around outside the car and back in the window all WITHOUT the shrinking tech just compromised my suspension of disbelief (although I'm doubly glad they didn't have Scott try to do it - that would have been even MORE ridiculous).


Overall I'd call it a solid 8 out of 10. Wouldn't see it again in theatre but if people like Marvel movies its worth a see.

[Grey_Wolf_c]

why did Hydra never recruit her?

Err... they did? "We weaponized her as an assassin and refused to help cure her condition" sounds like the Hydra!Shield SOP.


Michael Pina

Peña.

GW

[The New Bruceski]

I really enjoyed the movie. Jokes didn't quite land as well as the first one but that's not uncommon in sequels (you can never quite recapture that lightning) and they were still good jokes.

[Leewei]

This one really hit my funny bone. The Scott and Cassie interaction was downright magical. I really loved that big grin Cassie had when she saw her dad on TV.

Also, "There's no such thing as a truth serum!"

Bwahahaha!

[Erys]

It was decent but not fantastic. I enjoyed it but there were some pretty glaring inconsistencies and poor plot choices that kept it from being great (but didn't stop it from being good).

100% the weakest point of the movie was the villains.

Ghost was a weak character with an incredibly generic backstory, little development, and NO redeeming qualities. At the end of the movie when she said she was going to die I literally said to myself, 'so what? You're an ******* and deserve it.'

And the secondary villain was no better. I can't even remember Arms Trader With Ridiculously Fake Accent's real name, he was so generic and forgettable.

And they kind of sort of tried to use the FBI as a pseudo-villain but without somebody like Ross projecting an intimidating personality and slinging believable threats, they were just pointless filler. They turned the lead FBI agent into a punch line, not an actual danger to Scott.

The main problem with both of the villains was they weren't villains. They were plot devices.

Oddly enough, the fact that there were no 'villains' in this movie was something I genuinely appreciated. No world shattering bad guys to beat, just groups with overlapping and conflicting interest creating zany events for me to enjoy. :smallcool:

Two thumbs up.

[Darth Ultron]

It was a nice change of pace to have a superhero movie with no real villain. The heros are trying to save someone...and even themselves, but they are not ''just fighting a bad guy'' as they are superheros.

[Callos_DeTerran]

I really enjoyed the movie and I think the strongest point in its favor is something very simple...there was just a great feeling of chemistry among everyone and it was a fun, zany story that made good use of the powers on display for some fun action sequences.

I also really enjoyed Ghost's motivation and her compatriot's effect on her morality.

[chainer1216]

Loved the movie, the jokes were funny, the action was great, and the heart warming moments got me right in the feels.

[The Glyphstone]

Count me as another person who thought the lack of a 'villain' was a solid point in the movie's favor. The closest thing was the arms dealer, but he didn't really matter all that much. Ghost was a solidly non-villain antagonist, and her 'superpower' made for pretty cool fight scenes paired against the shrinking suits - much better than AM1's shrinker-vs-shrinker mirror match. Ultimately being a father-daughter movie with two biological father-daughter pairings on the "pro" side, and one adopted father-daughter pairing (Bill doesn't say it outright, but the parallel is pretty obvious) on the "an" side, with Sonny and Woo wandering into the plot at irregular intervals for comedic purposes, an unambiguous bad guy wasn't needed.

[Dragonus45]

I don't mind the lack of a villain, but I do mind the lack of personality from the not villains in the movie. Or from ghost really, Goliath had plenty of personality.

[Reddish Mage]

I disagree on Ghost being a non-villain anatogonist. If by villain you mean she has evil intentions (http://writerandproud.blogspot.com/2015/05/the-difference-between-villain-and.html) wanting to cure herself immediately without any care of the consequences (murdering Janet) definitely counts.

I think the ending was predictable, especially as they’ve been going for comedy, but things could easily have turned tragic had Ghost not been stopped.

We also see that she couldn’t be reasoned with, her own life and pain was more important for her than someone else, even though it turned out the one person she wanted to kill turned out to know how to cure her.

[Pex]

I enjoyed the movie and appreciated the humor, but I wasn't wowed. I think the reason is because there was no threat. The bad guys had their reasons and interests, but their reasons and interests boil down to Henry Pym exists. They want his technology and that's the only danger. If Hank Pym did not exist the bad guys wouldn't be do anything we'd be concerned about to hope someone else stops them. The mob-boss wannabe just wants to sell the technology. Ghost just wants to be cured. Ant-Man and Wasp are merely gimmicks to justify the movie. It was a Saturday Morning Cartoon episode. The after-credits scene was more interesting just for the context.

[Alabenson]

I disagree on Ghost being a non-villain anatogonist. If by villain you mean she has evil intentions (http://writerandproud.blogspot.com/2015/05/the-difference-between-villain-and.html) wanting to cure herself immediately without any care of the consequences (murdering Janet) definitely counts.

I think the ending was predictable, especially as they’ve been going for comedy, but things could easily have turned tragic had Ghost not been stopped.

We also see that she couldn’t be reasoned with, her own life and pain was more important for her than someone else, even though it turned out the one person she wanted to kill turned out to know how to cure her.

I tend to agree with the view that Ghost was very much a villain here, albeit one with sympathetic motivations. Keep in mind, in addition to Ghost's willingness to kill Janet if it meant saving herself, she would have also been quite willing to kidnap Cassie had Foster not stopped her.

[LaZodiac]

I mean if you're in pain every day, due to your molecular structure literally tearing itself apart, I'd be a little pissy too.

I think, given the fact that the instant she's cured she chills right the hell out, it's fair to say Ghost is not really a VILLAIN persay.

[Bartmanhomer]

Ghost is a one shot villain. She was only a minor villain who doesn't really play a leading role throughout the entire movie. I'll be surprised if she returns to Ant-Man 3. But chances of returning is very slim.

[ben-zayb]

...it's totally fine shrinking a car with people on it, but you can't do that same thing with the building?

[Leewei]

...it's totally fine shrinking a car with people on it, but you can't do that same thing with the building?No explanation given, however, I think the ants were still inside. It may have simply been a matter of convenience -- anyone shrunk in either vessel would be stuck that way until it returned to full scale.

Hank Pym was in the Quantum Realm when the building shrank. As written, it isn't merely a super-tiny state, but an entirely separate dimension, having its own rules (including tardigrade fields, time vortices, and a whole lot of psychedelia). He wasn't able to return until the building was back at full scale.

TL/DR; by fridge logic, the protagonists just want to avoid being trapped in a building.

[Kitten Champion]

I mean if you're in pain every day, due to your molecular structure literally tearing itself apart, I'd be a little pissy too.

I think, given the fact that the instant she's cured she chills right the hell out, it's fair to say Ghost is not really a VILLAIN persay.

She could probably have threatened Bill Foster if she really wanted to get results - Foster didn't come across as having a boundless will and nerves of steel - but as we see they genuinely cared for one another after having this relationship for most of her life, and he knew she'd see reason with some gentle prodding.

That's what separates her morally from Killmonger, despite having several similarities - a sympathetic straight-forward motivation, intense covert-ops training which somewhat warped their personality around it, a sense of betrayal stemming from their parent(s) death - Ghost still knew her ends didn't justify any means necessary and really didn't intend any harm to the protagonists beyond the FBI catching them. She retained most of her humanity, in circumstances which would crack most people.

Sure, Janet was likely going to die as a result, but I think I too would be willing to try and believe otherwise if every moment of my life was agony. Speaking as someone who's dealt with chronic pain, it does make you hasty and reckless. Seeing her, for instance, embiggening the lab at the end without carefully clearing the vicinity, that's the kind of thing I can really see someone doing in the cusp of finally relieving this ever-present pain.

[Friv]

...it's totally fine shrinking a car with people on it, but you can't do that same thing with the building?

It appeared that when the building shrank, its power went offline; when it got shrunk in the middle of Hank's mission, he couldn't find the beacon any more. Maybe it was just that it shrank much more totally than the car did, so it couldn't draw on whatever plotonium it was using to stay powered wherever they stuck it?

[Dr.Samurai]

I liked the movie a lot. I went to see it solely based on the trailer, which looked creative and like lots of fun and I think the movie delivered. My gripes are similar to the first movie; Michael Pena's character is annoying and seems out of place every time he's there. Just seems tonally off from the rest of the movie (same with the other two sidekicks to a lesser extent). The villain was lackluster.

I thought the movie was touching though, in particular the idea of people yearning to save a loved one. It was a little wonky that they didn't explain why Pym and Hope believed she would still be alive all these decades later in the quantum realm. I mean... how does one breathe and eat and drink when they are the size of a sub-particle? But, it is what it is.

The miniature car scenes and the Giant-Man were all great.

They're not implying that Scott is trapped in the quantum realm right? Or are they? Because I kind of thought they were at first because he's asking them to beam him back up but they've been Thanos'd. But Scott was the one that figured out how to return from the quantum realm in the first place so presumably he can do it again right? I'm guessing the shock value was that they were all killed after finally reuniting with the mother.

[Olinser]

I liked the movie a lot. I went to see it solely based on the trailer, which looked creative and like lots of fun and I think the movie delivered. My gripes are similar to the first movie; Michael Pena's character is annoying and seems out of place every time he's there. Just seems tonally off from the rest of the movie (same with the other two sidekicks to a lesser extent). The villain was lackluster.

I thought the movie was touching though, in particular the idea of people yearning to save a loved one. It was a little wonky that they didn't explain why Pym and Hope believed she would still be alive all these decades later in the quantum realm. I mean... how does one breathe and eat and drink when they are the size of a sub-particle? But, it is what it is.

The miniature car scenes and the Giant-Man were all great.

They're not implying that Scott is trapped in the quantum realm right? Or are they? Because I kind of thought they were at first because he's asking them to beam him back up but they've been Thanos'd. But Scott was the one that figured out how to return from the quantum realm in the first place so presumably he can do it again right? I'm guessing the shock value was that they were all killed after finally reuniting with the mother.

He didn't 'figure out' how to return. He realized he had a Plot Coupon that could return him. That being said, given that both he and Wasp were using them as weapons, it's entirely reasonable that he may have another Plot Coupon to return him to normal size.

[Darth Ultron]

...it's totally fine shrinking a car with people on it, but you can't do that same thing with the building?

Hope does make a quick comment that the car is like a suit. So the cars have the tech in them.

There is no reason they can't be in a shrunk building, in theory. It would just be the matter of making a building with all that tech in it. Though I'd guess you would need to make a full sized building with the tech, and that would take lots of effort and time.


Well, Scott is not exactly ''stuck'' in the Quantum Realm, it's more like time is movie frozen. Ant Man and the Wasp happens right before Infinity War, and the Scene happens right at the end of Infinity War. Ant Man will pop out in Infinity War 2, though likely only a short time will have passed.

[Rakaydos]

Well, Scott is not exactly ''stuck'' in the Quantum Realm, it's more like time is movie frozen. Ant Man and the Wasp happens right before Infinity War, and the Scene happens right at the end of Infinity War. Ant Man will pop out in Infinity War 2, though likely only a short time will have passed.


I actually think this is a lead in to have GHOST in Infinity war 2.
The entire reason for the trip to the quantum realm that time was to get healing particles to cure Ghost for good. But Ghost doesnt have them, so will be regaining her powers. She also has an uncanny ability to track down the Pyms, so has a reasonable chance to find the setup and rescue Scott, fairly early in Infinity war 2.

[The Glyphstone]

Speaking of shrinking - why did they decide now was the time to have Pym Particles start playing nice with biology, in Scott passing out from lack of oxygen as a giant? Wouldn't shrinking have the same effect with comparatively super-sized oxygen molecules being impossible to absorb into their miniature lungs?

[Grey_Wolf_c]

Speaking of shrinking - why did they decide now was the time to have Pym Particles start playing nice with biology, in Scott passing out from lack of oxygen as a giant? Wouldn't shrinking have the same effect with comparatively super-sized oxygen molecules being impossible to absorb into their miniature lungs?

It wasn’t lack of air, it was increased energy needs. It takes him a lot more energy to move his increased size. They mention early on that he slept for three days straight after the airport fight.

Re: trapped in the quantum realm, last time he escaped by using the size increase disk on his regulator. But the new suits don’t have regulators anymore, so he might not have the option anymore.

Grey Wolf

[Jeivar]

Yeah, I overall quite liked it. It's nice to get back to a bit of relative light-heartedness, and to have an antagonist with dimensions. The size-changes also make for some quite unique fight scenes.

I'm still not impressed with Hope's bad attitude, though.

As a side note, does anyone else think the slashfic writers are going to have an absolute field day with . . .

Janet hijacking Scott's body in that one scene?

[Dr.Samurai]

@Olinser: He very much "found out" how to escape the Quantum Realm. No one else thought it was possible. No one told him how to do it. That's not the primary purpose of the size-increase disks or the regulator, and it's not obvious that they would work together that way or at least not obvious enough for the inventor of both to give it a shot and go look for his lost wife.

@Grey_Wolf_c: I thought the new suit does have a regulator on it. Isn't that what's kind of going bonkers throughout the movie and causing Scott to grow and shrink to unwanted sizes? Or was that an old suit?

@Rakaydos: But I don't think he is trapped and needs rescue from the Quantum Realm. There's a sort of "disintegrating Dr. Manhattan" thing going on there; Reassembling myself was the first trick I learned. It didn't kill Osterman. Did you really think it would kill me? Scott Lang already escaped the Quantum Realm and inspired the entire sequel, so I don't think he's stuck there. I think he'll just pop back out and realize what must have happened when he learns about the events of Infinity War.

[Grey_Wolf_c]

@Grey_Wolf_c: I thought the new suit does have a regulator on it. Isn't that what's kind of going bonkers throughout the movie and causing Scott to grow and shrink to unwanted sizes? Or was that an old suit?

The new suits have a system to change sizes but not a regulator. The regulator of the first film was a wheel. The new ones have a digital thing. The film had a line of dialogue suggesting they weren’t the same. I’d have to watch it again to give you proper quotes though. Heck, I’d have to watch it again just to confirm if he was wearing the new or the old suit in the mid credits scene.

Bottom line is that they can have it both ways: they can make it a minor issue he solves immediately in the next film, or they show Wang picking him up because what’s left of the Avengers need all the help they can get.

Grey Wolf

[LaZodiac]

Yeah, Goliath mentions that if they have the suit's regulator, they could track Hope. They mention "well since Scott destroyed the old suit, and this doesn't have a regulator, we're ****ed". That's the entire point of that scene. The new suit lacks a regulator, so Scott can't put a size disc into it to fix this problem. So he IS stuck.

[Grey_Wolf_c]

Yeah, Goliath mentions that if they have the suit's regulator, they could track Hope. They mention "well since Scott destroyed the old suit, and this doesn't have a regulator, we're ****ed". That's the entire point of that scene. The new suit lacks a regulator, so Scott can't put a size disc into it to fix this problem. So he IS stuck.

... unless of course he is wearing his old suit since the new one is so reliably unreliable.

GW

[LaZodiac]

... unless of course he is wearing his old suit since the new one is so reliably unreliable.

GW

It's the new suit. They fixed the suit since "let's save Hope!" is finished as a distraction for Pym, so he can focus on the suit.

[JadedDM]

Even if his suit does have a regulator and he does have an enlarging disc on him, keep in mind he entered the quantum realm through a portal this time, not by shrinking himself, so it might not work.

That being said, I have my own theory on why this happened.

Remember what Janet said, about avoiding time vortexes while down there? What do you think would happen if Scott fell into one of these vortexes, being trapped down there and with no other recourse? What would happen if he went back in time to before the Snapture? Could this play a big role in Avengers 4?

[LaZodiac]

Even if his suit does have a regulator and he does have an enlarging disc on him, keep in mind he entered the quantum realm through a portal this time, not by shrinking himself, so it might not work.

That being said, I have my own theory on why this happened.

Remember what Janet said, about avoiding time vortexes while down there? What do you think would happen if Scott fell into one of these vortexes, being trapped down there and with no other recourse? What would happen if he went back in time to before the Snapture? Could this play a big role in Avengers 4?

I'm thinking future, not past, but yes that, that's an obvious tell for the next film.

[Friv]

There were set photos leaked that showed that Avengers 4 has rebuilt the Battle of New York set, and Ant-Man is there. It was assumed that this was either Doctor Strange Time Stone stuff, or Tony building more of his memory-holograms, but with the time vortices it seems plausible that Ant-Man is actually going to be time travelling, yeah.

[Kitten Champion]

There were set photos leaked that showed that Avengers 4 has rebuilt the Battle of New York set, and Ant-Man is there. It was assumed that this was either Doctor Strange Time Stone stuff, or Tony building more of his memory-holograms, but with the time vortices it seems plausible that Ant-Man is actually going to be time travelling, yeah.


They've apparently cast someone as an older Cassie Lang. Which isn't surprising given how much foreshadowing they put into her character's dialogue in this movie, and that Avengers 4 is going to involve time manipulation shenanigans in some fashion.

So, we're very likely going to get a scene with Scott meeting future Cassie as her Stature persona, with however that fits into the wider narrative of restoring the universe.

What I'm wondering is whether this future version of Cassie is going to be more of an anti-hero-type character of some kind. Given that she's displayed a fair amount of distaste for the police here - albeit in a childish fashion - that her life post-Snapture could be quite hard, and that it would provide a Marty McFly kind of moment with Scott reacting to this unexpected development in his adorable little girl.

[Aotrs Commander]

Well, I just got back from seeing it (delayed a month again in the UK, seem to be getting that a lot this summer). I enjoyed it very much. I absolutely think that making this a self-contained, personal, comparitively low-stakes movie was the right choice, given Infinity War. A nice, cheeful change of pace.

Nice to see Goliath, as well, at least in as much the only thing I know about the character was his pointless, stupid death in Civil War (I know nothing about him and it still offends me), so good on 'em for giving him something resembling dignity this time around.




Also... Wouldn't it be nice if the MCU stuck around long enough for Abby Ryder Fortson to play an older Cassie as... *wikis* either one of her codenames? 'Cos that would be awesome.

[ben-zayb]

Also... Wouldn't it be nice if the MCU stuck around long enough for Abby Ryder Fortson to play an older Cassie as... *wikis* either one of her codenames? 'Cos that would be awesome.IIRC Marvel's Cassie Lang......already had a teenage version for Avengers 4, which is supposed to be played by Emma Fuhrmann.

[Aotrs Commander]

IIRC Marvel's Cassie Lang......already had a teenage version for Avengers 4, which is supposed to be played by Emma Fuhrmann.

Yeah, but that wasn't sort of what I was driving at.
I mean, you sort of can't age up a ten year old for presumable future shanigans... But in another 5-10 years... Assuming the MCU lasts that long.

Really, it occurred to me as I was ruminating on how long the MCU can go on before it goes all pear-shaped, as it might do if it goes on long enough. There probably will come to a point where it want to go out on a high note (before the inevitable reboots) or risk slowly slipping into dreck. I hope that is still aways off, but considering everything these days, you do wonder.

[Rogar Demonblud]

Given the amount of blowback from them siding with Cernovich and Co against James Gunn, to the point they've maybe destroyed the Guardians side of the franchise (Bautista has overtly stated he will walk, Diesel and Cooper have dropped hints that they'll go with other studios' projects), that day may be a lot closer than you think. Especially if the discussed boycott of everything Disney (under the guise of Princess Protection) grows some legs.

And if it's true that Evans and Hemsworth have voiced displeasure direct to the execs instead of on social media, well, you suddenly have the potential for a much bigger problem.

[Aotrs Commander]

Given the amount of blowback from them siding with Cernovich and Co against James Gunn, to the point they've maybe destroyed the Guardians side of the franchise (Bautista has overtly stated he will walk, Diesel and Cooper have dropped hints that they'll go with other studios' projects), that day may be a lot closer than you think. Especially if the discussed boycott of everything Disney (under the guise of Princess Protection) grows some legs.

And if it's true that Evans and Hemsworth have voiced displeasure direct to the execs instead of on social media, well, you suddenly have the potential for a much bigger problem.

Hrm. Hadn't realised it had got that bad.

How utterly laughable the death knell might be due to human stupidity and reactivity not related to anything whatsoever.



An increasing number of dayas, I think Thanos was wrong, but only because he didn't go quite far enough, at least with regard to humanity...

[Giggling Ghast]

Hrm. Hadn't realised it had got that bad.

The petition to re-hire James Gunn has 380,525 signatures as of writing this reply.

https://www.change.org/p/marvel-re-hire-james-gunn

[Olinser]

The petition to re-hire James Gunn has 380,525 signatures as of writing this reply.

https://www.change.org/p/marvel-re-hire-james-gunn

Right because people really care about online petitions where its as easy to forge signatures as Twitter followers.

If they were going to re-hire him it would have been weeks ago when there was a huge amount of coverage and a LOT of people talking about it. He's gone, deal with it.

[Rogar Demonblud]

Actually, the issues seem to be "Don't risk annoying Trump when a multi-billion merger is in his regulatory hands" and contractual law--Gunn's contract keeps him at Disney unless certain things are met, and decade old social media posts don't count. Also, the person who apparently panicked and did the midnight firing is a 70-something year old guy who was already supposed to have been mandatorily retired and allegedly didn't have the legal authority to fire Gunn in the first place.

The whole thing is a mess, and is getting worse because Cernovich is doubling down by going after Patton Oswalt (again), Sarah Silverman (again), Tom Hanks and Steven Spielberg, among others. TH and SS have already threatened libel suits unless immediate retractions are very publicly made.

[LaZodiac]

Right because people really care about online petitions where its as easy to forge signatures as Twitter followers.

If they were going to re-hire him it would have been weeks ago when there was a huge amount of coverage and a LOT of people talking about it. He's gone, deal with it.

Can't find the link, but there was an article talking about how he's being brought on for consultation and how, if he were to direct from that roll, all the credit would go to the actual hired director even though he did the work.

So he's not gone, he's just being quietly rolled back in now that Disney's realized they did a stupid.

[Reddish Mage]

Can't find the link, but there was an article talking about how he's being brought on for consultation and how, if he were to direct from that roll, all the credit would go to the actual hired director even though he did the work.

So he's not gone, he's just being quietly rolled back in now that Disney's realized they did a stupid.

I was just reading about Cernovich and apparently, he is basically a professional troll who likes to find ways to get people fired who opposes his political views. He does so by digging up old tweets out of context and blasting people's bosses, publishers, etc. The other is twisting statements to be much worse, especially twisiting comments to carry implications of pedophilia. James Gunn is unusual in having actually intended to say the stuff he said, only ten years ago as a form of calling attention to himself.

The guy has gotten several journalists fired, and others reprimended at various journalist outlets. I'm not sure how many other non-journalist celebrities with active twitter feeds he has gone after. Responding to a guy like that by firing an employee is essentially troll feeding dialed up to 11.

[ben-zayb]

Might now be the best time to point towards the forum rules section?

From Disney's PR perspective: I can see why they did what they did, although I can also see why a lot of people see this as an exaggerated or overcorrective response.

I'm pretty confident Disney execs already were aware of those tweets way before this fiasco, if not Gunn himself telling the execs about those himself before the start of Guardians. Their problem now was it was brought out to the public eye, and that hurts Disney's branding especially because of their target market. Likewise, I won't be surprised if any other celeb gets the same treatment if their own past issues gets brought up to the public (such as Batista's WWE locker room shenanigans).

[Bartmanhomer]

*eating popcorn watching the drama unfolds.*

[Rogar Demonblud]

I'm pretty confident Disney execs already were aware of those tweets way before this fiasco

They were quite aware of them. The issue came up twice before he was hired to do Guardians, he issued full apologies both times. Plus, what else would you expect from a mainstay of Troma?

The sad thing is that all of those 'jokes' together add up to maybe two episodes of South Park.

[Giggling Ghast]

I guess Disney is sticking to its guns. (https://variety.com/2018/film/news/james-gunn-guardians-of-the-galaxy-disney-firing-1202907016/) No pun intended.

Well, I’m not watching Guardians of the Galaxy Volume 3, then. I swore that I wouldn’t if Gunn wasn’t re-hired. I don’t believe it will be a good film without his involvement, and I refuse to reward Disney for bowing to the whims of a jerk like Cernovich.

It’ll be the first Marvel film I’ve missed (not counting the screening of Inhumans at IMAX).

[Draconi Redfir]

You think ant-man was spared the thanos-snap because he was in the quantum realm? or was he just one of the lucky 50%?

[Darth Ultron]

Either way, he IS in Infinity War part two.

The idea is he gets, er, quantum energy, and helps beat Thantos....at least until Captain Marvel flies over and wiggles her pinky finger and saves the day.....

[Tvtyrant]

You think ant-man was spared the thanos-snap because he was in the quantum realm? or was he just one of the lucky 50%?
That would be interesting. Thanos was clearly aiming for macroscopic sentient life so it is possible.

[Olinser]

You think ant-man was spared the thanos-snap because he was in the quantum realm? or was he just one of the lucky 50%?

Just lucky. It was a short scene when it happened in the movie proper but there is no indication ANYTHING protects from it. As far as this group goes - small sample size sure, but 4 out of 4 only has a 1 in 16 chance of happening, SOMEBODY from that group was bound to be lucky.

[ben-zayb]

That presents an interesting idea. What did Thanos cover with the snap? Just humanoid sapient life, including humanoid aliens? Just sapient life, like ones seen in plenty of vertebrates and cephalopods? Sentient life, like in most animals? Eukaryotic life, which covers animals, plants, and fungi? Or all life, which includes bacteria? How about viruses and prions?

Did Thanos remove 50% of each species? Each genus? Family? Order, class, phylum, kingdom, domain?

[Olinser]

That presents an interesting idea. What did Thanos cover with the snap? Just humanoid sapient life, including humanoid aliens? Just sapient life, like ones seen in plenty of vertebrates and cephalopods? Sentient life, like in most animals? Eukaryotic life, which covers animals, plants, and fungi? Or all life, which includes bacteria? How about viruses and prions?

Did Thanos remove 50% of each species? Each genus? Family? Order, class, phylum, kingdom, domain?

Whatever he felt like doing. I mean at this point its been beaten to death that the plan is utterly idiotic and solves nothing, so I doubt he's really thought very deeply about it.

I assume he just did 50% of sentient life and roughly calibrated it within each species equal amounts of each sex (in sexually dimorphic species) died so they wouldn't be in danger of dying out, and let it go at that.

[Draconi Redfir]

That presents an interesting idea. What did Thanos cover with the snap? Just humanoid sapient life, including humanoid aliens? Just sapient life, like ones seen in plenty of vertebrates and cephalopods? Sentient life, like in most animals? Eukaryotic life, which covers animals, plants, and fungi? Or all life, which includes bacteria? How about viruses and prions?

Did Thanos remove 50% of each species? Each genus? Family? Order, class, phylum, kingdom, domain?

I did see second-hand a tweet or something that Animals were also affected, and considering Groot, likely also Sapient Plants, but probably not Non-sapient plants since the avengers were in the middle of a small jungle and no plants vanished.

So Elk, Tigers, Bears, Beavers, Rhinos, half of them are gone. Probably more then a few species on the endangered species list again.

Another question, is it half of ALL life, meaning there is potential for some species to be 100% wiped out, or half of EACH life, meaning that in a species of six, three will always remain.

[Kitten Champion]

Thanos' stated goal was to halve the burden of the universe to improve the quality of life for other half. If he destroyed half of the environment and food supply along with it, it would be pretty contrary to that end.

Plus, in the comics, it's clearly just sapient life because that was all that Death cared about for whatever metaphysical reasons.

[Draconi Redfir]

Thanos' stated goal was to halve the burden of the universe to improve the quality of life for other half. If he destroyed half of the environment and food supply along with it, it would be pretty contrary to that end.

Plus, in the comics, it's clearly just sapient life because that was all that Death cared about for whatever metaphysical reasons.

it's not JUST food though, it's things like metals, stone, and space. Not to mention with Plants not affected, then that's still more food for everyone.


With half the Deer gone, then there is twice as much Grass for Deer to eat, and twice as much room for them to expand into. Not only that, but since half the wolves are gone, there are fewer predators to hunt them down, and more space that was previously inhabited by other animals for the Deer to expand into, thus allowing for the Deer to expand further and populate a larger area.

and with half the demand for iron, less iron mining is needed, meaning iron reserves will last longer. Half the population in a town will mean each individual can have more land, allowing them to use it to grow more crops and thus more food, etc etc etc.

Even if the snap DID affect animals, it's still a "Benefit" for the remainder, as Food was not the only resource that was being drained.

[Eldan]

Thanos' entire theory doesn't work anyway. I mean, look at it at a smaller scale. If you take a company and kill half the employees at random, is it now more productive? Half the people means that 50% of the producers are gone, too. And there's a 50% chance that every person with an important skill is now gone, too.

[Giggling Ghast]

It’s likely that Thanos’ snap killed more than half the universe, true. It may have even destroyed some species, depending on circumstances.

Still, try telling that to a madman fixated on the idea that overpopulation was the universe’s biggest problem.

[Celestia]

I did see second-hand a tweet or something that Animals were also affected, and considering Groot, likely also Sapient Plants, but probably not Non-sapient plants since the avengers were in the middle of a small jungle and no plants vanished.

So Elk, Tigers, Bears, Beavers, Rhinos, half of them are gone. Probably more then a few species on the endangered species list again.

Another question, is it half of ALL life, meaning there is potential for some species to be 100% wiped out, or half of EACH life, meaning that in a species of six, three will always remain.
Well that is damn stupid. Biospheres exist in a delicate balance brought about by mutually dependant adaptations. Nature requires a cycle of life and death, and all species save apex predators are kept in balance by predation. If you deplete the population of one species, then everything that species ate becomes overpopulated and everything those species eat becomes dangerously underpopulated, and then the biosphere is thrown into chaos. Wiping out half of all the animals would lead to widescale environmental catastrophe and could potentially kill the planet.

[Draconi Redfir]

Well that is damn stupid. Biospheres exist in a delicate balance brought about by mutually dependant adaptations. Nature requires a cycle of life and death, and all species save apex predators are kept in balance by predation. If you deplete the population of one species, then everything that species ate becomes overpopulated and everything those species eat becomes dangerously underpopulated, and then the biosphere is thrown into chaos. Wiping out half of all the animals would lead to widescale environmental catastrophe and could potentially kill the planet.

ehh, given time they would adapt. New predators would move in from other regions, or overpopulated prey would expand into regions where the prey was hunted to near-extinction. it's happened before.

[Eldan]

Well that is damn stupid. Biospheres exist in a delicate balance brought about by mutually dependant adaptations. Nature requires a cycle of life and death, and all species save apex predators are kept in balance by predation. If you deplete the population of one species, then everything that species ate becomes overpopulated and everything those species eat becomes dangerously underpopulated, and then the biosphere is thrown into chaos. Wiping out half of all the animals would lead to widescale environmental catastrophe and could potentially kill the planet.

Nah, ecosystems are rarely long-term stable. They collapse all the time. They just get back up.

[Reddish Mage]

Another question, is it half of ALL life, meaning there is potential for some species to be 100% wiped out, or half of EACH life, meaning that in a species of six, three will always remain.

Thanos doesn't believe that lack of bio-diversity is a problem he thinks the problem is a glut of overpopulation of "life" in the broadest sense.


Thanos' entire theory doesn't work anyway. I mean, look at it at a smaller scale. If you take a company and kill half the employees at random, is it now more productive? Half the people means that 50% of the producers are gone, too. And there's a 50% chance that every person with an important skill is now gone, too.

I think objections to his ridiculous theory are stale at this point, but this is an odd one. The fact that something doesn't work on a small scale is meaningless when you scale it up to the macroeconomy (macroeconomics is not microeconomics). Sure, some companies will collapse, but others will grow after mass depopulation (corporate recruitment for skilled workers, by your logic, will be in high demand). Now simply removing half the population will certainly not make a planet a paradise for long, because repopulation dynamics tend to be swift, but that's entirely something else.


Well that is damn stupid. Biospheres exist in a delicate balance brought about by mutually dependant adaptations. Nature requires a cycle of life and death, and all species save apex predators are kept in balance by predation. If you deplete the population of one species, then everything that species ate becomes overpopulated and everything those species eat becomes dangerously underpopulated, and then the biosphere is thrown into chaos. Wiping out half of all the animals would lead to widescale environmental catastrophe and could potentially kill the planet.

I think that's overly dramatic (and surprisingly reliant on the logic of a small company being destroyed when key employees are removed). Some rare species with low birth numbers will be destroyed and perhaps it follows that we get ecosystem collapse on the local level...that means local mass extinction...but complete destruction of the biosphere?

Life on Earth have survived many a catastrophe that resulted in mass extinction and depopulation...far worse than a 50% random kill switch. It can survive the snap.

To be clear, I'm not saying a massive loss of biodiversity is a good thing (but Thanos might be depending on how you interprete the snap).

[Malimar]

It just occurred to me: if half of everybody's gut flora died in the Snap, for a little while won't there be a lot of, like, diarrhea?

Picture Thanos sitting on his porcelain throne, twisted in agony, yelling "I REGRET IT".

[Reddish Mage]

It just occurred to me: if half of everybody's gut flora died in the Snap, for a little while won't there be a lot of, like, diarrhea?

Picture Thanos sitting on his porcelain throne, twisted in agony, yelling "I REGRET IT".

No, because population recovery dynamics works very quickly, within a generation or two the population is mostly or entirely recovered, potentially with an overshoot.

For bacteria a couple of generations might take minutes to something north of half an hour, during which time Thanos might not be eating.

The overshoot is more a problem, maybe not for the bacteria so much as for everything that does so throughout every sort of ecosystem. This is especially relevant since the whole point was to tame overpopulation. Uneven repopulation dynamics can also wreck havoc with ecosystems (see above).

I see only two real reasons why the snap won’t work: 1. the whole malthusian premise of overpopulation being the main unhappiness problem isn’t very well established and 2. repopulation normally happens extremely quickly and often with a population explosion that brings them over the previous mark, exacerbating the very problem Thanos claims to have solved.

Other issues, biodiversity, killing off key people, or key organisms, key species, or problems caused by mass population reduction, I’m not seeing any problem, at least not if your looking at things on the scale of the entire universe (which is what Thanos is doing). Thanos doesn’t care if he kills off an entire planet (i.e. Xandar) since he’s looking for what’s good for the universe. Heck, he doesn’t even care that 50% of the people are dead.

If you want to find another problem with his reasoning, an Thanos’s logic: by strictly utilitarian calculations, its a problem that half of the beings you are looking to help don’t do very well under your scenario, although he’s crazy so maybe he considers killing masses of unhappy people a plus for the overall happiness (its been suggested as one of the many problems besetting utilitarians).

The practical problems caused by Thanos’ snap...their pretty transitory, just like the population numbers.

[Tvtyrant]

It just occurred to me: if half of everybody's gut flora died in the Snap, for a little while won't there be a lot of, like, diarrhea?

Picture Thanos sitting on his porcelain throne, twisted in agony, yelling "I REGRET IT".

This may be the funniest thing I have ever read about a marvel movie.

[ben-zayb]

Yep, Thanos follows the typical narrow-minded quest to reducing scarcity of resources than reducing poor access to resources. Was he able to survey the universe to even determine that there is scarcity? Let's say the snap wipes 100% of the population in a resource-filled planet while leaving another poverty stricken planet snapfree. How does that solve the big problem?

[The Glyphstone]

It just occurred to me: if half of everybody's gut flora died in the Snap, for a little while won't there be a lot of, like, diarrhea?

Picture Thanos sitting on his porcelain throne, twisted in agony, yelling "I REGRET IT".

If he was only snapping sapient species, I'd assume microorganisms remained exempt. But then I remembered that in the DC universe, pretty much anything and anyone can be handed a Lantern Ring, so the Marvel universe having at least one species of sapient gut bacteria isn't out of the question.

[Kitten Champion]

If he was only snapping sapient species, I'd assume microorganisms remained exempt. But then I remembered that in the DC universe, pretty much anything and anyone can be handed a Lantern Ring, so the Marvel universe having at least one species of sapient gut bacteria isn't out of the question.

There's a few sapient bacteria/viruses - one is a X-Men villain called Sublime and his sister Arkea, and another is Warlock from the New Mutants who was a sapient techno-organic virus alien thing, there are probably more just based on that.

There's also a whole micro-universe - called the Microverse - full of eclectic sapient life that one can be shrunk into, which I thought was a "between the atoms" thing but apparently is a parallel universe according to the wiki so probably unaffected to the Infinity Stones powers.

[Knaight]

Thanos' entire theory doesn't work anyway. I mean, look at it at a smaller scale. If you take a company and kill half the employees at random, is it now more productive? Half the people means that 50% of the producers are gone, too. And there's a 50% chance that every person with an important skill is now gone, too.

The smaller scale viewpoint fundamentally doesn't work here - and if it did a company is still the wrong way to look at it. This is a population ecology question more than anything, and while that's a field with a lot of specialized population models at least one of them will tend to fit most cases, and basically all of them have some sort of population cap mechanism built in. Assuming that life across the galaxy is generally earth like (because it mostly seems to be) this usually works out to nitrogen-phosphorous balances, and dropping the populations of all species genuinely would help the survivors, as the nitrogen-phosphorous richness cascades upwards, leading to quality of life improvements that show up in the models as higher birth rates and lower death rates.

This holds for however long it takes to get back to original levels - and given those higher birth rates and lower death rates, that's probably not too long. Also that process of getting to original levels is going to be all sorts of janky, which partially counteracts the help to survivors. For instance, you'd expect a lot of ecological cascade processes where the rapid breeding species (r species in general, some of which do technically have a long breeding cycle spike early, start dying horribly, and get replaced by higher population cap species (K species in general). This particular jank will also affect the rest of the species in the ecosystem, which leads to all sorts of unpredictable but likely deleterious effects.

Basically, the snap is a poor short term solution, where using the glove to lower fertility levels for dominant species would probably have worked fine.

[Draconi Redfir]

Thanos probably assumed that reproduction rates would remain the same post-snap, so a species that increases by 10% of it's population every year, would continue to do so, but just have more resources in the meantime.

what he didn't expect is the extra resources allowing that same species to reproduce by 50% per year.

[Aotrs Commander]

I love the fact the thread has moved over to discussing something that is related to something in the mid-credit scene...!

(Still, considering the Antman movie thread, as I recall, devolved into a sexism argument, definitely still a win...!)




Thanos better hope there aren't any Zerg/Tyranids (et al) in the universe (the ENTIRE UNIVERSE of hundreds of billions of galaxies he knows nothing about), as hallving everyone's numbers is going to massively improve their chances, given that that sort of species will bounce back far faster and is much more resistant to population crashes.

Actually he won't, of course, because he's steaming great blithering idiot.