Ant-man, directed by Peyton Reed, starring Paul Rudd, Michael Douglas and Evangeline Lilly, would have been one of the best action adventure movies of the summer if it weren’t for Spielberg’s Jurassic World and McQuarrie’s Mission Impossible: Rogue Nation. With superhero movies blossoming into the newest pinnacle of pop culture, Marvel comics has churned out several movies The Avengers being one of their most successful franchise 460 billion dollars, only being stripped of that title by its sequel, Avengers: Age of Ultron. But every so often Marvel produces terrible stories paired with ungratifying special effects, looking at you Fantastic Four, twice. But Ant-Man receives only minor criticism from me.

Ant-Man is the story of Dr. Hank Pym, played by Douglas, who unlocks the ability shrink or grow anything his engineered solution touches. Pym decides to hide his discovery from the world, Pym is then kicked out of his own corporation by his protege. Pym lives happily in a Victorian-styled house in the suburbs keeping his “Ant-Suit” behind several locked vaults, unaware that Darren Cross, his former apprentice and new owner of Pym Industries, is trying to replicate his work.

Scott Lang, played by Rudd, is a master thief, responsible for hacking a major corporation and outing them. Newly released from the California state prison, he then ventures back into San Francisco, Lang meets up with his old friend and roommate Luis. Pym, aware of Lang’s release, recruits him to recover the duplicate suit.

Ant-Man does what any Marvel action movie ought to do, go heavy on action while restrained to minimal exposition. The action scenes were humorous, Reed using every last inch of the shrinking cinematic scenes. Though Rudd regularly provides comic relief, Pena is the singular best, most noteworthy, necessary character, he is in other words, the true star and centerpiece.

It is obvious that Reed also used excruciating detail the special effects and for shrinking and growing combat scenes. The most enjoyable scene in the entire movie has a miniature battle alongside a perspectively enormous Thomas the Tank engine

However, the movie suffers from canned, uneasy, moments where dialogue seemed rushed, unfinished, or unnecessary. One of the pivotal plot points and character development. Lang stirs up some past events and creates emotional friction between Pym and his daughter, Hope Van Dyne. Van Dyne furious with her father rushed of to her car where Scott Lang comforts her, and that is not where the movie sins, cliche; yes. But the truly terribly part of the movie happens when Van Dyne returns, where Pym drops the most obvious reveal in a canned awkward, uneasy point in the story development.

All-in-all, I would recommend this movie if, and only if, you have seen both Jurassic World and Mission Impossible already.