Is it just more or has this movie completely flown under the radar? As one of Marvel’s supposedly biggest movie releases of 2023, Ant-Man and the Wasp: Quantumania has had little fanfare or buzz about its upcoming release.
Maybe it’s because the release date is still a good month away, but I feel like Ant-Man and the Wasp: Quantumania has not been marketed, advertised, or raved about by either the Marvel fans or even Marvel/Disney themselves.
It’s almost like Ant-Man 3 is a package among a thousand on a conveyor belt that’s just waiting to get shipped off for a rough delivery without any “Fragile” or “Carry With Care” signs on it, despite the titular character being one of the remaining Endgame Avengers.
Sure, I know Ant-Man has never been and realistically never will be anyone’s favorite Marvel character, but Paul Rudd (who is a big comedic Hollywood star) and his superhero should still be getting a little more attention from the marketing departments at Marvel.
Like I said, he’s one of the only “main” Avengers (and actors) that fought in Endgame and is still around in Phase 4, and perhaps might be the only one if things continue as they’re going.
Robert Downey Jr./Iron Man, Chris Evans/Captain America, Scarlett Johansson/Black Widow are already gone, Chris Hemsworth/Thor looks set to be leaving his role, Mark Ruffalo/Hulk is a part timer, The Guardians of the Galaxy are leaving after their 3rd movie comes out, Jeremy Renner/Hawkeye might not come back, Elizabeth Olsen’s Wanda Maximoff/Scarlett Witch is dead in the “regular universe” timeline, Paul Bettany’s Vision is also dead, Don Cheadle is most likely done with War Machine, and Chadwick Boseman has unfortunately passed away and T’Challa character respectful retired.
That’s a lot of classic Marvel characters that we’ve all grown up with and loved now departed/removed/part timer in the MCU. And that list isn’t including some of Marvel’s best villains, such as Josh Brolin’s Thanos, Lee Pace’s Ronan, Jeff Bridges’ Obadiah Stane, Hugo Weaving’s Red Skull, Cate Blanchett’s Hela, Willem Dafoe’s Green Goblin, Michael B. Jordan’s Eric Killmonger, and Alfred Molina’s Doctor Octopus, who are also out of the MCU in some way or another.
(Disney/Marvel-Ant-Man and the Wasp: Quantumania-Official Trailer)
The only other “main” characters and actors that remain from the “Golden Era” (Phases 1-3) of the MCU are Tom Holland’s Spider-Man, Benedict Cumberbatch’s Doctor Strange, Tom Hiddleston’s Loki, Brie Larson’s Captain Marvel (maybe), and Samuel L. Jackson’s Nick Fury.
Aside from Spider-Man, I can safely say that none of these characters (the actors are a different story) are “box office stars” for Marvel and Disney, which has me really wondering and worried about the future of the MCU.
It’s safe to say that Phase 4 has been an extreme letdown with the quality of the content coming out as Marvel has strangely favored overwhelming quantity of new superheroes over a smaller cast of well-thought out, unique characters.
That’s why I find it so strange that a movie and cast of relatively well-known characters from the pre-Phase 4 era is being “shoved under the rug” and released with little to no fanfare. Normally, I would have seen 10-20 Ant-Man and the Wasp: Quantumania ads, commercials, clips on T.V. social media, YouTube, etc. by now as was the case with nearly every ever Marvel project.
However, I had to go out and search if there even was an Ant-Man 3 trailer released. Obviously, there was one with 27M views as of today, but it was a trailer on the main Marvel account with 20M subscribers. I would have been shocked if it didn’t have at least 20M views on that account given the hundreds of millions of views the Avengers, Spider Man, Captain America, Iron Man, Thor, and Black Panther movie trailers got.
Nevertheless, just to prove my point a little more, Ant Man and the Wasp: Quantumania’s official trailer was not even the most viewed official trailer for an Ant-Man movie. Nope, the 2nd official trailer for the Ant-Man and the Wasp (2018) movie has 4 million more views than this latest trailer, while the official trailer for the first Ant-Man movie has just 1M less views than Ant-Man 3’s first trailer.
Now, the reason why these view counts are important as the general rule with the Marvel movies is the newer they are, the more popular and viewed they are on YouTube. This is mainly down to the overwhelming popularity surge of Marvel from the success of Phases 1-3 and the gradually increasing popularity of YouTube and social media over the years.
(Disney/Marvel-Ant-Man and the Wasp: Quantumania-Official Trailer)
Yet, like I said, this Ant-Man 3 trailer is underperforming old movie trailers, which must be concerning to the Marvel executives. Still, there’s a lot of time between now and February 17th (the release date), so maybe Marvel will release another trailer and it will blow up the movie’s popularity.
We’ll have to wait and see if Phase 4 really is as destructive and demoralizing to the Marvel brand as it has been to many new and old characters thus far.
Images Source: Featured Image: (Disney/Marvel) (Marvel Studios’ Ant-Man and The Wasp: Quantumania | Official Trailer – YouTube)
In Text Image 1: (Disney/Marvel) (Marvel Studios’ Ant-Man and The Wasp: Quantumania | Official Trailer – YouTube)
In Text Image 2: (Disney/Marvel) (Marvel Studios’ Ant-Man and The Wasp: Quantumania | Official Trailer – YouTube)
