Ant-Man and the Wasp: Quantumania – Shrinking Returns

Ant-Man and the Wasp: Quantumania was the bite-sized hero's attempt to elevate the stakes of his solo outings. With Kang—the MCU's big bad in waiting—as the film's central villain, it was meant to serve as a narrative intro for the next Avengers team up.

Alas, that appears like it is not to be. Even before Jonathan Majors, the actor portraying Kang, ran afoul with the law, Quantumania's poor reviews and lagging box office flashed warning bells for Marvel. 

Yes, it did earn $476.1 million at the box office, but that was down from the original's $518.9 million and its precursor's $623.1 million. Worse, Quantumania's 46% on Rotten Tomatoes is one of the worst scores the MCU has ever received.

That critical drubbing is mostly deserved. Quantumania is an overlong and muddled CGI stew of half-baked ideas. It's never thrilling, rarely funny, and squanders its opportunity to make audiences dread what Kang will do to the newest Avengers. Instead, the dude couldn't even topple their tiniest hero. So much for that Dynasty of his.

Now, sit back, take a bite out of a Space Lettuce Double IPA from Monday Night Brewing, and lookout for the little guy! I, the Thunderous Wizard (@WriterTLK), Bling Blake, Capt. Cash, and Chumpzilla are guzzling that goo!

This Week’s Segments:

• Introduction/Plot Breakdown – Witness the beginning of a new dynasty! (00:00)
• Lingering Questions – Did Kang work as a villain (not that it matters now)? (28:20)
• The "Conqueror's" Trivia Challenge – Chumpzilla challenges the field to trivia about the movie. (58:42)
• Recommendations – We offer our picks for the week and next up: We continue Super-Heroic Flops with a movie so bad we couldn't resist discussing it, Madame Web! (1:05:20)

And, as always, hit us up on Threads, Twitter, Facebook, or Instagram to check out all the interesting factoids from this week’s episode!

You can find this episode of Hops and Box Office Flops on Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Stitcher, Podbean, Spotify, Acast, TuneIn, iHeartRadio, Vurbl, Amazon Music, and more!