Ant-Man 3 writer was “despondent” about bad reviews
By Dan Selcke
Ant-Man and the Wasp: Quantumania is the latest movie from Marvel, and it’s not doing much to dispel doomsaying about the MCU being on the decline. Not only does the movie have only a 48% fresh rating on Rotten Tomatoes (the second lowest rating for a Marvel film, behind only Eternals), the box office dropped off steeply between the first and second weekend: by 69.7%. That’s not quite as bad as the projected 72% drop, but it’s not great.
Speaking to The Daily Beast, Ant-Man 3 screenwriter Jeff Loveness — who wrote actual Marvel comics before this, in addition to working on Rick and Morty and Jimmy Kimmel Live! — confessed to taking the reviews hard. “To be honest, those reviews took me by surprise. I was in a pretty low spot,” he said. “Those were not good reviews, and I was like, ‘What the …?’”
"I’m really proud of what I wrote for Jonathan [Majors, who plays the villain Kang the Conqueror] and Michelle Pfeiffer [scientist Janet Pym]. I thought that was good stuff, you know? And so I was just despondent, and I was really sad about it."
Then again, just because the critics don’t enjoy the movie doesn’t mean audiences dislike it; they’ve given it an 83% fresh rating, and Loveness was able to revive himself by attending a screening with an appreciative audience. “I’m like, ‘Goddamn! No, [the reviews] are wrong! I’m right! MODOK is great!’” he said. “I’m pretty happy with it overall, and I think I learned how to take a punch this week. And now that I learned that it’s not too bad, I can just get on with making things.”
Shang-Chi may mix it up with other Marvel heroes “sooner than you think”
So far as new things go, the future of Marvel may depend less on whether audiences like the movie than whether they see it at all, and it does look like fewer people are taking in Marvel films these days. Still, it’s the most profitable movie franchise in history and isn’t done yet.
For instance, Simu Liu talked to People about where his character Shang-Chi might go next after his debut in 2021 Shang-Chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings. Will he mix it up with other members of the MCU? “[W]ho knows, they might see something sooner than you think,” he teased. “We’ll see.”
"I’m such a big fan of both the characters and the performers that play them, so any collaboration is an opportunity for me to work alongside someone who, in their own way, is breaking barriers and at the very top of their game. I think that’s what excites me the most as a performer, [and] also as a fan."
Marvel fans will be “surprised” by Fantastic Four movie
A sequel to Shang-Chi movie is in development, but it’s always possible the character could show up in another Marvel movie before then. What about the upcoming Fantastic Four film, for instance, which is due out in early 2025? Marvel producer Nate Moore talked a bit about that one to Deadline:
"We have Matt Shakman directing, who’s so talented and who did WandaVision for us, and I think people are going to be pretty surprised by what we’re doing."
So there you go: Marvel may be going through some changes, but there are miles yet to go.
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