First, two MCU films that did not succeed at the box office, though I enjoyed both.
In Ant-Man and the Wasp, the eponymous heroes (Paul Rudd, Evangeline Lilly) rescued Janet Pym (Michelle Pfeiffer) from the subatomic Quantumverse. In ANT-MAN AND THE WASP: Quantumania (2023) Scott Lang’s daughter Cassie (Kathryn Newton) probes into the Quantumverse despite Janet’s warnings and sure enough, the entire family gets drawn in.
Behind it is Kang (Jonathan Majors), a time-traveling conquerer exiled by his parallel-timeline counterparts due to his conviction he needs to wipe out entire timelines — lots of them — to stabilize the timeline. He hoped to use Janet to escape; instead she left him there. He harbors some resentment — and some terrifyingly advanced weapons.
This is an odd mix, putting superheroes into a Guardians of the Galaxy setting, though it comes off more as a Star Wars knockoff (I did wonder if someone on the writing side was a fan of Marvel’s Micronauts because they have a lot in common). Overall the results were fun enough, though turning Modok into Kang’s comic-relief sidekick doesn’t work (and assault charges against Majors have apparently stymied plans to make Kang a Big Bad going forward). “It’s Schrodinger’s box — and you’re the cat.”
MARVELS (202 ) has fangirl Kamala Khan’s Ms. Marvel (Iman Vellani) over the moon as a malfunctioning dimensional gate keeps switching her, Captain Marvel (Brie Larson) and Monica Rambeau (Teyonah Parris) around (“You mean Captain Marvel was in my house? And I wasn’t here!”), then joining forces with them against a Kree fanatic out to avenge Carol’s destruction of the Supreme Intelligence. A winning cast (the writers definitely nail the comics’ Kamala) whose bonding makes this more appealing than Quantumania; however the plot is less interesting. The villain, for instance, is a recycled version of Ronan from the first Guardians of the Galaxy movie, right down to wielding his hammer. “So we’re literally herding cats?”
Next, two movies starring the cast of Family Ties (I supposed I could have watched Michael Gross in Tremors for a threeway).
TYG periodically watches SATISFACTION (1988) out of nostalgia for her teen years and this time I watched it with her though unsurprisingly I was less engaged. Justine Bateman plays a blue-collar girl trying to turn her garage band into a professional gig which leads to a romance with retired rocker Liam Neeson (Debbie Harry shows up as a Close Personal Friend of the latter). While the music’s competent, having the songs mostly from previous decades hardly makes them hip (I’m guessing it was a matter of getting rights as cheaply as possible). Forgettable but we’ve both seen worse; Julia Roberts makes her screen debut right before the superior Mystic Pizza. “It makes me laugh.”
THE SECRET OF MY SUCCESS (1988) has mailroom clerk Michael J. Fox exploiting his corporation’s dysfunctional structure to reinvent himself as a new executive and launch a romance with finance whiz Helen Slater. Fun fluff to rewatch; with Margaret Whitton as Fox’s lecherous aunt and Fred Gwynne as a corporate raider (though he spends so much of his brief scene sitting still, I wonder if he was in bad health?). Fox getting judgy about Slater’s sexual ethics when his are certainly a mess is an unpleasant moment, though. “My office hasn’t looked like the men’s room since I had them remove all the urinals.”
#SFWApro. Covers by Jack Kirby (t), John Buscema and Dave Cockrum; all rights to images remain with current holders.
