Behind-The-Scenes Facts From The Ant-Man Movies That Demand A Rewatch

After the events of Captain America: Civil War, Scott Lang was imprisoned and eventually placed on house arrest. While confined to his home, Lang found himself with a lot of time on his hands, so he learned how to do close-up magic tricks. He demonstrates his new skill throughout Ant-Man and the Wasp, and when he shows Agent Woo a trick, it really impresses the G-Man. 

Woo doesn't buy Lang's story, but he is interested in the magic trick, and he asks him how he does it. While it doesn't take place on-screen, Lang must have shown him how to do it after the events of Ant-Man and the Wasp, because the next time Woo appears in WandaVision, he deftly performs the same trick.

The first Ant-Man movie begins with Hank Pym storming into a conference room, upset over S.H.I.E.L.D.'s attempts to uncover the secret of Pym Particles. When he appears, Michael Douglas looks as if he were 30-40 years younger than he actually was. The MCU has embraced cutting-edge digital de-aging techniques in its movies to depict older actors in flashback scenes. It's nothing new for the MCU, but one part of Ant-Man and the Wasp was done differently.

Most people probably assumed that Laurence Fishburne was digitally de-aged for his flashback scenes. After all, he looks a lot like he did decades earlier, and there's more than enough old footage of the man to realistically de-age him. Despite this, the filmmakers went a different way; instead of de-aging Fishburne, they hired his son. Langston Fishburne looks a lot like his father, so he was cast to play him in the flashback, and hardly anyone realized it when the movie was released.

The ants in both Ant-Man films are created through CGI, and they are brilliantly done. They look and move like ants, and while you know you're seeing CGI animation at its best, they look real enough that the audience becomes immersed inside the tunnels with Ant-Man as he works alongside his army of insects. While they look real and certainly act like ants (for the most part), the filmmakers made some changes to how they look close up.

The thing about ants is, if you actually blew them up to a gigantic scale, they would look like absolutely hideous monsters! Think about it for a few seconds, and you'll probably come to the same conclusion. Because the ants in both films are meant to be handy little helpers, it was decided that they wouldn't look exactly like real ants. Various characteristics have been added, changed, and removed to make them cuter and less frightening. They look like real ants, but in reality, they look like less frightening versions of ants, and while doing that was a bit risky, it worked in the end.

Arguably, the best parts of the first Ant-Man film revolve around Luis explaining things to other people. His manner of storytelling is hilarious, and it's been memed to death. Because the fans loved Luis's explanatory scenes, the filmmakers wanted to throw it into the sequel, but they had a problem. They didn't want to simply do the same thing over again, as that would appear repetitive. To solve this problem, they came up with the truth serum scene.

In Ant-Man and the Wasp, Luis is injected with truth serum by some thugs, and before long, he launches into another stylistically hilarious version of events. He repeats the same style from the first movie, but it's not thrown in for a cheap laugh. The truth serum makes Luis's storytelling even funnier than it was in the first film. Since they've used a truth serum to repeat the gag in the sequel, there's no telling what will happen in Ant-Man and the Wasp: Quantumania. That said, it's clear the fans want to see Luis recap something, so odds are, they'll find a way to inject it into the next film.

The MCU has featured some of the greatest actors in the industry, and one of the best has to be Michael Douglas. He plays Hank Pym in the Ant-Man films, and his story is primarily centered around supporting his protégé, Scott Lang, while his past actions as Ant-Man are explored via flashback. Douglas is perfectly suited for the role, and he continued to make it work through the end of Phase III.

In an interview with Collider, Douglas explained why he took the job and what it meant to him and his family:

I probably would have been happy with anything Marvel was going to offer me, just because I’ve never done one of these big CGI, green-screen effects movies. To me, it’s this fascinating other world. And most importantly, I did it for my children. They’re so excited. I’ve finally got a picture that they are so excited about. Dad is cool. You have to understand, for most of my career, I’ve done so many R-rated pictures. They can never see any of my movies. Just recently, at 14 and 12, they’re becoming more aware of some of the things that I’ve done. So, this is a lot of fun.

Scott Lang's boredom during his house arrest afforded him the time he needed to learn close-up magic. It helped entertain his daughter when she visited him, and it kept him busy. Some of his tricks are relatively pedestrian, while others are well-executed feats of prestidigitation!

If you watched the movie and thought the tricks were executed via CGI, you'd be forgiven for thinking that, but in reality, there's no digital trickery behind the tricks... it's legit trickery. According to Paul Rudd, he did all of the tricks himself. He related, "I really did learn some of the magic. I haven't really kept it up. But then again, trying to learn to be really good at magic in a short amount of time is like trying to learn violin in a short amount of time."