For many people, the loss of Edgar Wright was a huge blow. His unique sense of direction coupled with his inherent love of and involvement with Ant-Man for so many years had fans excited to see what he had in store for the film. When he left the project in May of this year, the floodgates were open for negativity, as whatever was going on behind the scenes just had to be Marvel's fault. Any director that Marvel would hire to fill his shoes would be under intense fan scrutiny and, inevitably, director Peyton Reed's film, no matter how solid it could turn out to be, will forever have to live under the shadow of what the film would've been under Wright's guidance. With Wright's departure, a large sliver of the Internet community has dismissed the film entirely. But it's still happening. The Ant-Man film will be a part of the MCU. The fact that an Ant-Man film is even coming speaks volumes to the risks that Marvel is taking -- with the upcoming Guardians of the Galaxy being the first major gamble -- and for what the franchise's success has done for the viability of "harder sell" characters. Before he left, Wright assembled an intriguing cast, including Michael Douglas as Hank Pym and Paul Rudd as Scott Lang, which is still in place. Script changes may have taken place, but much of the pre-production visual work is likely to stay more or less the same. While Wright's departure is still an understandably sore spot for people, claims that the film is going to be an inevitable disaster or that it's already marked the death of the MCU or any of the other countless pessimistic things being said about it now helps no one. It could very well be a mess, but, considering the MCU's track record for success, it could also turn out to be yet another surprising gem. The film is coming, whether one likes it or not, but what's the point in rooting for it to crash and burn when we should all be hoping for the best?
Writer, film enthusiast, part-time gamer and watcher of (mostly) good television located on the fringe of Los Angeles, who now has his own website at www.highdefgeoff.com!
