How Kang Forces Ant-Man to Grow Up

Jonathan Majors plays Kang the Conqueror in Ant-Man and the Wasp: Quantumania. If you know your Marvel comics, that sentence doesn’t make a whole lot of sense. After all, Kang is an Avengers-level threat, so why was he chosen as the villain for the third Ant-Man movie? As it turns out, the director and cast had a lot to say on that bold choice, so hear what they told IGN about how Kang provides a big challenge to Marvel’s littlest hero.

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Why Kang?

Most Marvel fans know Kang as Kang the Conqueror, the time-traveling warlord. But what separates him from other Marvel villains is he’s a never ending menace with countless variants. Comic readers first met Kang in his ancient Egyptian guise known as the Pharaoh Rama-Tut, in 1963’s Fantastic Four #19. Then he popped up one year later in The Avengers #8 as Kang the Conqueror, his most iconic and dangerous variant. In the years since, we’ve met all manner of Kangs, including the Scarlet Centurion and Immortus. The many Kangs team up with each other to plot the downfall of Earth’s heroes in the Council of Kangs. As a master of time travel, Kang has access to the greatest technology and weapons from now to the distant future. Even if you somehow beat him, there’s a whole legion of variants ready to take his place, like a hydra (not to confuse Marvel bad guys, but you get the point). This baddie has successfully taken down the Avengers and ruled over Earth. So, to pit him against a family of size-changing heroes just seems unfair. But for director Peyton Reed, it was a premise too juicy to resist.

“Kang the Conqueror going up against Ant-Man, who’s going to win? It’s like, well, that’s a no-brainer. The tension that creates excited us as a starting point. How are they possibly going to survive this situation?” Reed explained. “I also loved it because when we started the first Ant-Man, Scott Lang was a character kind of playing in the margins. He was not anywhere near being an official Avenger, but eventually kind of worked his way into that organization. And now the idea that Ant-Man and Wasp, the first two Avengers, who are going to come up against Kang and he’s front and center in this movie, for me personally, was really exciting. It felt like a great progression of the trilogy.”

Ant-Man vs. Kang

Never in a million years did Scott Lang ever imagine he’d wind up as a superhero, let alone going head-to-head with a tyrannical time-traveler. Remember, in the first film he went up against a guy in a bee suit and in the second he fought a phase shifter and a gangster/restaurant owner. Challenging, but nothing to worry about. He has faced more fearsome foes, but whenever he’s been in over his head, like during Civil War and Endgame, he was backed up by Earth’s Mightiest Heroes. But this time, his safety net is gone. He’s stranded down in the Quantum Realm with his family where the Avengers can’t assemble. And he’s got to face Kang head-to-head, man to man, God to Ant. 

“He’s kind of powerful in a way that I’ve never faced,” actor Paul Rudd said of his character’s new nemesis, Kang. “And I faced Thanos who’s pretty powerful, but I also had a whole bunch of other Avengers with me. Kang possesses certain abilities and has strengths that even supersede Thanos.”

Rudd explained how he was kept in the dark about how Jonathan Majors would be playing Kang, so when they filmed their first scene together, which also happened to be the first time their character’s meet, his reaction to Kang’s imposing personality was genuine.

“We never talked about what we were going to do. I didn’t know exactly what he was going to do. Our first scene in the film where we meet each other was the first scene that we ever shot [together]. So it was really interesting to say, ‘Oh wow, I see, oh yeah, this guy means business. Kang means business.’ Jonathan has a handle on this role for sure. And it was really a charge to get to act with Kang in the movie for the first time,” Rudd said.

Bringing Kang to Life

It goes without saying that Kang was a challenge to translate from comic books to the silver screen. He sports green and purple armor with a chunky helmet and a blue facemask. His powers are vaguely defined as having to do with time manipulation, hyper-advanced technology, and energy blasts. He experiences time differently than normal people, giving him a detached personality. But it’s a challenge that the director and actor rose to meet.

“It’s always the big trick to take these characters, most of whom were created in the sixties in a comic book, and bring them to life now and make them feel like real living, breathing dimensional characters. There was a lot to figure out visually,” Reed said. He talked about how he collaborated with Majors on Kang’s look, especially the scars going down each side of his face. “ We talked about scarification and the idea of, what if we did these scars? And when the mask is illuminated, it highlights those and they were energized as part of the thing with the suit. The scarification I love because Jonathan showed up in the makeup and it was like, okay, that’s cool because there’s an implied thing there. This guy’s been through some shit, he’s been through some battles. I don’t know if that’s a ritualistic thing or if it was scars from battle. Was it a result of the mask? But we just love the look of it.”

Kang has a unique relationship with time that affects how he views the world around him. It’s a heady concept, but Majors explained that Kang controls time, but because he’s in the Quantum Realm where time behaves differently, time is no longer moving for him. He’s watching time move, but he can’t be moved by it. Time is “his biggest attachment and adversary,” Majors said.

Kang Becomes a Family Matter

Even though it’s Scott who must ultimately face Kang in Quantumania, he’s not entirely alone. He is, of course, joined by his family of fellow superheroes, not to mention his teenage daughter who is suiting up for the first time. Together, they have to find a way to foil Kang’s plans.

Actor Michael Douglas, who plays Dr. Hank Pym and knows a thing or two about playing a movie villain, had nothing but praise for Majors’ performance as Kang. 

“A good villain exudes power without having to act powerfully. [Kang] has just a sense of strength inside that always felt threatening,” Douglas said, also complimenting Majors’ supervillain physique. “I knew [Majors] was in good shape because I watched poor Paul come back from those fight scenes going, this is rugged. I think it’s going to be a wonderful addition to the Marvel Universe.”

Pym’s daughter Hope van Dyne, played by Evangeline Lilly, is known for being confident, so getting lost in a dangerous place like the Quantum Realm and going up against a villain like Kang makes her second guess herself. 

“I feel like there are so many scenes in this movie where Hope just has this really uncertain look on her face because she’s never–well, I mean in Endgame, I guess she was put in a position like this, but she was surrounded by formidable Avengers at that point. But to be there alone with the people she cares about most in the world, fully at stake under her care is somewhat overwhelming. And I think it’s really great to see her on the back foot because normally she’s so competent and capable in all situations. And Kang is certainly in a league that she’s not used to dealing with,” Lilly said.

But, not everyone is scared of Kang. Cassie Lang, played by MCU newcomer Kathryn Newton, is perhaps too young to have a healthy fear of superpowered tyrants. Comic readers know Cassie as the Young Avengers hero Stature, but in the film we see her become a hero alongside her family, instead. She appears to be wearing the purple armor of her Stinger persona from the comics. Well, whatever she’s wearing, it gives her the confidence to stand up to evil, even if she doesn’t realize what she’s getting herself into.

“[Cassie is] a little naive to the power that [Kang] has, and you can feel it. The first time she meets him, she’s like, well, what are you talking about? Very young to think that way. Almost disrespectful because she doesn’t know that. She doesn’t know how powerful she is. So I think it’s kind of nice that she’s like, I don’t really care who you are. I’m going to fight you. And she does it. She has no fear. And I think that comes with being youthful. The older you get, the more scared you get of getting hurt. She doesn’t care if she’s going to get hurt. She just leads with her heart and she’s a little bit impatient and falls over and is clumsy,” Newton said.

Kang Across the Multiverse Saga

Finally, it’s important to note that Quantumania is but one stop on Kang’s journey through the Multiverse Saga. We’ve already met one of his variants in the Disney Plus series Loki. The energetic and talkative He Who Remains warned of variants far worse than him, and that we would meet them after he was killed, which is why everyone in the Marvel Multiverse is now in grave danger, and why we’re about to see a lot more Kangs, as we already know the next Avengers movie will be Kang Dynasty, named after the classic comic where Kang conquers Earth. Reed shared what it was like to effectively tell the middle chapter of Kang’s story and the chilling impression they wanted him to make on the audience.

“I like the idea that in Loki, He Who Remains kind of references obliquely, there’s a bad guy coming. So we like the idea of Kang the Conqueror being the most feared Kang of all the variants. So much so that there’s a reason he’s in the quantum realm. He’s been exiled. We don’t know exactly why yet, why he has been exiled, he did something bad. Jonathan and I talked about what it would be like if you didn’t live time in a straight line, if it was in a loop, how would that affect your personality? And the idea that Kang is kind of a man outside of time and he’s broken, there’s a sadness to Kang. Because he sees this as his destiny. He talks to Scott and says, You’re an avenger. Have I killed you before? It’s like, wait, he’s fought the Avengers before and it sounds like he’s fought them so much. He can’t keep it straight. And that’s scary. There’s something scary about this guy who’s world weary and battle weary, but he keeps going. There’s an inevitability about Kang that is frightening. And we talked about the way Jonathan performs in this economy of movement and dialogue. When he says something, he really, really means it. And it’s a scary energy to put opposite Scott Lang.”

For more on Ant-Man and the Wasp: Quantumania, check out our Ant-Man and the Wasp: Quantumania review and everything you need to know about Cassie Lang aka Stature.