Director Edgar Wright is deep into pre-production on Marvel's ANT-MAN, the planned finale to their Phase Two line-up, which is set to star Paul Rudd as the size-shifting hero. However, it's yet to be said just which version of the character he'll be playing and Wright recently posted a tease that suggests it may not be the original incarnation of the character, Hank Pym, but rather the later version of Scott Lang. Wright posted a screengrab from the fifth episode of The Avengers: Earth's Mightiest Heroes animated series with the tagline "homework." The episode starred both Pym and Lang, ultimately ending with Lang taking over the mantle of ANT-MAN.
From Wright's blog:
Pym is well known in the Marvel universe to be, well, kind of a dick, which Rudd could easily pull off, but Lang is a bit more boisterous and playful in his demeanor, certainly without the nastiness of Pym, so it will be interesting to see which character he's ultimately shouldered with. However, Wright suggested a long while back (hat tip to Collider for the link) that both characters could play a role in the film, saying:
"Well, the thing is that what we want to do, the idea that we have for the adaptation is to actually involve both. Is to have a film that basically is about Henry Pym and Scott Lang, so you actually do a prologue where you see Pym as Ant-Man in action in the 60's, in sort of "Tales to Astonish" mode basically, and then the contemporary, sort of flash-forward, is Scott Lang's story, and how he comes to acquire the suit, how he crosses paths with Henry Pym, and then, in an interesting sort of Machiavellian way, teams up with him. So it's like an interesting thing, like the "Marvel Premiere" one that I read which is Scott Lang's origin, it's very brief like a lot of those origin comics are, and in a way, the details that are skipped through in the panels and the kind of thing we'd spend half an hour on."
Interesting stuff. With Tony Stark basically being laid out as the creator of Ultron instead of Hank Pym for THE AVENGERS: AGE OF ULTRON, the switch of having Scott Lang instead of Hank Pym as the main version of ANT-MAN wouldn't be too far of a stretch. It certainly seems like the Marvel Cinematic Universe is going "Pym-less" but until we hear anything officially we won't know for sure. Either way, I'm buzzed for Wright's take on the character as he's yet to let me down.
ANT-MAN hits theaters on July 31, 2015.