'Ant-Man and The Wasp: Quantumania' failed in China due to an ironic and unconvincing plot

Promotional material of Ant-Man and the Wasp: Quantumania Photo: Snapshot of Sina Weibo

Disney's Ant-Man and The Wasp: Quantumania has broken the 100 million yuan mark after being premiered on Chinese theaters on Friday, crowning the box office on its opening weekend. This seemed promising, but its luck seems to have stopped there.

"Unconvincing", "Star Wars played by a group of ants" and "ironic plot" are the most reviews from Chinese moviegoers who watched the threequel.

As the first film in the Marvel Cinematic Universe (MCU)'s Phase 5, Ant-Man and The Wasp: Quantumania did not help Marvel Studios get off to a strong start in this new phase.

The film has got a dismal score - 48/100 on Metactiric and 53 percent freshness rating on Rotten Tomatoes, making it the second worst-reviewed MCU film.

Similarly, the threequel dropped from 6.4 to 6.2/10 on Chinese reviewing website Douban, much lower than the past two Ant-Man movies - Ant-Man and Ant-Man and the Wasp, which scored 7.7 and 7.3 on Douban.

Why did the film earn such a low word-of-mouth? If you watch it as a pure popcorn movie, Ant-Man and The Wasp: Quantumania is above the passing line, which is the current benchmark level of Marvel movies. The refreshing visual spectacle and exciting action scenes are the highlights of the film.

However, if you watch it holding high expecctations, it may disappoint you as the story of the formidable villain Kang the Conqueror being defeated by the Ant-Man family is far too ironic. This task seems too big and challenging for the bug-guy to complete.

As an MCU movie with one of the lowest score, Ant-Man and The Wasp: Quantumania made me feel that Marvel Studios need to improve asap from their decadent Phase 4, but it seems that no such change is in view yet.

Black Panther: Wakanda Forever's poor performance in the Chinese mainland might partly be due to its late premiering in China, but Ant-Man and The Wasp: Quantumania was released on the same day as in North America, and yet it still underperformed. This only shows that Marvel films are no longer that appealing among Chinese moviegoers. 

Black Panther: Wakanda Forever, the last work of MCU's Phase 4, currently only grossed 100 million yuan after being released in the mainland for 13 days, according to Chinese ticketing platform Maoyan.

If Marvel studios want to re-win the nods in the world' second largest film market, they might need to think of creating some new stories that can really touch the hearts of the Chinese audience. After all, Marvel films are only limited to a certain number of die-hard Marvel fans in China, rather than the general public.

The author is an editor of the Global Times. [email protected]