He might be a founding member of the Avengers on the page, but Scott Lang has never had the firepower of Spider-Man or Iron Man outside of the comic book faithful. When Marvel made 2015’s Ant-Man, then, it could’ve been their first big bomb. Thankfully, though it wasn’t their highest-grossing film, the movie starring Paul Rudd, Michael Douglas and Evangeline Lilly was still popular enough to earn a sequel in the form of the upcoming Ant-Man and the Wasp.
But what are the chances of the second film spawning a third adventure for Scott Lang and Hope Van Dyne? Director Peyton Reed was asked this while chatting to The Hollywood Reporter and revealed that it’s a decision that’s out of his hands and he knows about as much as we do about the character’s future in the MCU. He did, however, say that he was “hopeful” that an Ant-Man 3 is on the cards.
“I’ll answer that question really honestly. Who knows, because I suspect, I don’t know this, but I think any further announcement of the slate — the rest of this year is going to be about the next Avengers movie and the tea-up to that stuff. And then I think we are all hopeful.”
He was then asked if he had any story ideas for what a third movie could consist of. Reed admitted that, as with the sequel, he won’t really start work on developing another film until he knows that it’s going to happen. He also recalled that it took “a month or so” after Ant-Man was released for Marvel to confirm that it was getting a follow-up, so fingers crossed that something similar will happen this time.
“Just the same as last time. We didn’t have any idea there would be a second Ant-Man until maybe a month or so after the first one came out. This was a giant question mark. With the first one, there was obviously behind the scenes drama that preceded me, but also, it’s Ant-Man. There was a question of, are people going to see this movie? It was not a fait accompli. It could have gone either way. I think we are all interested in doing one. There is a story to tell there. Definitely. There is a story we’ve talked about potentially. I’m very, very hopeful.”
Paul Rudd was recently asked if he had any ideas about an Ant-Man 3 and similar to Reed, he stated that he did have some things in mind that he’d like to see explored in a threequel, though he refrained from mentioning them in case it‘s commissioned. As for Michael Douglas, he’s hoping for a prequel movie all to himself. And Evangeline Lilly has her eyes on an all-female Avengers flick. Let’s just hope Ant-Man and the Wasp proves successful enough for all of them to get their wishes.