| Scott Lang | |
|---|---|
| Marvel Cinematic Universe character | |
 Paul Rudd as Scott Lang inAnt-Man and the Wasp (2018) | |
| First appearance | Ant-Man (2015) |
| Based on | |
| Adapted by |
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| Portrayed by |
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| In-universe information | |
| Full name | Scott Edward Harris Lang |
| Alias | Ant-Man |
| Occupation |
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| Affiliation |
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| Weapon | Ant-Man suit |
| Spouse | Maggie Lang (ex-wife) |
| Significantother | Hope van Dyne |
| Children | Cassie Lang (daughter) |
| Origin | San Francisco, California, United States |
| Nationality | American |
Scott Edward Harris Lang is a fictional character portrayed byPaul Rudd in theMarvel Cinematic Universe (MCU)media franchise, based on theMarvel Comics characterof the same name. Depicted as a thief-turned-superhero, Scott is recruited byHank Pym to use anadvanced suit that allows him to change sizes and communicate withants, inheriting the superhero identityAnt-Man.
Scott is recruited bySam Wilson to join theAvengers; works alongside Pym's daughter,Hope van Dyne; and rekindles his relationship with his daughter,Cassie Lang. Afterthe Blip, Scott is trapped inside theQuantum Realm before being accidentally saved, then helps the Avengers to stop an alternate version ofThanos. Afterwards, Scott writes amemoir. He is later trapped in the Quantum Realm once again, where he encountersKang the Conqueror and prevents him from escaping.
Scott first appeared in the filmAnt-Man (2015), then inCaptain America: Civil War (2016),Ant-Man and the Wasp (2018),Avengers: Endgame (2019) andAnt-Man and the Wasp: Quantumania (2023).Alternate versions of the character appeared in theDisney+ animated seriesWhat If...? (2021–2023), with Rudd reprising his role.
In the mid-2000s,Kevin Feige came to the realization thatMarvel Studios still owned the rights to the core members of theAvengers, which included the characterAnt-Man.[1] By 2005, Marvel Studios received a $525 million investment fromMerrill Lynch, allowing them to independently produce ten films, including one based on the Ant-Man character, set to be directed byEdgar Wright.[2] In 2013, multiple actors were considered for the film's lead role includingPaul Rudd, who was eyed to be portrayingHank Pym.[3] By January 2014, Rudd was confirmed to be starring asScott Lang.[4]
In May 2014, Wright and Marvel Studios issued a joint statement announcing that Wright had exited the movie due to creative differences.[5] According to Wright, he had been hired as writer-director but became unhappy when Marvel wanted to write a new script, restrospectively stating in 2017 that, he "wanted to make a Marvel movie", but that Marvel was not on board with his creative choices, which caused him to rethink his role.[6] Wright was replaced byPeyton Reed as director, withAdam McKay and Rudd rewriting the screenplay.[7]
Feige praised Rudd's casting, noting that he would be able to "do slightly unsavory things like break into people's houses and still be charming and [someone] who you root for and whose redemption you will find satisfaction in".[8] Reed also compared Scott toDanny Ocean (portrayed byGeorge Clooney inOcean's Eleven), saying, "He's a guy trying to create a new life for himself and find redemption".[9] Rudd went on to sign a multi-film contract with Marvel, with Feige stating it was "three [films]-plus-plus to appear in other things".[9][10][11][12][13][14][15]
 | This section needs to beupdated. Please help update this article to reflect recent events or newly available information.(April 2025) |
Scott first appeared as the character inMarvel Cinematic Universe (MCU) filmAnt-Man (2015).[16] The film depicts Scott as petty criminal who becomes the successor toHank Pym as Ant-Man, when Pym allows him to "steal" his old suit that allows him to shrink in size but increase in strength.[17][4][18][19] Scott works with Pym and his daughter,Hope van Dyne to take back Pym's company,Pym Technologies, fromDarren Cross.[8] To get in shape for the role, Rudd worked with various trainers and cut alcohol, fried foods, and carbohydrates out of his diet.[20] He stated that he "basically didn't eat anything for about a year", comparing his route to that ofChris Pratt.[21]
Scott next appeared inCaptain America: Civil War (2016) which saw him being recruited bySam Wilson to fight alongsideSteve Rogers in theAvengers Civil War againstTony Stark's faction of the Avengers, and theSokovia Accords.[22][better source needed] Peyton Reed had discussed the character with theRusso Brothers, the film's directors, and stated that Scott's appearance was important for continuity purposes.[23] During the airport battle, Scott reveals that his suit can grow rather than solely shrink, with Feige noting that "it was just a great idea to turn the tide of the battle in a huge, shocking, unexpected way".[24] Anthony Russo added that the transformation was the continuation of Scott's character arc fromAnt-Man, opining that Scott is "really impressed with Captain America, he just wants to deliver and he figures out a way to deliver where he might actually tear himself in half but he's willing to do it and it works".[25] Additionally, in the film, Rudd's suit "is streamlined and more high-tech" than the one seen in the previous film.[26]
Scott appeared inAnt-Man and the Wasp (2018).[27][28] In April 2017, Peyton Reed noted that Scott would don his Giant Man moniker once again for the film.[29] Following the events at the end ofCaptain America: Civil War, Scott escapes from the superhuman prison, theRaft, and is now "a bigger fugitive" from the first film, and is onhouse arrest.[30] During the film, Scott teams up with Van Dyne, who has now taken her mother's (Janet van Dyne) superhero identity, theWasp, to help her father rescue her mother from theQuantum Realm.[31] After rescuing Janet and completing his house arrest, during apost-credits scene, Scott is trapped in the Quantum Realm after Janet, Pym and Van Dyne disappear due toThe Blip.[citation needed]
Rudd reprised his role inAvengers: Endgame.[32] In a key scene in the film, in which attempts to send Scott through time instead drastically change his age, Scott is portrayed by twins Bazlo and Loen LeClair as a baby, by Jackson A. Dunn at age 12, and by Lee Moore at age 93.[33] This was Moore's final film before his death in August 2018.[34] Markus and McFeely explained that adding Scott helped with implementing time travel into the film, saying, "we had access to him in the second movie, and the fact that he was bringing a whole subset of technology that did have something to do with a different concept of time was like a birthday present".[35]
Scott reprised his role inAnt-Man and the Wasp: Quantumania (2023).[36][28]
Alternate versions of Scott appeared inseason one andtwo ofWhat If...? (2021–2023), voiced by Rudd.[37][38] Another alternate version of Scott as Giant-Man appeared inDeadpool & Wolverine (2024) as a large deadskeletal corpse, which was ultimately used byCassandra Nova as her headquarters.[39]Deadpool makes ameta-reference to Rudd's age upon seeing the corpse.[40]
Scott graduated fromMIT with a degree in engineering, but turned to a life of crime to punish a corporation that had swindled its customers. While in prison, his wife Maggie divorced him and took custody of their daughter,Cassie.[a]
In 2015, Scott is released onparole and moves in with his former cellmate,Luis. He visits Cassie unannounced, and is chastised by Maggie and her fiancé, police detective Jim Paxton, for not providingchild support. Unable to hold down a job because of his criminal record, Scott agrees to join Luis and his crew, Dave and Kurt, in aburglary. Following a tip, Scott breaks into a house and cracks its safe, only to discover and steal an old motorcycle-looking suit. When he tries it on, he shrinks to the size of an insect. He returns the suit to the house out of fear, but is arrested and subsequently broken out of jail by the homeowner,Hank Pym.
Hank reveals that he had previously operated as theS.H.I.E.L.D. agent codenamedAnt-Man, and had manipulated Scott into stealing the suit as a test. He reveals that he wants Scott to steal another suit from his former protégé,Darren Cross, who has reverse-engineered Hank'stechnology. Hank and his daughterHope van Dyne train Scott to fight, use theAnt-Man suit, and to controlants. Hank reveals that Hope's mother,Janet van Dyne, disappeared into the subatomicQuantum Realm while disabling aSovietnuclear missile over 30 years prior. Hank warns Scott that he could suffer a similar fate if he overrides his suit's regulator.
Scott is sent to steal a device from theAvengers Compound inNew York, where he encounters and briefly fightsSam Wilson. Scott, with the help of Luis, Dave and Kurt, infiltrate thePym Technologies' headquarters as Cross hosts a ceremony at the building to unveil his perfected "Yellowjacket" suit. Scott and Hope stopHydra agents at the event and detonate the building. Cross later dons the Yellowjacket suit and takes Cassie hostage in her house to lure Scott into a fight. Scott overrides the regulator and shrinks to subatomic size to penetrate Cross' suit and seemingly defeat him. Scott disappears into the Quantum Realm, but manages to reverse the effects and returns. Out of gratitude for saving Cassie, Paxton covers for Scott to keep him out of prison; Scott rekindles a relationship with his family. He is later told by Luis that Wilson is looking for him.
In 2016, Scott is recruited by Wilson to helpSteve Rogers, who has gone rogue in the wake of the implementation of theSokovia Accords to save his friendBucky Barnes. He is picked up byClint Barton andWanda Maximoff and is taken toLeipzig/Halle Airport inGermany. Before they can leave to stopHelmut Zemo, they are confronted byTony Stark,Natasha Romanoff,James Rhodes,T'Challa,Peter Parker, andVision. During the fight, Scott uses his suit to grow to an enormous size, allowing Rogers and Barnes to escape in aQuinjet. Scott is taken down by Parker, Stark, and Rhodes, and is later imprisoned byThaddeus Ross in theRaft, a superhuman prison. He and the others are later freed by Rogers and Romanoff. Scott, alongside Barton, negotiate a deal with Ross and the U.S. government, receiving a term ofhouse arrest.[b]
By 2018, Scott has lost contact with Hank and Hope. Still on house arrest, he is monitored byFBI agentJimmy Woo. However, he learns that he has unknowingly becomeentangled with Janet van Dyne after he receives an apparent message from her from the Quantum Realm. Scott contacts Hank about Janet, who sends Hope to kidnap Scott, leaving a decoy so as not to arouse suspicion from Woo. Hank and Hope (who reveals that she is upset Scott did not ask her to help him in the Civil War) recruit Scott to help build a Quantum tunnel to retrieve Janet. Hope uses her ownWasp suit to fight black market dealerSonny Burch (who has a part of the tunnel they need), before being attacked by a quantumly unstable masked woman. Scott helps Hope fight her off, but she escapes with Hank's shrinkable lab. Hank's estranged former-S.H.I.E.L.D. partner,Bill Foster, helps them locate the lab, where the woman captures the trio and reveals herself to be former S.H.I.E.L.D. assassin,Ava Starr, codenamed "Ghost". Her fatherElihas, another of Hank's former partners, died along with his wife during an experiment that caused Starr's unstable state.
Foster, revealed to be working with Starr, tells them that Starr is now dying from her condition, and that they plan to cure her using Janet's quantum energy. Believing that this will kill Janet, Hank refuses to help and escapes with Hope, Scott, and the lab. Opening a stable version of the tunnel, Hank, Hope, and Scott are able to contact Janet, who gives them her precise location, but warns that they only have one chance before the realms separate. Scott accidentally tells Luis where the lab is situated, causing Luis to be interrogated by Burch, who is also looking for the lab. Luis tells him, and inadvertently also tells Ghost who overhears. Scott returns home, but Hank and Hope are arrested by the FBI while Ghost steals the lab. After a pep talk with Cassie, Scott breaks Hank and Hope out of custody and they recover the lab with Luis' help. After an ensuring fight between Scott and Hope against Ghost and Burch, Hank rescues Janet safely from the Quantum Realm, and Janet voluntarily gifts some of her energy to Starr to temporarily stabilize her. Scott returns home once more, in time for a now suspicious Woo to release him from house arrest.
Sometime after, using a smaller quantum tunnel built in Luis' van, Hank, Janet, Hope and Scott plan to harvest quantum energy particles to help Starr remain stable. Scott returns to the Quantum Realm for the harvest, but as he is about to be brought out, Hank, Janet and Hope fall victim tothe Blip, trapping Scott.
In 2023, Scott is released from the Quantum Realm after a rat inadvertently activates the quantum tunnel and he finds himself and the van in a storage warehouse. After learning of the Blip, Scott is relieved when he learns Cassie survived, returning to her house and reuniting with her, now five years older.
Scott later drives to the Avengers Compound where he explains to Rogers and Romanoff that he experienced only five hours within the Quantum Realm, theorizing that Hank's Quantum technology could serve as a means of time travel. The trio visit Stark at his house to explain their plan for a "Time Heist" to retrieve theInfinity Stones from the past and use them to undo the Blip; Stark refuses at first. They then meet withBruce Banner at a diner and he agrees to help them, however, his initial attempts at time travel are unsuccessful, and Scott is turned from a baby into child and an elderly man. Stark later arrives to assist; he is successful in creating a device to time travel.
Scott and the others, along withThor,Rocket Raccoon,Nebula, Rhodes, and Barton formulate a plan to send them all back in time. Scott travels with Banner, Rogers and Stark to an alternate 2012 during theBattle of New York. Scott attempts to steal theSpace Stone from an alternate Stark, but it is later lost to analternate Loki. Scott takes theMind Stone back to the present while Rogers and Stark travel to an alternate 1970 to retrieve both the other stone and additional Pym Particles.
Once everyone returned, Banner successfully restores the victims of the Blip, but analternate Thanos from 2014 arrives and attacks the Avengers Compound. Scott, along with a revived Hope, joins the Avengers in abattle. Scott later attends Stark's funeral with Hope, Hank and Janet, and then returns home to spend time with Hope and Cassie.
By 2026, Scott writes a memoir titledLook Out for the Little Guy. During a family dinner with Hank, Janet, Hope, and Cassie, the latter reveals that she has been working on building a quantum satellite. Despite Janet's protests, upon opening the device, the family are separated and sucked into the Quantum Realm. Scott and Cassie encounter various species of beings, and learn that someone is looking for him due to his association with Janet. Both Scott and Cassie are captured by a surviving Darren, now cybernetically enhanced and referred to asM.O.D.O.K. After being imprisoned, they are approached byKang the Conqueror who reveals to Scott that he needs to reclaim aMultiversal Power Core to power his ship, allowing him to escape the Quantum Realm. Scott initially refuses to help him, but makes a deal in order to spare Cassie's life.
While Scott attempts to retrieve the Power Core which is trapped inside a probability storm, Scott meets other variants of himself who help him to retrieve the Power Core. With the help of the variants and Hope who flies in to save Scott, they shrink the Core down. Kang forcefully takes the Core from Scott, doesn't give Cassie back breaking their deal, kidnaps Janet, and begins to make his escape. Scott teams up with Hope, Hank, and an army of futuristic ants to fight Kang and his army and creates a portal back to their reality. Before Scott can make it through he is confronted by Kang who overpowers Scott and nearly kills him. Hope comes back to save Scott, and knocks Kang into the Power Core, seemingly killing him. Cassie reopens the portal on her end for Scott and Hope to return home, and the family happily resumes their life. Despite this, Scott questions if Kang is really dead or if he may have accidentally caused something worse to happen.
Severalalternate versions of Scott appear in the MCUmultiverse, including the animated seriesWhat If...?, with Rudd reprising his role.
In an alternate 2018, followingJanet van Dyne andHank Pym's return from theQuantum Realm, Scott is attacked and turned into a zombie by the pair who have been infected with azombie quantum virus. Later,Vision finds the zombified Scott and takes him toCamp Lehigh where he cures him with theMind Stone; however, Vision is only able to preserve Scott's head in a jar. When a group of survivors, including Scott's friend Kurt, arrive at the camp, Scott is aided by theCloak of Levitation and escapes withPeter Parker andT'Challa toWakanda. However, they discover that all of Wakanda has been infected by a zombie Thanos, until they receive help fromThor,Rocket, andGroot, but they were annihilated. After T'Challa's sacrifice, the Infinity Stones are destroyed, releasing a surge of energy. Lang and Parker are saved by the remaining sorcerers of Kamar-Taj. They welcomeShang-Chi, Katy,Kamala Khan,Blade Knight andValkyrie by saving them from the fall, and reveal to them that the energy of the Infinity Stones is being contained by Hulk, who has become "Infinity Hulk". Arriving to help defend the Hulk, Lang and the remaining heroes fall one by one.
In an alternate 1602, Scott,Bucky Barnes, andRogers Hood worked together and acted as aMerry Men-type group. After stopping a carriage carryingLoki, they were met byCaptain Peggy Carter. Scott accompanied them to a pub, however, it was attacked bySir Harold "Happy: Hogan, the Royal Yellowjackets, and theDestroyer who were in search for Carter. Scott was annoyed that the Royal Yellowjackets stole his shrinking techniques. After escaping, Scott, Rogers, and Barnes met with Carter,Tony Stark, andBruce Banner about a plan in saving the universe from an incursion. Scott, Barnes, Rogers, and Carter disguised themselves and infiltratedKing Thor's court palace. Once Stark arrived with his device and Carter had grabbed the Scepter carrying theTime Stone, they learned that Rogers was the cause of the incursion. Carter used the Stone to send him back which also caused Scott and the others to return to their respective universes.
In another universe, Scott Lang was pruned by theTime Variance Authority and sent to theVoid at the End of Time where he died while in his giant form. His skeletal remains were used byCassandra Nova and her forces as a base.
The consensus ofreview aggregator websiteRotten Tomatoes reads, "Led by a charming performance from Paul Rudd,Ant-Man offers Marvel thrills on an appropriately smaller scale – albeit not as smoothly as its most successful predecessors."[41]Todd McCarthy ofThe Hollywood Reporter remarked, "Although the story dynamics are fundamentally silly and the family stuff, with its parallel father-daughter melodrama, is elemental button-pushing, a good cast led by a winning Paul Rudd puts the nonsense over in reasonably disarming fashion."[42]
ForAnt-Man and the Wasp, the critical consensus on Rotten Tomatoes reads, "A lighter, brighter superhero movie powered by the effortless charisma of Paul Rudd and Evangeline Lilly,Ant-Man and The Wasp offers a much-needed MCU palate cleanser."[43] Simon Abrams ofRogerEbert.com felt that the film managed to juggle its many subplots while giving Rudd's Scott some decent character development.[44]Peter Travers, writing forRolling Stone, gave the film 3 out of 4 stars and praised Rudd and Lilly,[45] as did Manohla Dargis atThe New York Times, who praised Rudd, and felt Lilly found "her groove" in the film,[46] while Stephanie Zachareck, writing forTime, thought the film had reasonably fun action and stand-out moments between Rudd and Abby Ryder Fortson as daughter Cassie, but felt the focus on Lilly as a better hero than Rudd was "just checking off boxes in the name of gender equality."[47]
Richard Roeper of theChicago Sun-Times also praised the cast, especially Rudd and Fortson,[48] while Ann Hornaday ofThe Washington Post called the film "instantly forgettable" and criticized its plot, but still found the film enjoyable, particularly praising Rudd along with the action and effects.[49]
| Year | Film | Award | Category | Result | Ref. |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2015 | Ant-Man | Teen Choice Awards | Choice Summer Movie Star: Male | Nominated | [50] |
| 2016 | Critics' Choice Awards | Best Actor in an Action Movie | Nominated | [51] | |
| Saturn Awards | Best Actor | Nominated | [52] | ||
| MTV Movie Awards | Best Hero | Nominated | [53] | ||
| 2019 | Ant-Man and the Wasp | Teen Choice Awards | Choice Action Movie Actor | Nominated | [54] |
| Avengers: Endgame | |||||
| 2023 | Ant-Man and the Wasp: Quantumania | MTV Movie & TV Awards | Best Hero | Nominated | [55] |
Scott Lang / Ant-Man appears inAnt-Man and The Wasp: Nano Battle! atHong Kong Disneyland and in the preshow of Avengers Assemble: Flight Force atWalt Disney Studios Park. Rudd reprises the role for the character's appearance in Nano Battle!.[56][57]
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