The Marvel Cinematic Universe has grown to a massive size, and it has some fans who think they need to connect every movie to understand each one frustrated. Honestly, this is a non-factor, as almost every movie in the MCU can be watched on its own, with little knowledge, and fans won’t lose anything other than Easter eggs and things that really don’t matter much to the story.

If no one ever saw Loki, it wouldn’t hurt Ant-Man and the Wasp: Quantumania at all. While Kang made his first appearance on that Disney+ show, no one needs to know what happened there to understand this movie. No one needs to have seen Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness to understand the multiverse in this movie. No one really needed to see the first two Ant-Man movies, as Scott Lang pretty much explains everything in the opening of this movie.

However, there will still be people who don’t like this movie for one reason or another. That is okay, as everyone has an opinion, but this movie is nowhere near as bad as some detractors seem to think. It is just different, letting some goofy moments shine proudly, and is a nice setup for the future of the MCU.

Scott Lang is living his best life. He has a podcast. He wrote a bestselling book. He is back with his daughter and has the love of his life Hope by his side. However, there are also problems. Cassie Lang lived on her own for years during the Blip and she doesn’t understand why Scott isn’t fighting to save people as Ant-Man anymore – even though there really aren’t villains to fight for him right now. She ended up as a social protestor and has been arrested for this more than once.

She has also been working with Hope and Hank Pym to find ways to help people. Together, the three of them built a signal beacon to the Quantum Realm in case anyone there needed help. This was bad. Janet van Dyne never told them what is really in the Quantum Realm, and by the time she reminded them how dangerous it was, they all got sucked in and that is where the movie takes off.

The Quantum Realm is a lot like the world of the Micronauts (for those older comic book fans) and it is a lot like the what Negative Zone could look like. However, instead of dictators like Annihilius, there is a very different dictator in Kang the Conqueror. See, Janet met Kang years ago and helped him when she realized he was trapped like she was. It wasn’t until she helped find a way out that she realized Kang was a mass murderer and someone who had destroyed worlds. He was sent to the Quantum Realm as a prison sentence by the Kang’s from other timelines. Janet destroyed his way out and fled.

Kang has now used the machine Cassie, Hank, and Hope built to bring them all back into the Quantum Realm. He has two people he wants help from. He has Janet, who he knows can get the device working again. He also has Scott Lang, who he plans to send in to steal the object using Pym Particles. See, Kang also has someone in the Quantum Realm that knows Scott and hates him more than anyone.

Let’s talk about some of the complaints. First, people complained about the CGI and that really isn’t fair. The complaints are mostly about alien races that look a little goofy – but that was the entire point. There is a gelatinous alien named Veb (voiced by David Dastmalchian, who played Kurty in the first two Ant-Man movies) – and how else is he supposed to look? I get people who hated MODOK, but that’s just because he wasn’t the version from the comics (and the amazing Hulu series).

However, Jonathan Majors was incredible as Kang, going from calculating to downright evil. Admittedly, the plot was a paint-by-numbers ordeal, and everyone just went from one beat to the next. That was a little disappointing, as nothing really fresh happened here. However, what the movie had was visuals in spades – this movie looked like a Jim Starlin drawing coming to life. What some called bad CGI, I called creative artistic choices – and most of them worked for me.

Sadly, some of the story beats felt forced – such as Janet refusing to say anything about the Quantum Realm until it was too late. Wasp was also short-changed in the movie, and when she came back to save Scott, it didn’t ring true since it wasn’t part of the movie up to that point. However, despite the story problems and the unchallenging plot beats, the movie was still fun.

Not every MCU movie needs to have the highest of stakes, and when it comes to just delivering a fun time at the movies, Ant-Man and the Wasp: Quantumania delivered on that promise.