Although Marvel Studios has its entire slate of 2022 projects still coming as scheduled, 2023 is setting up to be an equally big year for the growing franchise as well. For the time being, the last theatrical project of that year will be Ant-Man and the Wasp: Quantumania, which will see Paul Rudd and Evangeline Lilly join forces for their biggest solo adventure to date.
As has been the case with nearly every MCU project in Phase 4, Marvel Studios' third solo Ant-Man movie has had to deal with the challenges of completing production with the worldwide Covid-19 pandemic still being a reality. The threequel was only officially announced at Disney Investor Day in December 2020, meaning all shooting and production would have to be done with elevated safety protocols.
While other projects like WandaVision and The Falcon and the Winter Soldier had this wrench thrown in part of the way through production, Quantumania finished everything that was needed to film more than a year ahead of its currently set release date. Recently, starring actress Evangeline Lilly looked back to how difficult that was while also mentioning how much the work was worth it in the end.
Evangeline Lilly on Ant-Man's Difficult Filming
Speaking with The Digital Fix on the promotional tour for South of Heaven, MCU star Evangeline Lilly looked back on Ant-Man and the Wasp: Quantumania's difficult production run. Specifically, she touched on how the team managed to complete their work during the COVID-19 pandemic.
Reminiscing on how she finished shooting for the movie in November 2021, she admitted that Quantumania "was the hardest one" that she and Marvel have made and that it was the only one they did "during the Covid lockdowns." Due to the entire group wearing masks during production, Lilly called it "an incredible complication" not being able to see anybody's faces:
“We finished filming at the end of November, and I think, hands down, it was the hardest one we’ve made. It was the most difficult. It was the only one we’ve made during the Covid lockdowns. That just adds such an incredible complication to making a movie. It adds a lot of stress. It makes things very impersonal because you can’t see faces.”
Major movie sets like this one are "already impersonal enough," and Lilly made it clear how high the intensity levels were as Covid complicated everything even further. Even with those issues, though, the starring actress feels that this movie may be "the best one yet" after all that the team managed to work through:
“Film sets are already impersonal enough, there is so much that goes on and so much that has to get done in a short amount of time, and the intensity level is really, really high. So it was a very trying experience doing the film with Covid measures. But I actually think…what we did, the stuff we shot, the material we managed to get, I think it might be the best one yet.”
Lilly also teased that she couldn't reveal anything about the movie's plot details, specifically whether she ends up meeting Bill Murray's unknown villain at any point in the story.
The Best Ant-Man Movie to Date?
Having played the role of Hope Van Dyne in the MCU since 2015's Ant-Man, Evangeline Lilly has seen plenty of developments and evolution in regard to Marvel Studios' production process with her three movies to this point. Even so, on top of a massive new story coming in Quantumania, the Covid situation only made this threequel that much more of a challenge for everybody involved.
Quantumania will see Lilly and Rudd explore the Quantum Realm more deeply than ever before alongside Kathryn Newton's newly-ordained hero Stature, all while facing Jonathan Majors' Kang the Conqueror and Bill Murray's undisclosed villain. Capturing all this action on camera while pushing through daily health & safety protocols added another layer of intensity to the filming process for the team.
In the end, it all seems to have paid off in a big way for Lilly, who's been consistently positive about her work on her third MCU solo film while helping promote one of Marvel Studios' biggest upcoming events.
With more than 18 months still remaining until Ant-Man 3 debuts in theaters, Marvel will have plenty more work to complete as the world continues navigating the issues presented by the pandemic. However, if even part of what Lilly has said turns out to be true, Summer 2023 will have eyes from all over the world looking at what the MCU is bringing with its 33rd film.
Ant-Man and the Wasp: Quantumania is set to premiere in theaters on July 28, 2023.
