Ant-Man Director Peyton Reed Wishes Paul Rudd A Happy Birthday

He may be on lockdown like Scott Lang during his house arrest thanks to everyone being quarantined in their homes, but it’s still a big day for Ant-Man star Paul Rudd. Rudd turned 51 years old today and his Marvel Studios director Peyton Reed took to Twitter to encourage MCU fans to wish him a happy birthday. “Please join me in wishing a very Happy Birthday to your ⁦Ant-Man⁩ and mine – Mr. Paul Rudd,” Reed tweeted. Even though Rudd booked the part of Ant-Man while Edgar Wright was still attached as director, the pair of Reed and Rudd are still thick as thieves.

A third Ant-Man movie is officially in development at Marvel Studios and was reportedly set to start filming in the early part of 2021, but the production and release delays as a result of the COVID-19 coronavirus have left a lot of things in flux with Marvel Cinematic Universe plans.

On Friday it was announced that Rick and Morty alumnus Jeff Loveness has been hired to pen the script for the Paul Rudd and Evangeline Lilly-starring threequel. Reed had previously boarded the project, making it his third film set in the MCU. The report suggests Marvel Studios and Loveness struck a deal shortly before the shutdowns began and the latter is well into writing the script.

With all the shuffling going on, it’s unclear when Ant-Man 3 could hit theaters. The next open date Marvel Studios has that is officially unclaimed is October 7, 2022 though movies like Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 3 and Blade are already well into development as well. It’s unclear at this point what the movie will be titled as well after Ant-Man 2 eventually took on the name of Ant-Man and the Wasp.

Either way, Reed himself previously told us he’d love to dive back into the Quantum Realm and see what other storytelling they could pull out of the mysterious Marvel location.

“I think that was the case in the first movie, particularly when Adam McKay and Paul were reworking the script on the first movie,” Reed previously shared with ComicBook.com. “In that movie, we added the Quantum Realm and Janet and stuff like that knowing that if we were able to make a sequel that that could be fertile ground.”

He added, “There are definitely things in this movie that, if we’re fortunate enough to make another one, there’s a lot to play with. We spend more time in the Quantum Realm in this movie, obviously, than the first movie but it feels like we’re just dipping our toes into it.”