Ant-Man Trailer: Five Things We Want To See

After a years-long and sometimes tumultuous road to production, Marvel Studios' Ant-Man will debut its first footage in a teaser trailer on January 6, as Marvel's Agent Carter begins on ABC.

The film, from Yes Man director Peyton Reed, will follow Paul Rudd as Scott Lang, the second Ant-Man, and explore his relationship with his mentor, Hank Pym (played by Michael Douglas), who invented the Ant-Man technology.

All they while, Pym will be dealing with a corporate takeover from the man who will eventually be Yellowjacket, played by Corey Stoll. It's described as a "heist" movie, in the same way that Captain America: The Winter Soldier was a spy movie with superheroes in it and Guardians of the Galaxy was a space opera.

So...what are we hoping to see in the upcoming trailer?

Hank Pym

What's the sense in having somebody with the gravitas of Michael Douglas if you can't use him?

Luckily for us, based on set photos and rumors, it seems that Pym will be a much more physically "present" part of the film than, say, Robert Redford's character in The Winter Soldier was, so it seems likely we'll see at least a taste of his work.

Of course, the real question is: will we see a younger Hank Pym as Ant-Man? Rumors have swirled around the idea of a flashback setting that deals with some of the earliest elements of the Avengers Initiative, possibly tying into Marvel's Agent Carter itself. Don't be too surprised if, assuming it's true, that's part of what we get in the teaser.

Ant-Man in action

When Arrow cast The Atom to appear in the show's third season, many fans wondered whether DC's shrinking superhero would beat Marvel's to the screen. He still may, in terms of a complete story, but as of now, we haven't even seen the effects yet. So...will we see Ant-Man?

Very much like when X-Men: Days of Future Past filmmakers were talking about their version of Quicksilver, Marvel has said repeatedly that the way they're doing the shrinking in Ant-Man is something different, special and unexpected. On the one hand, it seems like you have to show that in the teaser. On the other...might it be too good to blow so early?

Janet Van Dyne

If you look carefully at the blown-up version of the "Ant-sized preview," you can see the a haircut on one of the pixellated figures that is almost certainly Hope Van Dyne, the daughter of Hank Pym and Janet Van Dyne. It's been strongly hinted that Janet is out of the picture by the time the present day comes around, but will we see her in flashbacks? Or at least get a hint as to what happened?

We hope so, and we'll let that take Hope's spot on here, only becuase it seems like we already know Hope is in the trailer.

Yellowjacket

Marvel seemingly has an ingenious way of dealing with one of their most notorious moments.

Depressed, harried and exhausted, Hank Pym (then wearing the Yellowjacket costume, rather than Ant-Man, Giant Man or Goliath...the guy switches things up a lot) lashed out, striking Janet.

And much like Tony Stark's alcoholism or Aquaman "talking to fish," this one moment in a decades-old story has become the focal point of most conversations about Pym's character for years. It's not entirely unlikely this is why he's not the Ant-Man in the film.

So...what have they done to fix it? Well, Yellowjacket is the bad guy in this movie. So anyone who sees the image above without any kind of context will likely take away that it's the bad guy, not the hero. Clever.

If that is their motivation for making Yellowjacket the villain -- which is plausible but not necessarily likely -- then it stands to reason they'll want the idea of who Yellowjacket is out there early and often, establishing him as the big bad and as someone independent of Ant-Man, before people snap up any old Avengers trades to prep for the movie.

A Marvel guest

Ant-Man isn't Guardians of the Galaxy. It doesn't take place in its own "space." We'll almost certainly see some crossover, either with the current day Avengers or with members of the OSS and early S.H.I.E.L.D. from Captain America: The First Avenger and Marvel's Agent Carter...or both.

So...who do we hope to see? Darned if we know. But putting a familiar face in this trailer could go a long way toward reminding people that "it's all connected" and just because he's not in Avengers: Age of Ultron doesn't mean he isn't important to the Marvel Cinematic Universe.