Warning: The following contains spoilers for Ant-Man And The Wasp: Quantumania and the Marvel Cinematic Universe projects that predate it.Ant-Man And The Wasp: Quantumania kicks off Phase 5 of the Marvel Cinematic Universe with a trip to the Quantum Realm. The often-mentioned, but rarely explored, piece of the MCU gets to be seen in quite a bit more detail this time around. Scott Lang finds out that his daughter Cassie has been building equipment that will allow them to map the Quantum Realm. When she sends a signal to the other realm to show him and the Pym family how it works, the entire group finds themselves pulled into the Quantum Realm.
As is true with most comic book movies of the modern day, Ant-Man And The Wasp: Quantumania tells its story while hiding plenty of Easter eggs within it for the audience. Some of those Easter eggs are callbacks to the comic book source material, while others are really more of connective tissue to the wider MCU. There are also some pop culture references that fans will find fun to spot.
New Characters In The Marvel Studios Logo
Following the release of each new project in Phase 4 of the MCU, new Marvel characters were added to the banner that creates the Marvel Studios logo at the top of the movie. The same is true here. Shuri, in her new Black Panther ensemble from Black Panther: Wakanda Forever appears in the logo now. Interestingly, so does He Who Remains, the variant of Kang that appears in the first season of Loki on Disney+.
Jimmy Woo And Other Cameos
Scott Lang’s opening montage in which the narration doubles as him reading from his book (which acts as a recap of the MCU from his own point of view, and has previously appeared in Ms. Marvel and Black Panther: Wakanda Forever) includes Scott interacting with quite a few people. One of those is Randall Park’s Jimmy Woo, the FBI agent who was in charge of his house arrest in the last movie and had a substantial role in WandaVision.
Other cameos are more pop culture related. Actress Patricia Belcher, who is probably best known for her role in Bones and currently appears in The Villains Of Valley View is an Ant-Man fan. So is Buzzfeed Unsolved host Ryan Bergara.
Ant-Man Merchandise
In previous MCU installments, characters like Iron Man and Captain America have had merchandise available in the background that helps let the audience know how popular the characters are in the universe. Now, Ant-Man is just as popular. Kids can be spotted wearing backpacks with his poster design from the first movie on them and there’s graffiti on buildings of him.
The Blip Has Lingering Consequences
Less of an Easter egg, and more of a reminder of the connective tissue in the MCU, Cassie mentions the Blip. The Blip is the time in which half of Earth’s population was gone as a result of Thanos’ Snap. Though every MCU movie since Avengers: Endgame gets farther away from the Blip, the consequences are still being felt. There are homeless camps made up entirely of people who lost their houses as a result of it. The idea of the Blip is explored more in Hawkeye and The Falcon And The Winter Soldier.
Scott Lang Flew To Germany
Scott clearly spends a lot of time talking about his handful of adventures with the Avengers, much to the amusement of his family. One of the things that Cassie has clearly heard about more than she cares about is Scott Lang flying all the way to Germany to “fight Captain America” as Ant-Man. Scott corrects her that he would never fight Captain America. Fans will remember that as the first time Scott got to team up with other Avengers in Captain America: Civil War.
Sub-Atomica
Janet references that they have to get through Sub-Atomica to make it all the way into the Quantum Realm. In Marvel Comics, Sub-Atomica is actually the name of a star system - but a star system in the Microverse.
Sub-Atomica consists of five planets, most of which are visited thanks to Fantastic Four stories in the comics in the 1960s when Doctor Doom made a trip to the Microverse and the Fantastic Four had to stop him. The inhabitants of the different planets include humanoid creatures and lizard men, and are a diverse group, not unlike the inhabitants of the Quantum Realm that the movie introduces.
Quantum Realm Inhabitants
Most of the inhabitants that Scott, Cassie, Hank, Janet, and Hope meet in the Quantum Realm are created for the movie. A few of them, however, are nods to existing comic book characters.
Bill Murray’s Krylar is a character who actually interacts with Hulk in the Microverse in Marvel Comics. His storyline, as someone who betrays an ally and ends up dead, is essentially the same in Ant-Man And The Wasp: Quantumania.
Jentorra is referenced as being “of the travelers” by another member of the freedom fighters in the Quantum Realm. That might not mean those traveling from one part of the Quantum Realm to another. In the comics, Jentorra is actually the queen of a group of people from another planet in the Microverse that ends up displaced into the main universe.
The voice of Veb will also be familiar to Ant-Man fans. That’s David Dastmalchian voicing the character. He previously played one of Scott’s coworkers in the first two Ant-Man movies. Fans were surprised that he was cast in a new role for Ant-Man 3, but the voice work meant he still got to be part of the project.
The One With The Hammer
The audience knows by now that MCU projects like to reference other Avengers who aren’t in the movie by describing them instead of naming them. That’s what Kang does with Thor here, but it’s to indicate that he’s killed so many members of the Avengers that he can’t tell them apart anymore. Thor, however, is the only Avenger to get a description out of Kang, leaving just which Avengers he’s killed in other timelines up to the audience to guess. Of course, the audience might want to remember that Chris Hemsworth's Thor isn't the only one to wield a hammer either, so Kang could have killed Mighty Thor, Vision, or even Captain America while they used Mjolnir.
Kang’s Costume
Kang’s clothing remains true to his comic book counterpart, right down to the blue screen that’s part of his armor. While Kang has had many forms in the comics, his best known is Kang The Conqueror who dons purple and green clothing that acts as armor and comes with a lot of advanced technology from the future. That’s true here as well. Some fans might have thought his skin would be blue, but the blue screen that is a part of his helmet is also true to the technology he possesses in the comics.
The Tower Of Scotts
When Scott tries to get to the energy core that would power Kang’s ship, he is faced with all the possibilities of himself. As he weighs decisions, more possible Scotts emerge around him, including one that works at Baskin-Robbins instead of as Ant-Man. The imagery of the tower of Scotts banding together to help him get to the core is one that will be familiar to movie fans. It’s reminiscent of the first time Scott gets the ants to help him on a mission as the ants build a chain, and then a tower, below him to give him a boost.
18147
Quaz telepathically discovers that 18147 is the numeric sequence to gain the freedom fighters of the Quantum Realm access to a drawbridge. Many of the number sequences in MCU movies can often be Easter eggs, so fans might have wondered what this number could translate to.
Avengers #181 is actually the first appearance of Scott Lang. He’s a civilian in that first appearance, appearing in a sequence in Stark Industries. It’s Marvel Premiere #47, the other part of the numeric sequence, that features his first appearance as Ant-Man (and his daughter Cassie Lang’s first appearance in Marvel Comics as well).
Marvel’s New Fastball Special
Marvel Comics has what is affectionately known as the fastball special. It’s a move in a fight when X-Men team member Colossus picks up Wolverine and literally launches him at the enemy in a fight as though throwing a fastball in a baseball game. Variations of the move have been employed by plenty of other characters in the comics, but they are the duo most remembered for it. Here, it’s Hope’s Wasp who picks up a shrunken version of Scott and throws him like a baseball, only for him to use the technology of the suit to expand on impact, giving a new twist on the move.
A Craving For Citrus
When Cassie Lang transforms into a giant, it’s not just a nod to Cassie having growing and shrinking abilities as a Young Avenger as she does in the comics. It’s also a callback to Scott’s time in Captain America: Civil War. She chants, “please work,” just as he did before using the Pym Particle to make herself grow. She also immediately wants lime just as Scott wanted orange, an apparent side effect of using the ability.
Much of Cassie’s story, however, is a callback to Scott’s entrance into the MCU. Her first shot in the movie, turning around in a jail cell, is just like Scott’s turning around in a prison. Her constant desire to do better and to help people mirrors his own, and is what turns Scott into a hero in the first place.
Mid-Credit Scene: The Council Of Kangs
Early in the movie, Kang alludes to there being more of him, of his banishment, and “all of” him being responsible for ending different timelines. All of those hints culminate in the mid-credit scene of Quantumania in which the audience gets to see more variants of Kang from the comics. Both Rama-Tut, who was hinted at in Moon Knight, and Immortus, one of the most powerful Kang variants in the comics, appear to discuss the other version of Kang being vanished. The third variant looks to have similar costuming to the main timeline Nathaniel Richards, who eventually becomes the various villains.
The Council of Kangs exists in the comics as a group that decides to work together to conquer multiple universes. After they do, however, one member of the council begins killing the others, wanting to be the ultimate Kang. It’s possible the MCU could see a version of that play out among the infinite number of Kangs that exist.
Post-Credit Scene: Victor Timely
Victor Timely appears talking to an audience in the early 1900s. In the audience are Loki and Mobius, indicating this particular scene may be one appearing in Loki season 2. More than that, however, is that Victor Timely is one of Kang’s many aliases in Marvel Comics.
Though Kang’s comic book history goes back to the 1960s, Victor Timely makes his first comic book appearance in the 1990s. He’s one of the aliases Kang uses while traveling back in time. He founds the small town of Timely, Wisconsin, named after himself before he starts passing himself off as Victor Timely Jr when his not aging becomes apparent. He’s named for Timely Comics, the comic book publisher that would eventually become Marvel Comics.
Kang Will Return
Typically, at the end of the credits and any additional scenes, the audience sees text indicating one of the heroes will return in a future installment. Instead, “Kang will return,” is what shows up on the screen, reminding the audience that Kang is the big villain of Phase 5 and 6. Phase 6 will culminate with Avengers: The Kang Dynasty and Avengers: Secret Wars.