Ant-Man and the Wasp: Quantumania Ending Explained: Is Kang Really Dead? Cameos and Who Died?
The ending of Ant-Man and the Wasp: Quantumania allows us to shed some light on the direction that Phase 5 of the Marvel Cinematic Universe (MCU) will take. As explained in the spoiler-free Ant-Man 3 review, the film retains the fresh, fun, and light-hearted approach of its predecessors. Unlike other Marvel franchises, the one dedicated to Scott Lang is characterized precisely by plot developments with less impact on the MCU, and more devoted to entertainment. At the end of the film, however, Ant-Man and the Wasp: Quantumania lays the foundations for the future of Phase 5 of the MCU, with important developments that will certainly have relevant consequences in the next Marvel films and TV series. You can find them all listed in the Marvel 2023 release calendar. It is therefore worth taking stock of how Ant-Man and the Wasp: Quantumania ends and what important happens in the final scene.
The Story of Kang Ant-Man and the Wasp: Quantumania
The villain of Quantumania is Kang, one of the most famous villains of the Marvel universe, who already appeared in the miniseries dedicated to Loki. There are many versions of Kang: Ant-Man 3 is new and very dangerous. During the film, we are revealed that this version is known as Kang the Conqueror, one of the most dangerous and destructive. During the 30 years she has been stranded in the Quantum Realm, Janet has known Kang. She saves his life after he arrives on his ship in the Quantum Realm, getting stranded like her. The two work hard to try to get the spaceship back up and running and return to their respective worlds. It is revealed over the course of the film that Kang was exiled to the Quantum Realm by other versions of himself, with whom he has been battling. Already in the finale of the TV series Loki, it was explained that there are many versions of Kang in the Multiverse, perpetually fighting against each other.
After successfully repairing Kang’s ship, Janet makes a horrific discovery while touching its core. The technology she is made of is connected to Kang’s mind and, by touching her, Janet is as if she were reading his mind. In her memoir Janet discovers that Kang has conquered and destroyed countless worlds, killing millions for his lust for power. She then decides to use the latest technologies related to the Pym particles to dramatically increase the size of the ship’s core, forever locking Kang in the Quantum Realm. Before the destruction of the spacecraft, however, Kang got his armor back and, with his powers, begins to hunt down Janet and subjugate the populations living in the Quantum Realm.
How Ant-Man and the Wasp: Quantumania Ends: Ending Explanation
At the end of Ant-Man 3 Kang manages to capture Scott and his daughter Cassie. It is by threatening the latter that he convinces Ant-Man to collaborate with him. The man will have to shrink down, enter the expanded core of his ship and use the Pym particles to return him to his normal size, so that Kang can leave the Quantum Realm. He plans to use the army he has assembled to exact revenge against those who exiled him. Scott enters the core of the spacecraft and, helped by The Wasp and thousands of “possible” versions generated by each decision made by the two, manages to bring the core back to its normal size. Joined by Janet, Scott hesitates to give her the object. Kang has Cassie in her hands. The Conqueror has promised to let her go if he gets back what he wants.
Kang appropriates the object but doesn’t keep his promise, unleashing the wrath of Scott. As Kang prepares to leave the Quantum Realm, a gigantic version of first Scott and then his daughter Cassie manages to stop Kang’s departure. The two revert to human size in the microscopic Quantum Realm, becoming colossal. The conqueror’s army is defeated by the rebels of the Quantum Realm, who have come to fight at Cassie’s call. Furious, Kang takes the field and single-handedly manages to stop the Ant-Man family members and the rebels. His technology and knowledge of the future make him nearly invincible. Surprisingly, Hank Pym’s ants will stop him, who ended up in the Quantum Realm years earlier and reorganized themselves as a civilization with impressive technological and warfare advances. Hank had immediately sensed the presence of something calling him to the Quantum Realm. After meeting his ants, he allied with them against Kang.
MODOK, the new incarnation of Darren created by the conqueror, also makes a decisive contribution to the victory over Kang. The man has abandoned hostilities against the Lang family spurred on by Cassie, who after neutralizing him asks him to try to “stop being a dick”. The victory, therefore, belongs to the Pym/Lang family: the Quantum Realm is free from Kang’s aims. Cassie uses Kang’s ship and its technology to open a portal back home. The Pym family and Lang begin to pass through the portal. At the last moment, however, Kang reappears and attempts to travel to the human world to leave the quantum world.
Is Kang Really Dead?
Scott stops to hold him, engaging in a fight with a Kang. The Conqueror is weakened but not defeated. Worried, Hope goes back through the rift and helps Scott get the better of Kang, who seems to be sucked into the same core of his mind-ship as him. It is unclear whether Kang is dead. From the scene, it seems that he has been sucked into the same technology mind of his ship, almost trapped in the same memory as him.
Scott returns to Earth along with his entire family, unharmed. He decides to celebrate a birthday among his daughter Cassie’s many lost ones, even if it’s not the day of the party. The protagonist is still haunted by what Kang told him: if he hadn’t managed to free himself from the Quantum Realm, the future would have been disastrous. However, he decides not to think about it and sets aside any thoughts about it.
The Theory of the One Who Remains?
Throughout Ant-Man and the Wasp: Quantumania, Kang mentions a few points that seem to link him directly to the One Who Remains, the version of him we met in the Loki season finale. In the tape, Kang is upset at being exiled to the Quantum Realm and notes that he will seek revenge against all the versions of himself that imprisoned him. By this he refers to Kangas’ advice (which we saw in more detail in the post-credits scenes) and that he will seek to dominate everything. Loki, He Who Remains tells a similar story. He says that he ended the multiverse war by wiping out all versions of himself, making sure to create a single timeline that he could control. Without that timeline, he points out, everything would be chaos. Similarly, he mentions that he was once known as “Conqueror”, which is a nickname of several Kang, but it may be connected to what we see in Quantumania.
At the end of Loki, Sylvie kills Kang which frees the timelines. Interestingly, He Who Remains says: “See you soon.” The only thing the character doesn’t mention is that he was once imprisoned by other Kangs, which offers the possibility that he’s just another version of Kang. With this kind of narrative, we may see Kang’s story in a sort of “reversal”, seeing his death begin, with Quantumania being an earlier point in his life, and we may see a story where the Kangs kill him. imprisoned or in which he faces other Avengers before being imprisoned in the Quantum Realm, which is also a place without time. The truth is that it is unlikely that the Quantumania version of Kang died. It is seen how he is absorbed by the core technology that could help him get out of the Quantum Realm, so it is possible that he went free, later developing into the One Who Remains or taking another path. With the multiverse anything is possible. As for the next time we see Kang, we may not see him until the next phase of Marvel, but anything can happen.
These Are The Cameos at the End!
Something that stands out about Marvel movies is that, sometimes, they present us with different cameos during their movies or series, which is why Ant-Man 3 was no stranger to these, check out what are the cameos that are inside the movie at continuation.
Krylar-Bill Murray
Something we knew in advance was that actor Bill Murray was going to have a role in Ant-Man 3 and that is that Murray plays Krylar, a former friend of Janet Van Dyne in the Quantum Realm and to whom she goes for help after getting stuck in place. The Ant-Man movie marked, once again, the importance of the Sacred Timeline currently in the UCM, since it was even mentioned in cameos.
Loki-Tom Hiddleston
With a brief appearance in the second post-credits scene, we can see Tom Hiddleston once again playing Loki, hinting that the second season of the series is well linked to Ant-Man 3, the Sacred Timeline, and the Kang variants.
Agent Mobius – Owen Wilson
Another character from the Loki series that was also present in the second post-credits scene of the film is Agent Mobius, who is accompanying Loki on his mission.
Who Dies in Ant-Man 3?
Don’t worry, if you care about the death of any of the most important characters, they emerged victorious from their first face-to-face battle with the new villain Kang, but there is still a lot to cover in this new Phase that the UCM presented to us. Warning: You will find spoilers for Ant-Man 3 below, if you have not seen the movie yet, please stop reading here. 3 characters die in this new film, find out what they are below:
Krylar
Interpreted by Bill Murray, Krylar is one of Janet Van Dyne’s old friends and to whom she goes for help when they fall back into the Quantum Realm, after a brief appearance, the character dies devoured by a type of bug that Hank throws one of his PYM particle disks into the cocktail parties where they are.
MODOK
MODOK is another of the characters that die in Ant-Man 3, on the tape we discover that he is still Darren Cross/Yellowjacket, but that banished to the Quantum Realm he was rescued and transformed into half a machine. His ending is a bit sad, and it is that after a fight with Cassie, he redeems himself and helps them attack Kang the Conqueror, for which he ends up dead at the hands of the villain.
Kang the Conqueror
Kang the Conqueror ends up dead at the hands of Hope and Scott after Hope arrives to save Scott from a strong and shocking fight. They ruin Kang’s force core that allows him to leave the Quantum Realm, this variant of Kang is absorbed and dies, without achieving its mission of conquering the entire multiverse.
