Skip to main content

Michael Douglas joins the cast of Marvel’s Ant-Man as the original Ant-Man, Hank Pym

michael douglas joins cast ant man admired his golden globe
Image used with permission by copyright holder

Academy Award winning actor Michael Douglas has joined the cast of Marvel and director Edgar Wright’s Ant-Man as the original Ant-Man Hank Pym, according to Marvel. Paul Rudd, who has already been confirmed for the film, will play the second character in the comics to go by the name Ant-Man, Scott Lang.

The announcement should help to clarify some of the older, contradictory reports regarding the story of the film. Some early news posts claimed that Rudd would appear as Pym/Ant-Man, while others claimed the character of Pym would appear in more of a supporting, possibly mentor-like role to Rudd’s Lang. Although Marvel isn’t ready to discuss the story of the film just yet, the latter report seems more likely, with Douglas’ character overseeing Rudd as Ant-Man.

In the comics, Scott Lang first appeared in 1979, long after Hank Pym had been established as Ant-Man. Despite being an electronics genius, Lang was forced into a life of crime to support his family. After his daughter Cassie faced a life-threatening illness, Lang returned to crime and broke into Pym’s house, where he stole both the Ant-Man costume and the gas that allows a person to shrink down. Lang then went to the labs where the only person who could save his daughter worked, and discovered she was being held hostage. Lang’s heroic side kicked in and he thwarted the crime.

Afterwards, Lang returned the suit to Pym and was prepared to go to jail, but instead Pym allowed him to keep it and carry the Ant-Man mantle. Since then, Lang has appeared as Ant-Man in several comics as a member of multiple teams, and even reached the pinnacle of superherodom when he died and came back to life.

The casting confirmation comes less than 24 hours after the 69-year old Douglas walked away with the Golden Globe for “Best Actor – Miniseries or a Movie,” for his portrayal of Liberace in the HBO movie Behind the Candelabra

“With Hank Pym’s rich history in the Marvel Universe, we knew we needed an actor capable of bringing the weight and stature to the role that the character deserves,” Marvel Studios President Kevin Feige said. “We felt incredibly relieved when Michael Douglas agreed to step into the part with the charm and fortitude he brings to every character he inhabits, and couldn’t be more excited to see what he will do to bring Hank Pym to life.”

Ant-Man hits theaters on July 31, 2015. 

Editors' Recommendations

Ryan Fleming
Former Digital Trends Contributor
Ryan Fleming is the Gaming and Cinema Editor for Digital Trends. He joined the DT staff in 2009 after spending time covering…
Marvel’s Spider-Man Remastered on PC makes me excited for Sony games again
marvels spider man pc steam deck impressions msmr hero

When I got my review code for the PC version of Marvel’s Spider-Man Remastered, I was about to leave for a weeklong vacation. Normally, that would be bad news. With no gaming laptop, I’d have to wait until I got back home to test it out, before rushing out some impressions in a few days. But that wasn’t the case this time. In fact, the timing couldn’t have been better … thanks to my Steam Deck.

While the PC version of Insomniac's hit superhero game comes with a list of flashy improvements, its Steam Deck verification status is the most exciting one. That meant that I could take a supersized open-world game on the go and casually poke away at it for minutes at a time, rather than sitting at my PS5 or PC for long sessions.

Read more
Marvel’s Spider-Man Remastered gets DualSense features, DLSS support on PC
marvels spider man remastered gets dualsense dlss support on pc marvel s

Marvel's Spider-Man Remastered is less than a month away from swinging to PC, and Sony has revealed some new features on the PlayStation Blog that players will experience when they get the game. Two of the port's most notable features are its PlayStation DualSense integration and Nvidia DLSS support.

DLSS is an acronym for "deep learning super sampling," and it's responsible for enhancing the graphical performance of a PC game, boosting its frame rates and resolution without compromising image quality or taxing the graphics card in the process. However, DLSS does this with the help of a dedicated Tensor Core A.I. processor that can only be found in GeForce RTX GPUs.

Read more
Marvel’s Avengers won’t give Spider-Man his own story missions
One of Spider-Man's costumes in Marvel's Avengers

After a long wait, Marvel's Avengers players on PlayStation are finally getting access to Spider-Man this month, just without any story missions. As revealed in IGN's preview of Spider-Man in the Marvel-based action game, the web slinger's debut won't include any story missions.

Marvel's Avengers Expansion: Black Panther - War for Wakanda Cinematic Trailer

Read more