Perhaps the most plot-important after-credits scene in the Marvel Cinematic Universe was Ant-Man getting stuck in the Quantum Realm during the Snap. After the events of Ant-Man and the Wasp, Scott Lang travels back to the Quantum Realm to get the particles needed to help the film’s antagonist, Ghost, recover from her quantum sickness. However, while he is getting the particles needed, Thanos snaps his fingers, and everyone who knew about Scott’s mission and could help bring him back from the Quantum Realm is turned to dust.
In fact, the later implication is that Doctor Strange perfectly timed giving Thanos the Time Stone so that the Snap would occur while Scott is in the Quantum Realm, and thus, cannot be snapped. In any case, Ant-Man and the Wasp ends with Lang stranded at a subatomic level.
But how long was Ant-Man stuck in the Quantum Realm?
Because of the 5-year time skip during Avengers: Endgame, we know that five years pass in the outside world. During that time, Scott is assumed to have been snapped with Hope Van Dyne and her parents. It takes a rat running across the controls of the van to return him to the present.
Despite five years passing, it only feels like a matter of hours for Scott, thus he returns home to find his young daughter, Cassie, is now a teenager, while he has not aged a day. So the answer to the question depends on your perspective—a few hours, or five years.
Theoretically, this should indicate that time passes much slower in the Quantum Realm than in the normal world. But this is complicated by Janet Van Dyne appearing to have aged at the same rate as her husband, Hank Pym, despite having spent decades in the Quantum Realm. Could this be a result of those time vortexes that she warned Scott about? Or just another part of Paul Rudd’s miraculously eternal youth?
Maybe this will be one of the things answered in Ant-Man and the Wasp: Quantummania. In the new sequel, Scott is pulled back into the Quantum Realm, and we’ll have to wait and see how long it takes him to get out, though it seems like it may be more than just a matter of hours for him this time.
(featured image: Marvel Entertainment/Disney)
