Ant-Man opened last weekend, and did reasonably well considering its lack of name-recognition and troubled production history. While I personally didn’t like the film as much as others, it’s stayed on my mind and I definitely want to give it a second viewing, which is more than I can say for a lot of other blockbusters this year. While the movie will inevitably be compared to its Marvel bretheren, Ant-Man breaks out where the last two Marvel movies have fallen short: the stinger.

Marvel partly made its name on how well it teased future films, but Guardians of the Galaxy remained self-contained, and Avengers: Age of Ultron whiffed on its Thanos’ stinger. Ant-Man tries to bring the pride back with not one, but two important end credits scenes for future movies. It’s Phase Two ending with a bang as the studio prepares for Phase Three to commence with Captain America: Civil War in May 2016.  But before it gets to the war, it tries to keep the focus on the Ant-Man world.

The Wasp Stinger

Let me make a brief aside to say that one of the things I liked best about Ant-Man was how it dealt with Janet Van Dyne. Instead of simply killing off the character, it allowed her to sacrifice herself (remember: there’s no greater of heroism of the MCU than self-sacrifice) and likely return for future movies since she’s stuck in the Quantum Realm. I’m sure whenever Ant-Man 2 rolls around there will be plenty of speculation on who will play Janet.

However, we probably won’t have to wait that long to see the Wasp. In the first end credits scene, Hope (Evangeline Lilly) learns that Hank (Michael Douglas) and her mother had been working on a new Wasp suit, and that he’s now got it ready for her. “It’s about damn time,” she says, and frankly, there’s no good reason she should have to wait.

The movie twists itself into a knot explaining why Hank chose Scott, and I agree with Matt Singer’s piece over at ScreenCrush that it feels more like an excuse than an explanation. What if Scott (Paul Rudd) hadn’t proven himself worthy with the test heist? What if Scott had died since he clearly wasn’t as ready as Hope? If the best chance to save the future is Hope, then shouldn’t she get the suit ASAP?

But as it usually does with its female superheroes, Marvel kicked the can down the road, and now we’ll get Wasp in a later Marvel movie. Presumably, she’ll show up in Avengers: Infinity War since Lilly hasn’t been announced for Civil War. On the one hand, that film is already packed with superheroes, but it did find some room for Ant-Man to do his thing, which leads us to the second post-credits scene.

Catching up to the Winter Soldier

The second stinger is a prelude to Captain America: Civil War, and it drops a lot of information. The biggest is that Civil War presumably won’t devote a sizable amount of screentime to Captain America (Chris Evans) chasing down the Winter Soldier (Sebastian Stan) because he’s already caught him. Of course, audiences would still probably like to know the particulars of how exactly Cap and Falcon (Anthony Mackie) found Bucky, and how Bucky got his arm stuck in a vice.

So where exactly does Civil War begin? Well here’s the official synopsis:

“Captain America: Civil War” picks up where “Avengers: Age of Ultron” left off, as Steve Rogers leads the new team of Avengers in their continued efforts to safeguard humanity. After another international incident involving the Avengers results in collateral damage, political pressure mounts to install a system of accountability and a governing body to determine when to enlist the services of the team. The new status quo fractures the Avengers while they try to protect the world from a new and nefarious villain.

But judging by the scene in Ant-Man, finding Bucky is still Steve’s side project, and something that’s off the books, or at least not something where he’s willing to open up the issue to the New Avengers outside of Sam.

The scene also briefly mentions Tony, and we hear about the “accords”, which I assume will be dealt with in more detail in the movie. But it’s okay because Sam knows another guy with a special suit, which then ties us back into the action scene from earlier in the movie.

So what do you think of the credits scenes? Where do you think they’ll lead the MCU? Sound off in the comments section.