Marvel can try all it likes, but it’ll never produce a better trailer than this insane ‘Ant-Man’ promo

A truly legendary trailer for the first Ant-Man film is once again going viral in the lead-up to Ant-Man and the Wasp: Quantumania.

Marvel’s got the trailer game down to a fine — if somewhat predictable — art, teasing fans via a series of increasingly revealing glimpses in the lead-up to each of its major releases. This is precisely the approach it’s taken to Quantumania, which is set to hit theaters in just a few days. But an early trailer for the first film in Scott Lang’s trilogy showcases a very different promo approach from the media giant, and we might just prefer it over the action-soaked teasers that have since followed.

The strange promo simply features Paul Rudd’s Scott Lang alongside Michael Douglas’ Hank Pym as they engage in a gradually more frantic series of snaps and claps. In the background, tense audio builds as the pair stare intensely at one another, and then at the camera.

Then, nine seconds in, Douglas utters the first rabid “ants” with a singular ferocity, and the camera briefly cuts to a shot of an ant. The second utterance of the simple word is just as intense, as the clapping, snapping, and audio continues to build, and at 13 seconds Rudd lets out a brief, desperate “Ant-Man” to polish off the charming, but truly baffling, teaser.

Accurately dubbed the “Greatest Trailer in the History of Marvel” by Charlie Schneider, who retweeted the clip on its fourth anniversary, the clip quickly gained steam online. Its comment section is overflowing with confused, but delighted, viewers, most of whom are still utterly bewildered by the clip four years later.

Scattered amongst expressions of bemusement are frequent callbacks to the clip itself, as people simply scatter comments proclaiming “ants” below the viral clip. After all, if that’s all that’s required of Douglas in a promo for a blockbuster film, why should we ask more of the viewing masses?

Marvel struck absolute gold with this weird and altogether outlandish clip, and it seems safe to say that no promo will ever live up to its glory as it’s simply too offbeat and unexpected. Audiences can at least gasp at the glory that drenches every moment of the clip when they head to theaters for Quantumania, which officially releases on Friday, Feb. 17.