Memorable Ant-Man moment in Ms. Marvel wasn’t originally scripted

The delightfully chaotic ending to Ms. Marvel’s first episode came as a result of a gigantic Ant-Man statue. However, this memorable moment wasn’t actually in the original script.

SPOILERS FOR MS. MARVEL EPISODE 1…

Ms. Marvel – the newest hero to get the MCU treatment – had her first episode premiere on Disney+  yesterday. The series is filled with fun and whimsical chaos, which can be gathered from this trailer…

So naturally, while no real villain has been revealed, the episode still ends in an action-packed, slapstick-style manner, when Kamala Khan – aka Ms. Marvel – first discovers her powers while attending a cosplay contest at AvengerCon.

• Read More: Ms. Marvel Episode 1: What is AvengerCon?

The set design for AvengerCon is massive, and filled with giant statues of Earth’s Mightiest Heroes, including one of Ant-Man.

Kamala takes a photo with the statue, sitting in his giant hand, then it is subsequently forgotten about. Until she gets her powers.

When Kamala’s superhuman abilities are triggered from a bangle that she wears with her Captain Marvel cosplay, she begins using them, partly out of shock, and partly because they are helping her win the contest.

However, while displaying her powers, she accidently hits the top of the giant Ant-Man statue, which leads to the head falling off and rolling through the convention, destroying everything in its wake. Then chaos follows, as because of Ant-Man’s head, Thor’s giant hammer gets loose and sends a character flying.

This moment is hilarious to watch, and perfectly fits the tone of the show. So it’s hard to imagine the scene not happening. But apparently, Ant-Man’s statue disaster was never actually written into the script.

How did the Ant-Man statue scene happen?

Bilall Fallah – who is the executive producer and director of Episode 1 – reveals in an interview with Marvel.com that the idea for Ant-Man’s decapitated statue came when they were already on the set of AvengerCon. Not only that, but it was the cast and crew’s subsequent love for the convention that sparked the statue concept:

“We are fanboys ourselves. So, we were taking selfies, putting on the Ant-Man helmet, and playing with Thor’s hammer.”

• Read More: Ms. Marvel Episode 1 review: Kamala Khan makes a charming debut

This playing around with the set led to everyone wanting to push the environment further, in order to make it a bigger part of the episode’s story. The actual idea for the Ant-Man moment came from production designer Christopher Glass, after Fallah and co-director Adil El Arbi mentioned that they wanted more action in the scene.

“That was not in the script. We had a lot of things that just came out [from] everybody brainstorming and improvising,” Fallah explains.

One can only wonder what events actually played out in the script, but considering that there was a push for more action, it’s easy to guess that the episode’s climax wouldn’t have been nearly as exciting or iconic.

Ms. Marvel’s first episode is available to watch on Disney+, and a new episode will be streaming every Wednesday.