Hope Van DyneThe Wasp

Unstoppable Legacy

After the death of her mother Janet Van Dyne, Hope took the anger she felt towards her mentally- and emotionally-absent father Hank Pym and put that energy to good use learning how to defend herself. As she grew up, taking on her mother’s name, Hope Van Dyne not only honed her physical abilities, but also her mental ones, becoming the chairwoman of the company her father founded, Pym Technologies.

When Pym refused to share the secrets of his Pym Particles to protégé Darren Cross, Cross and Van Dyne voted to remove Pym from Pym Technologies. When Cross revealed the Yellowjacket technology—the ability to create soldiers the size of insects, based on Pym’s research—and planned to sell the tech as instruments of war, Hope worked with her father to stop Cross.

Feel Her Might

Training at a young age, Hope Van Dyne established herself as an experienced and formidable athlete and martial artist without any reliance on a technologically-enhanced suit should she find herself in an altercation. Her acrobatic fighting style and swift reflexes allows her to disarm opponents and evade attacks. Van Dyne trained inexperienced Scott Lang to develop all the physical skills she possesses and utilize the Pym Particles in the Ant-Man suit to control ants and other small insects.

Showing the same intellectual aptitude and business acumen as her father, Van Dyne held enough passion in several fields of science and power to sit on the board of Pym Technologies.

Beware the Sting

Van Dyne saw her father Hank Pym as the main antagonist for much of her childhood thanks to his distant nature after the loss of her mother and his wife Janet Van Dyne. In adulthood, Van Dyne aligned with one-time Pym student Darren Cross ousting Pym, found and CEO, from Pym Technologies.

Once Cross revealed his unethical intent to sell the Yellowjacket and Pym’s tech to questionable organizations, Van Dyne aids Pym and Lang in stopping Cross and Mitchell Carson, Pym’s former colleague at S.H.I.E.L.D., who was an undercover HYDRA operative.

Friends in Small Places

Van Dyne loved her mother Janet very much. After a mission with Hank Pym, Janet disappeared into the Quantum Realm. Under the impression that she mysteriously died, Hope did not know how to deal with her passing, and her father's relative absence didn't help. In adulthood, she sought after and mended her relationship with her father.

Despite their first shaky encounter, she warmed to ex-convict Scott Lang, whom her father passed on the Ant-Man suit and mantle. With the help of Lang’s criminal allies, Luis, Dave, and Kurt, they managed to erase all of the Yellowjacket data from the Pym servers and destroy the entire building.

Tales to Astonish

The death of matriarch Janet Van Dyne deeply strained her family. Grieving, Hank Pym threw himself into his work to find a way to bring Janet back and sent seven-year-old Hope away to boarding school. In her efforts to cope, the young Van Dyne immersed herself in martial arts training.

The resentment still strong and present in adulthood, Hope Van Dyne partnered and aligned herself with kindred spirit Darren Cross, the scientist Pym took under his wing, and aided him in establishing sole ownership of Pym Technologies with her deciding vote. Soon after, Van Dyne worked closely with Cross at the renamed Cross Technologies, who was close to perfecting his own Yellowjacket suit, based on Pym Particles and original Ant-Man designs, which Pym refused to share with him.

However, once Cross grew too cavalier and careless, and lost his moral compass in his pursuit of discovering the secret to Pym’s shrinking technology and his desire to sell the Yellowjacket as an all-purpose vessel of war and espionage to the highest bidder, Van Dyne sought the help of her estranged father, despite still present resentment. Their mission became all the more dire when Cross entertained potential buyers like S.H.I.E.L.D. leader-turned-mercenary Mitchell Carson.

Van Dyne, intent on stopping Cross and securing the destruction of the Yellowjacket research and technology, followed her father’s orders that she not don the Ant-Man suit he created decades ago herself and to train ex-convict and latest protégé, Scott Lang. Despite knowing she was the far more capable and deserving hero, Pym forbade her from following the risky path her mom had taken.

While working with Pym and Lang, Van Dyne learned the truth about her mother. Partnering with Pym on missions with her own shrinking suit, going by the hero moniker Wasp, Janet sacrificed during a mission to disarm a Soviet ballistic missile and disappeared into an inter-dimensional Quantum Realm, a complex and unknown subject he has been working to understand for the decades following. The father and daughter began to reconcile their relationship as Hope forgave Hank, giving their mission renewed focus.

In order to break into Pym Tech, they needed to steal a signal decoy device Pym build while still with S.H.I.E.L.D. that had been warehoused by Howard Stark in upstate New York. Unbeknownst to them, the Avengers made the facility their new headquarters. Van Dyne pushed Lang to abort the mission. Impressing Van Dyne, Lang defeated Falcon and flew away with the signal decoy.

On the day of the Yellowjacket Suit presentation, Cross revealed his knowledge of Van Dyne and Pym’s betrayal and his true nature—his plans to sell the Yellowjacket suit to Carson and HYDRA and kill Pym himself. With the help of Lang’s criminal allies, Luis, Dave, and Kurt, Pym, Lang and Van Dyne manage to erase all of the Yellowjacket data from the Pym servers and destroy the entire building.

Following the skirmish with Cross, realizing his daughter as the solution and hero he needed the entire time, Pym gifted Van Dyne an upgraded prototype of the Wasp suit, realizing he and Janet had started working on decades ago for Hope, which she enthusiastically accepts.

Winging It

Hank eventually told his daughter what really happened to Janet. She went subatomic to deactivate a bomb, but was sent tumbling into the Quantum Realm. Scott's return trip from the very same place got Hank thinking about rescuing Janet and he began working with his daughter towards that goal.

However, Hope and Hank had to go underground after Ant-Man helped Captain America in Germany, breaking the Sokovia Accords. Because of their association with the hero, Hank and Janet had to go underground. They built a secret lab in a shrinkable office building and began working on a Quantum Tunnel. Upon trying the invention out for the first time, it failed, but Scott Lang had a dream about Janet and left a message with Hank.

Hope then went out, tranquilized Scott, set up a giant ant to maintain his house arrest for violating the Sokivia accord and brought him to the lab. They explained their theory that he had become entangled with Janet on a quantum level which would have allowed her to leave a message in his head. After hearing the full content of Scott's dream, they were convinced that Hope's mother was still alive and carried on with their plans.

A Ghost Of A Chance

Posing as Susan, Hope met with Sonny Burch to acquire a component that would stop the tunnel from overheating. When Burch tried to go back on their deal, Hope got in her Wasp suit, took out his goons and grabbed the device. However, Ghost appeared and gave her trouble. While Hope and Scott did get the component, the new player made off with the shrunk-down lab.

Without any of their equipment, Hope and the others sought out Hank's old partner Bill Foster. He gave them a way to track the lab while also secretly working with Ghost. After acquiring the old Ant-Man suit from Cassie's school, they used it to track the lab back to Foster's house where he was treating Ava Starr (a.k.a. Ghost). The young woman knocked out the two heroes and also grabbed Hank. When they all woke up, Ava recounted the story of how her father Elias Starr took several desperate risks after Hank Pym had him fired and discredited. The ensuing lab accident turned Ava into Ghost. Foster started helping her shortly after, though S.H.I.E.L.D. turned her into an assassin. Bill got her out after the organization fell apart.

Foster posited that they could extract the Quantum energy absorbed by Janet and use it to save Ava even if it threatened van Dyne's life. When Hank faked a heart attack, Hope tricked Foster into letting loose some shrunken ants and they escaped.

Quantum Mechanics

Hope and the others got the lab back, got it to a safe location and began updating the Quantum Tunnel. The process worked enough for Janet to take control of Scott's body and fix the algorithm to get the whole thing working properly. Hope watched as her "parents" altered the system to track Janet.

When Lang had to leave to not violate his house arrest, the FBI managed to nab Hope and Hank. Ghost took advantage of the situation and stole the lab, but Ant-Man helped Hope and Hank break out of custody. Meanwhile, Foster and Ava began the extraction process.

While Hank journeyed into the Quantum Realm to save Janet, Hope did her best to keep the shrunken lab safe. Along the way, she saved Scott's life after he grew too large and passed out in the water. The gamble worked and Hope was soon reunited with her mother. Hope did her part to escape the authorities after that.

With the heat off, Hope and Scott started seeing each other again. From there, Hope, Scott Hank and Janet attempted to gather elements from the Quantum Realm to save Ava. After Lang entered the Realm, though, Thanos snapped his Infinity Stone-adorned fingers and blipped out Hope, Janet and Hank while Ant-Man survived in the Quantum Realm.

The Wasp's Sting

Reconstituted along with both of her parents after the Avengers created a new Infinity Gauntlet and snapped everyone back five years later, Hope geared up and answered the call when Doctor Strange began opening portals to the location of a time-traveling Thanos' most recent attack on Earth.

The Wasp got in on the action right away and reunited with Scott, but they switched gears when the Avengers realized they needed to get the Infinity Stones back to their proper places in time so that Thanos couldn't get his hands on them. Van Dyne and Lang shrunk down and flew off to find Scott's van, which still had the Quantum Realm device in the back. The vehicle was dead, but Scott worked to hotwire it so they could get it started back up.

The effort ultimately proved fruitless as the van blew up during the attack. Hope didn't give up though, instead she focused on the invaders and keeping them from getting the Gauntlet. In fact, The Wasp joined up with Captain Marvel, Valkyrie, Pepper Potts and several other heroes to keep it out of Thanos' hand! Though they all fought hard, Iron Man managed to steal the Stones from Thanos and snap the intruders away. Tony perished wielding all that power. Hope attended his memorial alongside Scott, Hank and Janet.