Does Ant-Man and the Wasp take place before or after Avengers: Infinity War?

Avengers: Infinity War leaves fans with only one question: What happens next?

If you think the next Marvel movie — this July’s Ant-Man and The Wasp — will answer the question, temper your expectations. While the upcoming film is coming out after Infinity War, the time period it’s in is exactly the opposite.

So, when is Ant-Man and The Wasp set?

According to the movie’s official synopsis, Ant-Man and The Wasp is set after Captain America: Civil War — which is the last time we saw Scott Lang, aka Ant-Man in a Marvel movie — and before Avengers: Infinity War. Here’s how Marvel put it:

In the aftermath of Captain America: Civil War, Scott Lang grapples with the consequences of his choices as both a superhero and a father. As he struggles to rebalance his home life with his responsibilities as Ant-Man, he’s confronted by Hope van Dyne and Dr. Hank Pym with an urgent new mission. Scott must once again put on the suit and learn to fight alongside the Wasp as the team works together to uncover secrets from their past.

That means that we probably won’t be getting any meaningful follow up on Infinity War’s ending from Ant-Man and the Wasp.

Instead, we’re going to go back to Scott Lang figuring out how to balance his complicated superhero life with his complicated family life. At least, that’s what it looks like from the most recent trailer:

Do we know anything about what Ant-Man and The Wasp were doing during Infinity War?

[Warning: The rest of this post contains some spoilers for Avengers: Infinity War.]

That’s a fair question! We’ve already gotten a taste of what might be in Scott and Hope’s future, there might be some conclusions we can draw. But we only know a little.

Before Infinity War ‘s release, Marvel published a tie-in comic that recapped where all of the Avengers were before the movie started. Marvel’s Avengers: Infinity War Prelude established that Scott went home to his family after Captain America: Civil War, a movie in which he went to an airport in Germany to help Captain America and Captain America’s friends punch a lot of Captain America’s other friends so that Captain America and his best friend could chase a terrorist to Siberia. For his participation in that airport brawl, Scott was thrown in jail, but was later liberated by Captain America, because, really, it’s the least he could do.

Avengers: Infinity War elaborates just a little bit on that info, when Captain America explains that Scott — and Clint Barton, aka Hawkeye — took plea deals and are living under house arrest (And after all the trouble Captain America went to, springing them from super jail, tsk, tsk). Gallivanting around the world as super-outlaws and spies would have taken too much of a toll on their families, so they elected to give up their costumes.

But if the trailer for Ant-Man and the Wasp is any indication, it looks like retirement won’t last long for Scott.

Hm ... so it’s possible that Ant-Man and the Wasp ends the same way Infinity War does!

It’s possible! Ant-Man and the Wasp doesn’t have to show us what happens to Scott and Hope during the events of Infinity War, but it could. We’ll just have to wait until July 6, when Ant-Man and the Wasp hits theaters.