Quantom X

Corrected entry: One of the big sources of tension in the heist is the fact that they supposedly have a limited number of Pym particles, as stated by Scott Lang. So after the test run they only have enough for everyone to take one round trip through time. Cap and Tony use their return supply to go to 1970, which is why they needed to steal more particles to get back. However, Ant-Man's shrinking tech is also based on the Pym particles, and his shrinking suit seems to work without restriction in 2012. They also have enough to both shrink the Benetar in 2023 and re-grow it in 2014. So either Scott is mistaken about how many Pym particles he has, or he is lying about them. And before someone says they calculated the number of particles it would take for the shrinking during the mission before assigning them to the team members, Scott discusses the limited supply before they had any plan of what they were going to do in the past.

Vader47000

Correction: Shrinking for those more common actions would not eat up as many Pym particles as say, shrinking enough to go sub atomic, as well as controlling where you're going and doing time travel.

Quantom X

This was addressed in the post. Scott calculated all the Pym particles he had on hand and said there was enough for 1 round trip each and 2 tests. Not '1 round trip, 2 tests and an indeterminate amount of shrinking during the mission which we haven't planned yet.' Plus, he uses a whole vial in mistakenly shrinking before the test, after which he says there's enough for 1 test, not 2. So, maybe there are enough extra Pym particles to do some shrinking after they plan the mission, but this is never brought up and would seem to contradict what Scott has already said about it and what we see onscreen about how many Pym particles it takes just to shrink (though the shrinking tech has never really been consistently portrayed in any of the films featuring it). So, a justification for one perceived mistake just raises a question somewhere else. There's just something off about how the film conveys the circumstances of using the Pym particles, however it is parsed.

Vader47000

Thanos has access to technology centuries beyond Earth. It's definitely possible his crew of henchmen were able to replicate the particles.

To add to Quantom X's correction: Thanos' men reverse engineered the Pym particles to allow evil Nebula to return with the others and pull the ship through the timestream. Remember it can take as long as they want to reverse engineer it before sending evil Nebula back, nobody would notice. There were never any more particles used than what Scott had available. Either more were obtained (from Pym himself in 1970's), or more made (by Thanos' men). I agree with the original correction that the small size shrinking obviously doesn't use up as much particles as the subatomic shrinking does and that's why he could do it.

lionhead

The shrinking tech for Scott and the shrinking tech for objects are two different things, remember he has those red and blue discs that shrink and grow things and he uses the vial in the suit.

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