Guardians
of the Galaxy is an anomaly in the Marvel Cinematic
Universe. When it first came out, everyone assumed it was going to be Marvel’s
first big critical bomb, and with it being based on a property that virtually
no one outside of hardcore comic book geeks has heard of, expectations were
pretty low. Not only was anyone expecting it to be a big buddy heist
movie/space opera with a tongue-in-cheek sense of humor and a huge nostalgia
gleam in its eye, no one was expecting it to be one of the most beloved movies
in the franchise. Much like The Avengers,
our engagement wasn’t so much the actual stakes as it was about the
interactions with our main cast, but unlike The
Avengers, which needed five movies to develop its characters, Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2 only
needed one. This time around, writer/director James Gunn decides to stay the
course by keeping everything that made the first movie work (the humor, the
character interaction, the candy color palette, the awesome soundtrack etc.),
but raise the stakes significantly.
Our story follows the
Guardians, Peter “Star Lord” Quill (Chris Pratt), Gamora (Zoe Saldana), Drax
(Dave Bautista), Rocket Raccoon (Bradley Cooper) and Baby Groot (Vin Diesel)
after a mission collecting a power source for a proud alien race in exchange
for Gamora’s evil sister Nebula (Karen Gillan), who they plan on turning in to
the authorities. After Rocket insults their leader and steals a battery, they’re
pursued by their fleet, but are rescued by the human form of Ego (Kurt Russell),
an ancient, sentient planet. As it turns out, Ego is also Peter’s long lost
father, so he whisks him away (along with Gamora and Drax) to make up for lost
time and teach him how to harness his untapped abilities. Meanwhile, Rocket,
Groot and Nebula are captured by a group of space pirates lead by Peter’s former
mentor Yondu (Michael Rooker), who wants to collect a bounty on their heads and
revenge for getting double-crossed in the last film. While Peter is overjoyed
to be reunited with his dad, Gamora is suspicious of Ego’s motives, suspicion
that is proven true when those motives are revealed.
The one thing that
stood out the most to me about Vol. 2,
at least compared to other Marvel sequels and especially to the last Guardians, was how small in scale it
was. I know that sounds like an oxymoron considering the movie takes place in
outer space and is intercut with giant spaceship battles, but the setting
mainly jumps back and forth between a few locations and the core of the story
focuses mainly on the inner-workings and interactions of its ensemble. The
movie has lots of action and great special effects, which is to be expected,
but a lot of it is intermittent with the characters just bonding. Star Lord
bonds with his father but still resents him for leaving him and his mother,
Gamora and Nebula grow closer through their shared abusive childhood at the
hands of Thanos, Drax forms an adorably awkward budding romance with Ego’s
servant Mantis (Pom Klementieff), and Rocket and Yondu work out their more
asshole-ish tendencies after Yondu’s crew throws a
mutiny. While it is a bit overstuffed with subplots, Star Lord and in
particular is the focal point of the plot, especially when it comes to the
movie’s overarching theme of the true meaning of family, and his conflict
between being reunited with his real father who was absent from his life until
then, and the familial bond he has developed with the other guardians, and
especially Yondu, who wasn’t the best parental figure but was the closest thing
to a dad that he ever had. I was actually surprised by how much screen time
Yondu got in this. He was only a minor character in the first film and I did
raise an eyebrow when he started showing up on the posters, but after seeing
him in action, I say he was an excellent addition to the team. It also helps a
lot that the movie has a much more engaging and detestable villain than the last movie.
Of course, the thing that
kept people coming back to Guardians
was its quirky sense of humor, which Vol.
2 cranks up to eleven. While most of the characters do get a personal
moment, they also get a time to drum up some laughs from the audience. Rocket
is still the snarky jerk of the bunch, with one specific incident of his
inability to keep his mouth shut being the inciting event of the movie, Drax’s incapability
of understanding metaphors gets a lot of laughs and his pathological
cluelessness of social cues makes his interactions with Mantis even more
awkward, Star Lord’s constant references to dated pieces of pop culture fall
deaf on everyone’s ears, but Baby Groot practically steals every scene he’s in
just by standing there and being adorable. Gunn also uses the film’s excellent
special effects for comedic advantage, especially with one scene where they go
into hyper-drive. I would be lying if I said that the humor was flawless,
though. There were some jokes that went on a bit too long and there were one or
two jokes that were meant to deflate some really tense moments but weren’t well
timed, but the hits far outweigh the misses.
I also have to praise the
soundtrack which, like the last movie, is a good mix of vintage pop tunes which
play an important part in setting the tone. In the first Guardians, the mixtape is so important to Star Lord because it’s
one of the only pieces of Earth he has with him, and it’s the last keepsake
from his dead mother, who made it for him. In the end, he finds that she made
him another one, which provides the soundtrack this time around. Each song is
used perfectly. There are times when it’s actually part of the plot, like how the
lyrics to Looking Glass’s “Brandy (What A Fine Girl)” is the catalyst for a
pivotal moment between Peter and Ego, but other times it’s used for comedic
juxtaposition. My personal favorite musical moments however, are the opening
credits where Baby Groot dances to ELO’s “Mr. Blue Sky” while the rest of the
guardians battle a giant tentacle monster in the background, and “Come A Little
Bit Closer” by Jay and the Americans playing while Rocket, Yondu and Groot lay
waste to a whole wave of enemies. (The things Yondu can do with that arrow… damn.)
Overall, Guardians of the Galaxy Vol.2 is about
on par with the first movie, and even excels it in some areas. The characters
are way more fleshed out, the action is great, the humor is on point, and while
it is basically more of the same, it knows exactly what it wants to be and
knows what works for it. If it ain’t broke, don’t fix it.
8/10
Side note: while it’s
pretty much par for the course to sit through the credits of a Marvel movie for
the post-credit scene, this one has a walloping FIVE, and they’re all pretty
great, even if only one has any significance to the MCU. Also, this movie has,
hands down, the best Stan Lee cameo
to date.
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