--Written by guest reviewer Danesh Noshirvan
---No Spoilers. I will warn you when to stop---
The challenging part of
this super hero movie (and its predecessor) was that the characters and their
storylines are mostly unknown to the average audience. And unlike the upcoming
movie Spider-man: Homecoming (A story
we are all TOO familiar with after 5 movies) you won’t see Tony Stark flying
through the air, making cool costumes, and essentially vouching for the movie
in every trailer. The Guardians are on their own. The first movie, released in 2014,
was considered risky and should have fallen flat on its face. Director James
Gunn surprised everyone when it actually worked. How did it work,
though? Was it luck? Will Gunn get lucky twice? Will he try the same formula?
The main protagonist of
both Guardians Vol 1 and 2 is Peter
Quill, (Chris Pratt-- pretty much Andy from Parks
and Recreation). The casting couldn’t have been more perfect. The innocent
child-like nostalgia machine from Earth kept the movie grounded and relatable.
The first film starts with a fun and adorable dance number during the title
credits to Redbone’s Come and Get Your
Love-- very charming. Guardians 2 kicked that idea up a notch, but this
time with Baby Groot (Vin Diesel) dancing. Behind him are the rest of the
Guardians fighting some space-octopus creature with the head of the sandworm
from Beetlejuice. It makes for a
funny contrast and skips over a battle that does not serve the movie much
purpose anyway. From this point on, the movie continues to echo the best parts
of the first movie. These comparisons are almost obvious, and look – if it
isn’t broken, why fix it? I get it. We can skip over that. They did exaggerate
one aspect that was at first hard to get past…
Its barrage of nonstop jokes.
Guardians 2 is funny. In fact, at times it was TOO funny. There seems to be this
ongoing theme in the Marvel movies that reminds me of Gilmore Girls. I know, you’re about to tune me out, but hear what I
have to say. I firmly believe that watching an episode of Gilmore Girls is no different than listening to nails on a
chalkboard while chewing on broken glass. The dialogue is incredibly
unbelievable. The Gilmore Girls show
takes place in a fictional world where every person encountered is a quick
talker, super clever, incredibly witty, and has the ability to improvise a joke
at an inhuman rate. Now, I wasn’t saying Guardians
of the Galaxy is terrible like Gilmore
Girls, but the Marvel movie universe has become oversaturated with
smartass, wise-cracking, funny heroes that are always ready for a one-liner.
You have Iron Man, Spider-Man, Deadpool, Rocket, Quill, and Ant-Man and the
list goes on. At times one has to wonder whether they are watching a comedy or
an action movie. Guardians just had
way too much comic relief during times where relief wasn’t even necessary.
Every scene was always funny and every other line is a throw-away joke. At a
certain point, director James Gunn is just showing he’s not confident that he
has the audience’s attention. Halfway through the movie, I was starting to get
annoyed. I was already writing this paragraph in my head until something
changed…
The movie changed. Enter Ego (Kurt Russell), father of Peter Quill.
Assumed an orphan up until this point, Quill experiences a range of emotions
when he faces a father he never knew. This is the moment where the movie grabs
your heart and squeezes out every emotion you have harder and harder until the
end. No amount of jokes can save you for how much you’re going to cry. The
movie wasn’t oversaturated with jokes. The movie needed contrast for the
emotional rollercoaster it’s about to put you through. You’re soon begging for that
comic relief.
--- Warning! Danger! Spoilers Ahead! ---
The
landscape of Ego’s planet, with George Harrison’s My Sweet Lord playing in the background, is awe inspiring. Your
heart is pounding for every character from Gamora (Zoe Saldana) and her tumultuous
relationship with her sister Nebula (Karen Gillan), Drax and his bottled up
feelings for his dead* daughter, or Rocket and Yondu and their search for
acceptance. None of their stories compare to Peter Quill’s.
Peter’s
storyline is the most heart-wrenching because of that innocent child-like charm
I mentioned earlier. It’s easy to see him as a sensitive and vulnerable child
and that makes it so much harder to see him get hurt. So, to witness him
finally reconnect with his father and play catch with him was sweet and hopeful
and it was all Peter had ever wanted. You have to remember, Peter is still
attached to his mother. He carries the Walkman she gave him, right before she
died, everywhere he goes. His emotional immaturity hinders his ability to move
on. To see him reconnect with his father is gratifying. At this point, you
forget the movie has no antagonist and enjoy the strong relationships between
each character.
Ego
explains that he is somewhat of a God, but he specifies that he is god with a
little “G”. It’s our first hint at his dissatisfaction. He explains that he
started out as a brain floating in space. No, that doesn’t make sense. We just
have to move past it. 100% ridiculous even for a sci-fi movie with a talking
raccoon and an anthropomorphic, partially-speaking tree. Ego eventually encased
himself and became a planet using his unknown floating brain powers (whatever).
He then created a human body for himself to travel to other planets to find
life. Okay, there is so much that is muddled here. Why is an Earthling’s human
body ideal for space travel if they’re not space traveling? How did he just
speak English if he has never encountered any life? Okay, we cannot go down
this path or we’ll spend a long time here. Let’s just move forward. So, at this
point we only know that an entire planet boned Peter’s mom and they had a kid
that wasn’t 50% planet or floating brain (whatever). However, he does have
creation powers passed down from his father though, but only when he’s near his
father’s planet for some arbitrary reason. I’m not complaining, I’m just trying
to make sense of it (I can’t).
Rocket
and Yondu bond over their lack of acceptance from those around them. Rocket
feels he keeps pushing the Guardians away and Yondu pissed off Sylvester
Stallone for some reason WE WILL NEVER KNOW WITHOUT SUBTITLES. Sylvester
Stallone’s dialogue is hard enough to comprehend with his infamous no-facial-expression-grunt-speak
of the Rocky days, but it’s even
harder to understand this Orc because his face is also frozen due to plastic
surgery. His very first lines on that Tortuga/Hoth planet was completely
unintelligible! Anyway, the reason I brought up Yondu is to talk about that
whistle-arrow killing the mutinous Ravagers on the ship. Yondu is straight up deadly.
He and Rocket walked in a straight line without pause as countless bodies fell
from the ship. The retribution is sweet and puts a smile on your face.
Before
moving forward, there’s something that I couldn’t just ignore and that’s the
subtle hints of misogyny. Look, I liked this movie, but I have to point out
something. When the Ravager asked Nebula what she’s going to do with her
portion of the bounty, she revealed that her father, Thanos (Josh Brolin),
tortured her all her life and she plans to purchase heavy artillery to kill
him. Then the Ravager talks down to the daughter of Thanos and says that he
thought she was going to get some jewelry or a nice hat to make the other
ladies jealous. C’mon… You have strong female characters in your movie, don’t
do that to them. Maybe I’m just nitpicking. I can let that one slide because
maybe the Ravager character is just ignorant and misogyny is expected from that
type of character. Okay, fine. BBBUUUUUTTTT there’s one bit that doesn’t sit
right though. Peter keeps propositioning Gamora and insists that they have a
special unspoken connection. Without leaving open opportunity for doubt, Gamora
says “no” several times. Peter keeps pushing and insists that she is interested
in him until she has to physically push him off. It is not made better by the
fact that by the end of the movie she gives in to his advances. If you enjoyed
the movie like I did, I know you don’t want to accept it, but please don’t try
to justify it in your head. It’s not the best message. No should mean no and
that’s it.
Anyway,
Ego and Peter connect over Brandy You’re
a Fine Girl as Ego tells Peter more about himself and his desire to be
omnipresent. He wants to go from god with a little “g” to God with a big “G”
(hence the name Ego.) While explaining the more sadistic part of his plans he
puts Peter in a trance. I assume it’s a trance. He gets space eyes and becomes
very mellow. Ego’s powers don’t make any sense so I’m trying my best here. So, Peter
is infected with the space-eyes-roofie that allows him to see Ego’s plan. He
doesn’t want to be just omnipresent, he wants to be everything. He explains
that he traveled the universe and planted himself all over to spread throughout
the universe, but he can’t do it without more power and that’s where Peter
comes in. He uses the hypnotized Peter as a battery to supercharge his own
power and begins his evil plan.
So
there you have it. His father is the antagonist. Your heart starts to pound.
This is the most brilliant villain/hero relationship Marvel films has ever crafted.
Ego
doesn’t want to waste any time. Peter asks again about his mom and that’s when
Ego reveals that he never lied about how infatuated he was with her. He tells
Peter that he was forced to plant the tumor in her head or he’d never finish
his plan.
There’s
an audible gasp throughout the audience. He gave her cancer. He killed her.
I
love the quick reaction to that news. Peter breaks the trance immediately.
Without struggle, without hesitation, and without second thought he pulls out
both pistols and fires at his own father until the weapons are empty. Again,
that child-like innocence and attachment he has to his mother makes his instant
reaction so sweet.
Without
going through every detail, the fight scene between the Guardians and Ego is
pretty much The Mummy without all the
sand. Eventually, Ego is able to use his son Peter as a battery to fuel his
onslaught against the universe. Now, here’s the thing. Even though Rocket keeps
saying they’re going to save the galaxy again; Ego said he planted himself
across the universe over the course of millions of years. When he caused those
eruptions throughout the universe, he took out a city on EVERY SINGLE PLANET IN
THE UNIVERSE WITH LIFE ON IT. That is probably the most deadly attack with the
most body count damage I’ve ever heard of. At this point, they can defeat him
and be the heroes, but he still committed the most diabolical mass murder I’ve
ever seen in any movie ever.
Yondu
teaches Peter how to use his powers by telling him to use his heart. When
everything seems lost, Peter thinks his happy thoughts and without any pixie
dust, he flies and has full control of his nonsensical space brain powers in
his genes! Within Peter’s happy thoughts, there’s one flashback of Yondu
teaching Peter how to shoot. It’s only one quick cut away, but at this point it
should start adding up. Yondu was accused of constantly protecting Peter, he
taught him how to defend himself, and he’s here saving him now. Brilliant. This
movie is brilliant and “I’m Mary Poppins ya’ll” was the hardest I laughed in a
movie theater. I had popcorn in my lungs.
Baby
Groot sets off a bomb to destroy the planet. Everyone escapes except for Peter
as he is still fighting his father on the planet. Rocket’s grief leaving Peter
behind makes your heart sting again and maybe gets you a little teary-eyed.
When Ego is defeated and he crumbles in his son’s hands, I didn’t feel a sense
of retribution for his mom. I felt bad that he had to lose his father too. And
while Peter sits there alone without any godly powers (or parents), surrounded
by what looks like the collapsing Cave of Wonders from Aladdin, you stop and think that this is a really depressing movie
and it can’t get any more emotional. Just then, Yondu saves Quill and says the
line that makes me tear up even as I write it now, “That guy may have been your
father, but he ain’t your daddy.” And unexpectedly, Yondu steals the show.
Tears are streaming from your face as he sacrifices himself to bring Peter to
safety. Peter screams and tries anything to save him while Yondu embraces Peter
as he dies. Peter had to just watch another parent die. The movie ends with
Yondu’s funeral where he is finally accepted by Sylvester Stallone, whom I
guess didn’t accept him earlier? I wouldn’t know. When Stallone talks, it
sounds like the teacher from Peanuts
mixed with the little boy from The Grudge.
All the other relationships tie together perfectly. Baby Groot never became an
annoying gimmick. At the end of the movie he sits on Peter’s lap as they both
listen to Cat Stevens’ Father and Son just
to give your heart one more squeeze for the drive home.
To
sum it up, it’s great. Better than most Marvel films. I really liked it, but I
feel like the movie itself is unaware of the universe-wide collateral damage
after Captain America: Civil War
pretty much focused on collateral damage.
Bonus
Points for: Hasslehoff cameo and the use of Howard the Duck.
*She’s
not dead ;)
A-
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