Let's Talk About: Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2

With the new movie being what it is, let's ramble for a few hundred words on it.

Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2, in its ideal form, would function as the perfect sequel to the original film. Its tight focus on developing its protagonists, expanding the roles of several side characters, and avoidance of providing too many extraneous additions to the cast allow it to function quite well, even avoiding the pitfalls of the usual Marvel formula. Still, it's not a perfect movie - but it's a damn good one, even a great one.

Mind, I don't want this to be review. As much as possible, I do not want to review this movie. For God's sake, it's hard enough with these Marvel movies to remain unbiased in my analysis without them completely blowing my mind every time one of them comes out. For the last couple of these films, I've been ready to shout "Best in the MCU!" just a little too quickly. Who knows - maybe a legitimate play-by-play of Vol. 2 might come to coincide with the home video release (hint: it won't).

Oh, yeah. Spoilers.

Anyway, the point I'm trying to make is that I loved what they did with the characters in this movie. As much as I appreciated the characters in the first film, it honestly felt like they were a little undercooked by the end. Sure, they were eccentric and loveable and you could learn a lot about them by pure virtue of just how they talk, but a lot of the character stuff felt kinda "on the surface" - especially in comparison to this movie, which is ALL about character. Peter Quill was kidnapped from Earth and he's a space criminal who is bad at being a space criminal and is stuck in arrested development. Rocket and Groot are the comedy duo with potentially tragic backstories. Drax is the straight man also with generically tragic backstory. Gamora is the repentant daughter of Thanos, Nebula is the unrepentant daughter of Thanos. Characters weren't bad in the first film; on the contrary. They were great! But the first film clearly sets up more to be done with them in the future. And the sequel delivers on that promise in spades!

Peter's relationship with his father, Ego, is central to this movie. His denial, his excitement, his delusion, and his ultimate disappointment and anger feel so viscerally real here. The zoom-in on Peter's face when Ego reveals what happened to his mother is particularly heartbreaking, as well as the well-earned "Fuck yeah!" moment when he opens fire on Ego with his twin guns. The best part about Peter's family relationship though, is the revelation that Yondu kidnapped him to save him from his father - who turned out to be huge prick. Yondu being the kindly step-dad was something that was hinted at in the first film, but comes out in full force in this movie. Michael Rooker managed to bring out such humanity and depth to Yondu that his death ended up being really effective. (The friendship and common ground he found with Rocket was also very nice.)

The sibling rivalry between Nebula and Gamora felt like a natural extension of the subplot from the first film, while the absolutely boundless humor to be found in Drax's rediscovery of a "father-daughter" relationship with newcomer Mantis was unexpected and heartwarming. Really, the whole theme of this movie was just "family is awesome." Which is, of course, capped off with Baby Groot basically being the heart and soul of this movie. At the beginning, everyone is so concerned with him and loves him and he's basically everybody's baby throughout the movie. He's the connective tissue, the ROOT by which everything good STEMS in this film. Without Groot, the film doesn't work. And it only works with Baby Groot because he's just so gosh-darned adorable.

Yeah, the film's a little exposition-heavy but whatever. This is a good movie. Fuck it, it's a great movie. Worthy sequel. 9/10. Empire Strikes Back of Guardians. Maybe. Don't quote me on that. But it's real good.