Movie Review: Guardians of the Galaxy, vol. 2

GUARDIANS OF THE GALAXY might turn out to be my favorite Marvel movie franchise.

And I really (really, really) love Marvel movies.

The second installment of GotG hits the ground running with Star⚡️Lord and co. battling a toothy interdimensional monster on behalf of a people called the Sovereign.

The Sovereign are beautiful, intelligent, arrogant, and genetically engineered to be that way. Basically, they’re a bunch of jerks, but for compensation they offer the Guardians something they want more than money, so Peter, Gamora, and Drax suck it up until they can get their payment and leave . . .

But Rocket . . .

So the adults play pass-the-Groot while trying to outmaneuver an entire fleet of remotely piloted Sovereign ships hellbent on their destruction, when some random dude surfing on the back of a new ship nukes the Sovereign into oblivion. Peter’s ship is too busted up to do anything but crash land on the planet they were intending to jump to should they survive to do it, and they’re all still yelling at each other when their mysterious savior shows up.

If you’ve seen the trailers, you probably know who said mysterious savior is, but just in cases, NOT TELLING.

That’s where I’ll stop as far as plot summary goes—maybe the first ten minutes of the movie—except to say Baby Groot is even cuter than you imagined, I promise. The first time I saw it (b/c yes, I’ve already seen it twice), I barely noticed what was going on with the monster, b/c BUH. *wants to hug him and squeeze him and love him TO PIECES).

Suffice it to say the remaining two(ish) hours were almost constant shenanigans and hilarity.

BUT. It was also much more than that.

GotG2 is about family. The family you make for yourself when either your own family sucks, or is gone, or you never had one to begin with. It’s about the very real freedom to make that choice for yourself.

I’ve already seen several reviews slamming Drax’s treatment of Mantis, and I’m not going to say there isn’t a kernel of truth to what the outraged think about it. Maybe more than a kernel if the scenario falls under your trigger umbrella.

That being said, it didn’t bother me. I mean, sure, I thought Drax was a little OTT when he feigned nausea in response to his misperception of Mantis’s intent-that-time, but it never occurred to me that someone could be offended by it until I saw that first negative review.

Of course a typical interaction between me and one of my sisters looks like this:

Me: Hey remember that time you thought the lyric in Sway was “makes me go wheeeeeeeee”?

Sister: Go die. Remember that time your pants split at that job interview and you had no idea?

Me: I hate you.

Sister: Whatever. You’re stupid.

Me: Whatever. You’re ugly.

View Spoiler » « Hide Spoiler <——A picture of my sister who has never been ugly a day in her life, not a spoiler.

So I might not be the best judge in this regard.

But while we’re on the subject of Mantis: View Spoiler »I bet she’s Peter’s half-sister. « Hide Spoiler <——pure speculation.

GotG2 is also about redemption. I cried four times during this freaking movie. FOUR. Granted three of those times were back-to-back-to-back, they were still separate bouts of crying. I’d pull it together from one situation only have the next one start the waterworks fresh.

So yeah. I recommend it. To anyone who won’t be filled with rage at the (admittedly) too forthright opinion that a clearly attractive female is ugly, coming from an alien whose culture is so in-your-face about ALL THE FEELS that a father retells the story of his children’s conception every winter solstice. O_____O

There are FIVE extra scenes after the end credits begin:

1. View Spoiler »Kraglin practicing with Yondu’s arrow and hitting Drax. « Hide Spoiler

2. View Spoiler »Ravenger reunion between Stakar Ogord (Starhawk), Martinex, Charlie-27, Aleta Ogord, and Krugarr. « Hide Spoiler

3. View Spoiler »Sovereign High Priestess reveals her next generation GotG hunter. A full(ish) explanation can be found here. « Hide Spoiler

4. View Spoiler »Teenaged Groot. *giggle snorts* I am Gru-ew-oot. « Hide Spoiler

5. View Spoiler »Blah. More Stan Lee. « Hide Spoiler

You’re welcome. *orbit gum smile*

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