Filed under: Movie Reviews | Tags: Bradley Cooper, Chris Pratt, Dave Bautista, Drax The Destroyer, Gamora, Groot, Guardians of the Galaxy, Josh Brolin, Karen Gillan, Lee Pace, Nebula, Peter Quill, Rocket Racoon, Ronan, Starlord, Thanos, Vin Diesel, Zoe Saldana
The latest release from Marvel sees them take the first step in converting the wider Marvel Universe for the big screen with Guardians of the Galaxy – the penultimate movie in their Phase 2 releases.
The hype ahead of this has been fairly consistent as first glimpses of the cast and the trailers would almost guarantee a massive audience when it hit its general release date….although it seems pretty standard these days for Marvel’s movies to get a lot of attention and praise anyway. The biggest question is usually whether it stands up against what Marvel have already produced and where it sits in everyone’s top 5 or 10 of Marvel movies?
Now it’s obvious that GotG brings characters to the big screen that maybe aren’t as well-known as previous offerings, at least for the general movie-going audience but that’s not really a big concern as Marvel seem particularly adept at pulling together good movies let alone good comic book movies. The same can be said with GotG as we’re given a full-on action movie that’s jam-packed with comedy and larger than life characters that somehow get a fair share of screen-time and I think that’s mainly down to the Writer\Director James Gunn.
Gunn has brought Peter Quill aka Starlord (Chris Pratt), Gamora (Zoe Saldana), Drax (Dave Bautista), Groot (voiced by Vin Diesel) & Rocket (voiced by Bradley Cooper) to the screen in the most amazing way possible. Turning a group of thieves & killers into a lovable group that you kinda want to be part of (G-Man the Blogger just doesn’t seem to fit in like I’d hoped though) and while the bullets and laughs fire thick and fast…….there’s far more to this release than was first expected. Subtle layers that help this become far more than the sum of its parts and it starts and ends with some poignant moments for Peter Quill.
The death of his mother in the first scenes of the movie and the significance of music, particularly the mix tapes his mother makes him is something that continues from here and adds not only a great soundtrack for the movie but an instant connection to the world for those that are watching. A familiar element in a fantastical world is Gunn’s genius stroke in the movie and something that resonates during and well after the movie as surely one of those songs will be stuck in your head.
Great heroes of course need significant enemies and Thanos (Josh Brolin) makes some brief appearances which I was surprised at,as I thought he would have played a bigger part – although his son Ronan (Lee Pace) & daughter Nebula (Karen Gillen) take over with a similar ruthless approach to getting their hands on that powerful Infinity Gem. The family of villains are all vying for that power though and the typical traits of betrayal creep in along the way. An all out attack on Xandar marks the final showdown and brings together a sea of characters which could well have overwhelmed us, is actually a good thing as we just have more people to cheer on.
Any previous doubts I had were swept aside over the course of GotG’s 121 minutes running time and a mix of action, comedy & subtle touches come together with Peter Quill’s poignant moments at the beginning and end to cover all the bases. One of the best that Marvel have produced and the goal of expanding the Movie Universe has been kicked into top gear thanks to a stellar cast and highly entertaining story. I would have preferred to see more of Thanos and the Ronan villain did seem a bit predictable but that’s the only minor quibble I had with the movie. It’s well worth a listen to that soundtrack below…..and there is, of course, the post-credit scene to hang around for too.
8/10
G-Man
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Comics Anonymous 
Great Show! A bit disappointed by the post credit scene though.
Comment by Jerome Canty August 20, 2014 @ 1:58 pmYeah thought it expanded the Marvel Universe exactly the way they wanted…..and there’s just as much focus on the post-credit scenes these days as the film themselves. OK for a bit of fun with this one but was hoping for a teaser of the next film tbh.
Comment by G-Man August 20, 2014 @ 8:05 pm