I went into this movie with an open mind because I'd never heard of these so-called Guardians during my time reading Marvel comics in my not-so-distant youth. It was refreshing to go into this story with no expectations about who the characters are, how they should be portrayed and which storyline they should follow. In that vein I found the movie funny and entertaining. It's everything you'd expect from a family-friendly comic book movie: no swearing, none of the main characters actually die (spoiler alert!), the good guys save the day and everything wraps up nicely in the end. It's formulaic in that it's a ragtag gang of outcasts, criminals and assassins who must join together to save the galaxy. At the end they're all best friends and everything's just peachy.
Those aren't the issues I have with the movie though, my issues come down to how the galaxy is portrayed and how the romantic sub-plot is written.
First of all, the Milky Way galaxy in which we inhabit is a really big place and one I believe to be the holder of immense diversity in planets, stars, moons and species. It bothers me that so many of the alien species we imagine as humans are so humanoid. Can't we think out of the box just a little? Most of the alien extras in this movie were humans with body pant and maybe a couple interesting ones with extra bumps and lumps. The main planet that must be saved is pretty much a futuristic looking Earth. You might be thinking: what about the raccoon and the tree-guy that are part of the guardians gang? Well the raccoon is explained as a genetically modified experiment of an Earth creature! Even Groot, the tree-looking guy is still based on a flora that exists exclusively on Earth. In this story of the exploits of the guardians at no point do we see Earth represented in any substantial way throughout the galaxy on par with the likes of the species in the movie who've mastered space travel, hyper-drives, surviving in space without space suits and other advanced technologies. Aside from the main character: the self-proclaimed Starlord there are no humans in this space race but so much of Earth is part of this picture of the galaxy. I guess I do have some expectations when comes to portrayals of space travel and the galaxy having grown up in a time of imaginative scifi such as Star Trek: The New Generation, Voyager and Deep Space Nine, StarGate and movies like Alien, Predator and Star Wars (just to name a few). I just wish the writers of either the comic book in which it was based or of the movie got a little more creative with their portrayal of our galaxy.
Now to the 'romantic subplot' if it can even be called that. The main character, Peter Quill, portrayed by actor Chris Pratt, who you may remember as the bumbling fool boyfriend of Aubrey Plaza's April on Parks and Recreation, got whipped into shape for the role and we're supposed to fall in love with this supposedly charming and funny bad boy character, a la likes of Captain Kirk and Han Solo, but it really doesn't work out that way. I find I didn't come out of it with a new appreciation for the actor and I didn't feel anything for him, probably the same way Zoe Saldana felt because there was absolutely no chemistry between the two characters (read: actors). There was more chemistry I felt between Bradley Cooper's Rocket the Racoon and Vin Diesel's Groot. Now there's a bromance (or maybe better named alienmance...? I'll keep working on that one) similar to that of Han Solo and Chewbaca in Star Wars. Zoe Saldana's Gamora is supposed to be an infamous and kickass alien assassin, which she plays well. Then they ruin it by playing out the tired damsel in distress cliche where Gamora is in a life-threatening situation and Quill must save her life and then that becomes the turning point in their relationship. But still even after the rescue it still feels forced. It also makes use of such tired cliches of the bad boy player who's finally met his match as she plays hard to get and he has to win her love/wear her down. Really? Just truly lazy writing I think. Why does there have to be a romantic subplot between the main character and the only female member on their galaxy saving team anyway? From personal experience, I'm not a fan of mixing work with pleasure, it never turns out well. What happens when they have a fight? Thanos is threatening the galaxy again but sorry that'll have to wait because Peter & Gamora are having a lover's quarrel...like really?! I think I again had great expectations going into this after the amazing job Joss Whedon did with the Avengers movie last summer.
Now there were some things I did love about the movie, specifically: Groot.
Groot's the tree-like creature and even with his limited vocabulary and CGI rendering, I felt like he was the most complex and interesting character in the entire movie with, in my opinion, the best powers. I also want to mention some extraordinary acting by the likes of Karen Gilan (of Doctor Who fame) who plays Nebula, a sadistic and fitting nemesis to Gamora, and Lee Pace (The Hobbit) who plays the big badie Ronan. Does that say something about me that I prefer the bad guy characters in this movie to the good guys? Honourable mention to Dave Bautista, who's a former WWE wrestler, as Drax.
All in all though it's an entertaining summer blockbuster and another money-making addition to the Disney monopoly (Marvel is turning out to be a really great investment for Disney, I wonder how long it can last?)
