Global Courant 2023-05-05 13:00:22
Marvel has a direction problem.
That’s not to say it has a directorial problem; the Marvel Cinematic Universe (MCU) has never hurt big names behind the camera. The biggest problem with Marvel’s latest movies isn’t the movies themselves: it’s the direction they’re all going.
After a decade-long run of increasingly interconnected films managed to build a storyline that stretched all the way back to 2008’s Iron Man and ended in that one flashy second of 2019’s Avengers: Endgame, the franchise has largely been let go.
The MCU’s incredible achievement has led to the creation of what is essentially a giant crossover installment – varied enough to appeal to fans of multiple genres, and big enough to follow along with feels like a communal experience.
However, every conflict eventually needs a solution, and unfortunately even Marvel Studios CEO Kevin Feige can’t keep the same game going indefinitely. And these stories are much less convincing if they feel like they have no reason to exist.
So when I watch Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 3 is the best and first really good Marvel entry since Endgame, maybe you can give me some leeway.
LOOK | Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 3 trailer:
It’s one of the first MCU properties still releasing movies. And while James Gunn isn’t the only director with writing credits, it’s the only one, aside from Joss Whedon’s old Avengers entries, written and directed solely by the same person. That gave Guardians Vol. 2 a unique voice, even when his contemporaries were relatively strong.
Now that almost every other cinematic release reads like a holding pattern until they finally get to mutants, Guardians Vol. 3 is the first sign in a while that Marvel might still be having some real fun in the tank.
Final of trilogy a dark departure
As for the plot, Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 3 has continued the friends-is-family ethos at the center of the group since its inception. After the events of Endgame, Gamora (Zoe Saldaña) no longer remembers former love interest Peter Quill (Chris Pratt), and is instead hired as a Ravager – essentially a space pirate – led by the still confusingly underused Sylvester Stallone.
Mantis (Pom Klementieff) and Drax the Destroyer (Dave Bautista) clash in the captivating friendship b-plot that culminated in The Guardians of the Galaxy Holiday Special. Here the journey is less about finding strength in each other and more about that relationship wilting on the vine.
Quill drowns himself in alcohol in a self-pitying character arc that comes off as more obnoxious than human. Taking care of him is Bradley Cooper’s Rocket, perhaps the most depressed creature of the bunch.
The character who isn’t a raccoon at all (according to him) is stuck in the past. We see him moping in their spacehouse Knowhere, listening to an overwrought acoustic recording of Creep, reminiscing about his soon-to-be-revealed animal-friendly background as tears stream down his cheeks.
It’s all very slow and very sad – that is, until he’s blown into a coma by about six buildings, leaving the rest of the gang to race across the universe for a cure.
If it sounds like a departure from the wacky but superficial fun of past Guardians installments (and pretty much everything else on the big screen from Marvel lately), that’s because it is.
In Gunn’s conclusion to the trilogy, his writing and directing display a barbed animosity toward his characters; the awe-inspiring millennial humor that has become the bane of virtually everyone’s existence is replaced by a bitter – and surprisingly violent – undercurrent.
This allows you to throw pretty much all the messages that the previous movies built out the window. Although that might be the worst fate imaginable for some past fans (“Remember when these movies were fun? James Gunn wasn’t,” reads Mashable’s review), the grown-up look at his characters gets Marvel out of his rut. The growing animosity between everyone on this team does more to serve the characters than any amount of lame comedic jabs or saccharine get-togethers ever have.
Chukwudi Iwuji, right, appears as the High Evolutionary, the main antagonist in Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 3. (Marvel Studios)
Compelling villain, strong action
Quill’s painful attempts to get Gamora to love him again result in a series of explosive monologues that will prove refreshingly original to those who found Adam Sandler’s attempts to manipulate a trauma victim in 50 First Dates deeply disturbing.
Rocket’s coma flashbacks from his experimental upbringing do a surprisingly good (if sometimes mawkish) job of tying the story together, while cementing Cooper as one of the few truly talented live actors to have become voice actors.
And our villain, Chukwudi Iwuji’s High Evolutionary, pairs an impressive performance with a good enough backstory to actually justify its existence – unlike Christian Bale’s solidly acted yet narrative one-note Gorr the God Butcher.
And despite the somewhat dour twist, the comedy is still there. Will Poulter (who cut his teeth at comedy all the way back in his Son of Rambow and School of Comedy days) does a good job here, though sadly adding even more to Marvel’s plethora of “too stupid to live” relief comic characters.
Will Poulter, left, appears as Adam Warlock, with Elizabeth Debicki as Ayesha. (Marvel Studios)
Ignoring the measly puppet-eyed cast of animal characters that Rocket gets to draw out obvious pathos, the power of Vol. 3 is unmistakable in its action (the trilogy ender has some of the most impressive fight scenes to date), multiple climactic moments, and mature but not too mature tone.
For the first time in a long time, it’s a Marvel movie made to tell a story, rather than drag along a story as an excuse for bright colors and explosions. Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 3 is twice as exciting with half the fat, which may not be as appetizing for those just here for dessert.
