Just when you think Marvel forgot what charm was, James Gunn reminds everybody that a smile and a gun fight is a lot better than just a gun fight. Or should I say a Gunn fight is better than a gun fight? How about — he brought a talking tree to a Gunn fight.
Eschewing the usual Star-Lord focus, Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 3 concentrated on it’s smallest, yet arguably most popular, member: Rocket, a Frankensteinian hybrid hyper-intelligent raccoon. In this film, we get full details on how we turn an ordinary trash panda into an engineering genius. Or at least we get a decent cover story. While Star-Lord (Chris Pratt) is busy brooding over Gamora (Zoe Saldaña), whom he lost a few films ago, the kid from We’re the Millers shows up and wrecks the place.
Seriously, you can’t just paint Will Poulter gold, make him fly around like superman, and still expect we won’t recognize him from We’re the Millers. His object is to collect Rocket, but the Guardians –and I can’t honestly tell you how 
many of them there are any longer- fend off the attack. Rocket (voice of Bradley Cooper) is badly injured in the process, and the only way to save him is to override Rocket’s internal killswitch embedded by Orgocorp, Rocket’s Dr. Frankenstein. Turns out, Orgocorp is the company trying to collect Rocket in the first place, so we’re all heading for a showdown in the same place.
Meanwhile, Rocket gets a backstory. Some wannabe god, the High Evolutionary (Chukwudi Iwuji) has devoted his entire life to the evil pursuit of good. Follow me here, this dude anthropomorphizes animals in an effort to create a perfect race. The goal seems nice, if a little cringe-y, but the methods are just plain wrong. First, he tampers with animal brains, making smart creatures, but also often inhibiting them physically. Then he cycles up their evolution a bunch, often destroying the product in the process, or lets them live in a colony, which he eventually destroys as well. Bottom line: your hamster gets a 150 IQ, but sooner or later will be destroyed by the endower all the same.
Unlike so many films in the comic book hero genre of late, Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 3 really found the spark of humanity (ironically) when pairing Rocket with imprisoned peers, an otter with mechanical arms, a paraplegic walrus and some sort of rabbit/spider hybrid. The conversations among the inmates are where the film shines. It’s hard not to be moved by these disturbing freaks of nature. Rocket is the special one because … reasons. And suffice to say the story ain’t gonna end well for most everything High Evolutionary touches.
Meanwhile, the other Guardians are off to the rescue. The mostly involves miscommunications between Drax (Dave Bautista) and Mantis (Pom Klementieff), while Star-Lord constantly ponders his love-life vis-à-vis the multi-hued Thanos sisters, Gamora and Nebula (Karen Gillan), while treeboy says “I am Groot” a lot. It’s more charming than I describe it. For the first time in a while, Marvel nailed tone
perfectly. Let your heroes be charming first, heroic second. This is especially true of the Guardians, who have specialized in creating heroism out of mediocrity.
Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 3 is both enjoyable and moving. This is another on the fence between “good” and “great.” It suffers from “too many characters” which is true of a lot of DC/Marvel films these days, but James Gunn is better at sorting them out than most directors. This is one of those films in which you could ask ten different fans: “Who is your favorite?” and get ten different answers. And, yeah, there will be a death or two in this epic.
Marvel still suffers from the unforced error it brought upon itself during Infinity War: the stakes are always too high. The brass has decided that unless an entire civilization, nay world, is being destroyed, the plot isn’t worth our attention. Seeing that the most compelling part of Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 3 involved a raccoon in captivity, I disagree. I think you guys aren’t trying hard enough to show off the assets you have rather than force-feeding a doomsday plot. Galaxy 3 stemmed enough of that for me to be optimistic about future Marvel films, but I’m still left a little empty by how much of the plot involved world destroying … well, that and the Lord of the Rings resolutions here; rule of thumb: try not to end the film more than twice.
The bottom line, however, is that Marvel and the Guardians are back, and this is a good thing. There will be more Guardians in the future and I’m looking forward to it.
Tis the ballad of Rocket Raccoon
Most advanced pest twixt here and the moon
This mock rodent did ail
Yet his buds didn’t quail
He’s needed for the next sequel soon
Rated PG-13, 150 Minutes
Director: James Gunn
Writer: James Gunn
Genre: Oh yeah, these movies are supposed to be fun
Type of being most likely to enjoy this film: Fans of raccoons
Type of being least likely to enjoy this film: People waiting for Marvel’s inevitable downfall
