June 14th in Charleston, WV. Everyone is back for the sequel. The film received an 81% Rotten Tomatoes rating, opened to the tune of $146 million and has grossed over $376 million domestically. It is a commercial success by any standard.
Everyone's favorite group of space pirates are at it again. The film opens up with the gang protecting valuable batteries from an inter-dimensional monster, it's desire for the batteries are never explained, for the Sovereign race, essentially elves of middle earth in space (gold skin, tall, great hair, good looking, smart, talented and a heavy air of superiority).
This is Ayesha, the queen if you will. She's come a long way since here early days as bathing suit clad eye candy...
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It's nice to know that alien females still have all the goods in the right spot.
After they finish the job, the Guardians draw the ire of the Sovereigns for stealing some of the batteries they were paid to protect. This sets off a series of events that gets the gang into one mess after another.
The main story arcs are Quill's daddy issues, Gamora and Nebula having sister issues and of course the fate of the universe hanging in the balance. Quill is torn between the abandonment issues with his birth father, Ego (nicely played by Kurt Russell), the living planet and the man that raised him, Yondu. Despite getting together in the last film, Quill and Gamora are in the "will they, won't they" portion of their relationship. Come to find out that Nebula and Gamora, daughters of the evil Thanos, have a "Jan v. Marcia" type relationship. We also get Groot, a cute as the dickens little plant is setting himself up for his teenage years in the next installment. Rocket's arc is the "I won't let anybody in because I'm afraid of being hurt" cliche. Drax is pretty much just comic relief. Quite a step down from the hell bent on revenge bad ass he was in the first film.
The effects were good, the acting was good (seriously, Kurt Russell was perfectly cast), lots of cool cameos, a few laugh out loud moments and a terrific soundtrack but everything was pretty predictable. We all know that there's a 3rd film in works so it's not climactic when the gang is facing "certain" death at the end. Hell! Even Nebula survives! I understand that Marvel has a grand plan. The Guardians will have a stand alone 3rd film that will somehow tie-in into a future Infinity Wars story line. Until then, they're going to give us a lot of style but not that much substance. If you've invested time in the films, like a lot of people, then you should see the film. Just be sure to stay for the all the post credit scenes. There's a few of them. But no Thanos.
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