Guardians of the Galaxy





Tell me if you have heard this one before: An orphan gets abducted by a UFO. He grows up to be some sort of space pirate, but because he double crossed one of the gad buys, he has both the good guys and multiple bad guys chasing him. Along the way he gets runs into a couple different people who would like to either kidnap him or kill him, but after a big fight they all get thrown into jail. In jail they team up with each other and some other questionable characters to break out, but they still have bad people who want to kill them over some mysterious all powerful orb in their possession. They can't let the orb fall into the hands of the bad guys, because that would be really, really bad, and these bad guys are really, really evil. So this leads to almost non stop fights and shootouts for the entire movie.

Guardians of the Galaxy is bigger on action and special effects than it is on drama, character development, or a story that seems remotely plausible. Overall, the story feels a little messy, with too many bad guys and characters to keep track of. Since it is based on a comic book, I suppose that I can forgive its excesses and enjoy it for what it is. The movie does present us with some interesting side characters, such as an intelligent genetically engineered Raccoon named Rocket, and a tree person, Groot, with a very limited vocabulary.

If I am being honest, I think that the movie is suppose to be a comedy, and it does have a few comic touches and at least one running joke. I don't think that I fully understood if I was suppose to enjoy this as an action film, sci-fi movie, comedy or drama. It has all these elements, but the entire movie feels like an excuse for non-stop shootouts and battle scenes. However, most of these are at least somewhat interesting, and there is just enough character development to make me care about the characters.

Part of my problem is that I saw this movie on the small screen. Literally. If I had seen it in the movie theater, then it might have come across as a grand spectacle.

Rating: * * * 1/2

Guardians of the Galaxy has a 90% rating on Rotten Tomatoes.