Review of Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2 (2017) by Kaptenvideo — 06 May 2017

„Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2“ (2017) – 5/10 – or 8/10 if you like the first one, or big superhero movies in general.

I stopped watching mainstream superhero movies in 2013 and have mostly avoided them ever since.

They offer nothing to me personally and I'm honestly surprised at their huge commercial and critical success, given that almost all of them are just more of the same, copying the genre trailblazers such as original „X-Men“ and „Iron Man“.

I don’t have the time nor energy to still watch the same thing over and over again after 15 years or so. How many times can you enjoy watching two guys hurl through air, repeatedly punching each other, for example?

There are some exceptions to this of course („Logan“) but superheroes nowadays are better off in TV or streaming series such as „Luke Cage“ where the makers get the chance to put freshness and depth on the table.

The first „Guardians of the Galaxy“ collected over 770 million dollars from the cinemas in 2014, so the sequel is, of course, very similar. A true-blood superhero movie, just like the grandmother used to make.

It’s loud, brash, full of colors and explosions and always ready to gently tease about superhero and sci-fi movies’ tired cliches, without bringing anything to replace them.

Yes, the result is full of „energy“ and much „fun“, but if you don’t particularly care about the paper-thin characters or picturebook world they inhabit, it’s difficult to hold interest after 30 minutes or so.

And how can one care if there’s never even a slight feeling that any big character is really in danger, no matter how large the explosions and enemy guns! It’s all sound and fury, signifying nothing, as the late great Shakespeare would say.

The story is trivial as expected and thus would work better in small doses… but the movie format is much more profitable, so we get about 140 minutes in a row.

Nevermind that there’s maybe 90 minutes worth of story here, every self-respecting Hollywood epic must last over two hours.