REVIEW - Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 3

A part of me will always wonder what the highly anticipated Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 3 might have looked like without Marvel's embarrassing firing of James Gunn, which contributed to this movie's 3-year delay. Was there this much sentiment in the first draft of the script, or did nearly losing his Guardians family shatter Gunn's heart and scatter fragments all over the finished product? However the sausage was made, fans can breathe a sigh of relief that the 3rd "Guardians" film takes a page more from Toy Story 3 than Spiderman 3.

It's been a while since last we saw the Guardians blasting through outer space (well, I guess they did give the briefest of cameos in the last Thor movie), and we've all had a rough few years waiting. The film itself seems to recognize this, which is perhaps why this film feels so much more somber than almost anything else from the MCU. The humor is still there, yes, Drax still shares observations about how even his butt can make metaphors, but the laughs are all situated within a greater spread of melancholy than the previous installments offered. Even the film's color palette is considerably muted compared. The space disco gives way to a swan song.

As was the case in the last volume, the plot starts off being more concerned with the individual exploits of the group itself. The superhero stuff comes in later. This character-centric psychological approach separates the film from many of Marvel's more forgettable offerings, especially in the last few years, where the superheroes are almost purely reactive.

Most of the actors here give their best performance of their MCU career, their comedic timing outmatched only by their emotional range. I'll single out Karen Gillian for seeing Nebula through one of the more underdiscussed character growths not just within the MCU, but pop culture at large.

The film bathes in a sentimentality in a way that could almost be called indulgent. There are factions of the audience that might resent a right angle turn to emotionality just because the franchise is ending, but the underground emotional current has always been the franchise's secret weapon. What was the original "Guardians" if not one kid's decade-long journey to reading his dead mother's goodbye letter? The crowd that watches these films purely for the cursing racoons might find the generous hugging and crying off-putting. They have my sympathies, but no part of me regrets watching these guys flying away together into the beautiful forever sky.

--The Professor

Comments

PROFESSOR'S PICKS: 25 Most Essential Movies of the Century

"Best." "Favorite." "Awesomest." I spent a while trying to land on which adjective best suited the purposes of this list. After all, the methods and criteria with which we measure goodness in film vary wildly. "Favorite" is different than "Best," but I would never put a movie under "Best" that I don't at least like. And any film critic will tell you that their favorite films are inevitably also the best films anyways ... But here at the quarter-century mark, I wanted to give some kind of space to reflect on which films are really deserving of celebration. Which films ought to be discussed as classics in the years ahead. So ... let's just say these are the films of the 21st century that I want future champions of the film world--critics and craftsmen--to be familiar with. Sian Hader directing the cast of CODA (2021) There are a billion or so ways to measure a film's merit--its technical perfectio...

Year in Review: 2024

Let me start this party by admitting ... I really dropped the ball on reviews this year, folks. Not counting my Percy Jackson response , which in practice plays more like one of my essays anyways, there was a six-month gap between reviews with Wish last November and The Fall Guy this May. More than once during that drought, I took my notebook to the theater and came back with a page full of notes, but for various reasons I was unable to piece together anything. It didn't help also that deliveries this year were comparatively sparse, what with the strikes strangling the production line. I will try to do better this year. (For those curious, I am also going to try to review the final season of Stranger Things , like I did with the 4th season, when it drops sometime this year. That will all depend on a lot of things, including the method by which Netflix chooses to release these episodes.) My reviews didn't par...

REVIEW: Wolf Man

The thing about any figure as iconic as The Wolf Man is ... you already know how his story ends because there's only one way it can end. Much in the same way that any "King Kong" movie has to end with the ape falling off of the Empire State Building. Any other ending just feels incongruent. Grafted from some other story. The equation can only produce a single sum. As Maria Ouspenskaya warned us in the original Wolf Man, "So tears run to a predestined end." I'll break the film critic's seal here a little and say that, if you love the Wolf Man figure, then you already know what happens to him at the end of Leigh Whannel's film, and you already basically know why. But I don't for a second count that as a bad thing. Reinvention is easy. Doing your homework, that takes commitment. And Whannel's new film does its homework. Here, our Wolf Man is Blake, a loving father living in the city with his daughter, Gi...

Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind: Do Clementine and Joel Stay Together or Not?

Maybe. The answer is maybe. Not wanting to be that guy who teases a definitive answer to a difficult question and forces you to read a ten-page essay only to cop-out with a non-committal excuse of an answer, I’m telling you up and front the answer is maybe. Though nations have long warred over this matter of great importance, the film itself does not answer once and for all whether or not Joel Barrish and Clementine Krychinzki find lasting happiness together at conclusion of the film Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Min d. I cannot give a definitive answer as to whether Joel and Clementine’s love will last until the stars turn cold or just through the weekend. This essay cannot do that. What this essay can do is explore the in-text evidence the film gives for either side t...

Pan's Labyrinth: The Fantasy and Reality of Good and Evil

So here’s a question I’m sure no one’s asked yet: what is the point of fantasy? Ask your resident D&D enthusiast or aspiring fantasy writer what it is about the fantasy genre that excites them so much, and you’re bound to get a variety of answers, but the topic of escapism tends to be a common thread. Sometimes the trash compactor of the real world just stinks so much, and you just need to vacation in someone else’s world. You can only stew in real world politics for so long before you just have to unwind by tracing the Jedi lineage or memorizing the rules of alomancy. This is where you commonly run into thoughts that fantasy nerds are just incompatible with reality and are deliberately shirking any responsibility from participating in it. This mindset has a lot in common with the nostalgia stigma we discussed with “Roger Rabbit” and “Detective Pikachu.” It is also a very elitist perspective born out of the same attitude...

REVIEW: Enola Holmes

Inspired by the children's book series by Nancy Springer, Netflix's new film, Enola Holmes , turns the spotlight onto the younger sister of the famed detective as a new mystery thrusts her into an insidious conspiracy that compels her to take control of her own life and leave her own mark. The film's greatest achievement is reaffirming that lead actress Millie Bobby Brown of Stranger Things is indeed one of the most promising up and coming talents around and can seemingly step into any role with enthusiasm, but beyond that there's little about this film to celebrate. Enola Holmes lives alone with her mother, Eudoria (Helena Bonham-Carter), away from the pursuits of her much older, much more accomplished older brothers--the snooty Mycroft (Sam Clafin) and the ever-charming, ever famous Sherlock (Henry Cavill). Enola enjoys the attention of her mother until Eudoria vanishes without warning. It is this disappearance that summons her older brothers back to the estate to se...

REVIEW: Mufasa - The Lion King

To get to the point, Disney's new origin story for The Lion King 's Mufasa fails at the ultimate directive of all prequels. By the end of the adventure, you don't actually feel like you know these guys any better. Such has been the curse for nearly Disney's live-action spin-offs/remakes of the 2010s on. Disney supposes it's enough to learn more facts or anecdotes about your favorite characters, but the interview has always been more intricate than all that. There is no catharsis nor identification for the audience during Mufasa's culminating moment of uniting the animals of The Pridelands because the momentum pushing us here has been carried by cliche, not archetype. Director Barry Jenkins' not-so-secret weapon has always been his ability to derive pathos from lyrical imagery, and he does great things with the African landscape without stepping into literal fantasy. This is much more aesthetically interestin...

The Power of the Dog Doesn't (want to) Understand Toxic Masculinity: A Deconstruction and History of the "Toxic Cowboy"

I want to start this piece by recounting my very first experience watching John Ford’s 1956 masterpiece, The Searchers . The film sees John Wayne playing Ethan Edwards, rugged cowboy who embarks on a years-long quest to recover his young niece, Debbie, after she is kidnapped by a band of Comanche Indians, who also murder her entire family. Ethan is joined on this adventure by Debbie’s adopted older brother, Martin, played by Jeffrey Hunter. Ethan does not welcome Martin’s presence on this mission and even tries to leave him behind at the start, and he will continue to menace Martin as they travail the desert. Part of this is because Ethan does not consider Martin to be Debbie’s real family, and he also resents Martin’s Native American lineage. But most of his animosity stems from the fact that he simply sees Martin as weak. He does not seem like the kind of guy who can ...

Everybody's Got a Wolf Man

The late 19 th and early 20 th century brought about a newfound interest in human nature within the field of psychology. Of particular note from this era was the development of Sigmund Freud's theory about the human subconscious. This surge in interest in human nature overlapped with another leap forward for mankind, this one of the technological sort, that of moving pictures, and it wasn’t long until the two converged. Film theorists have long typed the medium as a sort of glimpse into the human subconscious, displaying human desires and fears through code in a form that almost resembles a dream. In December 1941, these two innovations converged as Universal released what has become a signature face of horror filmmaking, The Wolf Man . In this film, Lawrence “Larry” Talbot returns to the house of his father, Sir John Talbot, for the first time in years. He quickly becomes smitten with local antique shop owner, Gwen Conliffe, and asks her out on a date. That night,...

Films and Feelings

Search This Blog