guardians of the galaxy 2 movie review

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James Gunn ’s “Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2” opens with a franchise-defining credit sequence. As an incredibly expensive CGI battle unfolds in the background, the camera stays on an adorable Baby Groot, dancing to ELO’s “Mr. Blue Sky.” This is a series more about whimsy, excitement and family than it is “things that go boom,” and that’s what really separates in the Marvel Cinematic Universe right now. And the clever opening credits, in which the other characters have the nerve to interrupt Baby Groot’s dance number as they fight for their lives, sets the tone perfectly for what’s to come: a thoroughly enjoyable summer blockbuster. This is the rare Hollywood CGI orgy that doesn’t take itself deadly seriously—like the current plague of superhero movies—and wants to be as purely entertaining as possible. To that end, a wave of heartfelt speeches and apocalyptic sequences hinder the final act and hold the film back from pure greatness, but you’ll have had enough fun by then that you won’t really care. To be blunt, “Vol. 2” avoids many of the flaws of the first movie, and does several things notably better. It’s fun, clever and a great kick-off to the summer movie season.

In keeping with the simplicity of its title, “Vol. 2” picks up relatively shortly after the end of the first film. Groot is still a baby, and the other four members of the Guardians are on a job for the Sovereign race, led by a golden woman named Ayesha ( Elizabeth Debicki ). Peter Quill aka Star-Lord ( Chris Pratt ), Gamora ( Zoe Saldana ), Drax ( Dave Bautista ), Rocket (voiced by Bradley Cooper ) and Baby Groot have to defend a valuable group of batteries from a monster called the Abilisk. They do so in exchange for a prisoner being held by the Sovereigns, Gamora’s evil sister Nebula ( Karen Gillan ). The mission goes off without a hitch, but Rocket steals the batteries on the way out, leading a whole race of people to come after the Guardians.

To seek vengeance, Ayesha ends up hiring someone who knows the Guardians well, Yondu ( Michael Rooker ), the blue-skinned Ravager who raised Peter, but there’s dissent among the Ravagers. For reasons that will become clear later, Yondu has essentially been exiled from his own people and his crew are starting to consider mutiny, especially when he’s reluctant to track Quill. At the same time, Quill finally meets his father, a Celestial named Ego, played with smooth style by Kurt Russell . In ways I won’t spoil, Star-Lord is eventually torn between his biological family and his makeshift one with the Guardians.

Of course, like Dom Toretto on a confessional bender, family comes up over and over again in “Vol. 2.” It’s most prominent in the arc between Star-Lord and Ego, but the competitive sibling dynamic between Gamora and Nebula is explored in this volume, and the adoptive father relationship between Yondu and Peter plays a major role as well. And, of course, as with so many superhero group films, it’s the Guardians themselves who are the ultimate “family.” As a writer, Gunn beats this drum a few too many times, but he mostly handles the issue of family being more than pure biology in a way that provides these films with an emotional spine other superhero flicks lack.

It helps greatly that the “family” is given nearly equal development and screen time in this adventure. It would have been easy to push Pratt to the front of the stage and rest the action of the film squarely on his shoulders, but every member of the Guardians feels more fully developed this time than in the first film, which was weighed down by origin/introduction arcs. The underrated Saldana turns Gamora into the most practical member of the group; Bautista gets as many big laughs as any MCU character playing the big guy with no social filter; Cooper does great voice work as he finds how Rocket disguises insecurity with self-sabotage; even Gillan and Rooker take characters who could have felt merely supporting and give them surprising depth. This is arguably the best MCU ensemble.

What’s perhaps most surprisingly enjoyable about “Vol. 2” is that Gunn doesn’t rest on his success at all in terms of production. This franchise is too big to fail on so many levels, and so it could have easily been phoned in. And yet Gunn and his team craft some of the most striking visuals of the entire MCU. There are fantastic bits of production design sprinkled throughout the film, from the Sovereigns’ “battle room” to the entirety of Ego’s planet to the grungy functionality of the Ravagers’ ship. Gunn and cinematographer Henry Braham don’t take the visuals of their billion-dollar sequel for granted, finding beauty in shots that many other filmmakers would toss away. “Vol. 2” looks surprisingly great.

That attention to detail extends to both the minor beats and the major action sequences, which also feel more accomplished here than in the first film. There’s an incredible break-out scene, a few nifty space battles, and while the finale is undeniably crowded, Gunn does a great job of keeping us attuned to where everyone is in the fight and what they’re doing. Most notably, the final battle takes full advantage of everyone, the action playing on character development that came before. There are elements of the final scenes (which I don't want to spoil) that feel like they fall into the trap in which every superhero movie has to climax with the apocalypse but the individual actions within those greater moments resonate more than most films of this type.

“Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2” uses music in much the same way as the first film, often in-scene as a product of Star-Lord’s mix tapes. And so it’s tempting to compare this movie to the second album from an artist after a beloved breakthrough debut. Sure, the songs are familiar. You’ve heard the basic beats before. But this is no sophomore slump. It’s a film that doesn’t just repeat itself or rest on its leading man. Most of all, it’s no mere bridge to the next adventure, even if it does set up a third volume in exciting ways. Like most movie critics, I suffer a bit from superhero exhaustion. It’s unavoidable at this point in the pop culture spectrum. No one’s more surprised than I am how much “Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2” woke me up.

Brian Tallerico

Brian Tallerico is the Managing Editor of RogerEbert.com, and also covers television, film, Blu-ray, and video games. He is also a writer for Vulture, The Playlist, The New York Times, and GQ, and the President of the Chicago Film Critics Association.

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Film credits.

Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2 (2017)

Rated PG-13 or sequences of sci-fi action and violence, language, and brief suggestive content.

136 minutes

Chris Pratt as Peter Quill / Star-Lord

Zoe Saldana as Gamora

Dave Bautista as Drax the Destroyer

Bradley Cooper as Rocket Raccoon (voice)

Vin Diesel as Baby Groot (voice)

Karen Gillan as Nebula

Michael Rooker as Yondu Udonta

Pom Klementieff as Mantis

Kurt Russell as Ego

Sylvester Stallone as Stakar Ogord / Starhawk

Sean Gunn as Kraglin Obfonteri / On Set Rocket

Elizabeth Debicki as Ayesha

Tommy Flanagan as Tullk

Michael Rosenbaum as Martinex T'Naga

Evan Jones as Wretch

Cinematographer

• Henry Braham
• Fred Raskin
• Tyler Bates

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Guardians of the galaxy vol. 2, common sense media reviewers.

Lots of laughs, thrills, tunes in slightly lesser sequel.

A Lot or a Little?

What you will—and won't—find in this movie.

The Guardians are all about teamwork and redemptio

The Guardians continue to be a group of flawed, ro

At one point it seems like the heroes will die, an

Peter's parents are shown kissing. The Ravagers ar

Strong language isn't constant but includes "s--t,

Brands seen in the movie include Sony, Zune, Dairy

Ravagers and others drink at a pub (and on their s

Parents need to know that Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2 continues the adventures of Marvel's motley group of space outlaws first introduced in the smash hit Guardians of the Galaxy . Expect lots of interest from kids of all ages, but it's most appropriate for tweens and up. There's frequent fighting…

Positive Messages

The Guardians are all about teamwork and redemption, the power of second chances, and the idea that family isn't limited to blood but can extend to the bonds and promises you make to people you care about and respect. Also a great lesson that although family/tribe/squad members might fight and disagree, they always have one another's backs. That said, the characters' motivations and actions aren't always 100 percent pure.

Positive Role Models

The Guardians continue to be a group of flawed, roguish former outlaws. They're misfits with checkered pasts, but they ultimately make selfless decisions to protect one another and defend the universe. They're courageous and won't give up until they've vanquished threats to not just themselves but to the greater good. Gamora and Nebula aren't typical female superhero characters or sisters. Gamora finally apologizes for their upbringing and how she treated Nebula. Yondu is able to redeem himself for his mistakes and betrayals.

Violence & Scariness

At one point it seems like the heroes will die, and ( spoiler alert! ) a popular character does die, so kids should be prepared for that. Hand-to-hand combat using guns, swords, and taser-like weapons. Lots of explosions, crashes, and tense, war-like space chases/battles in which a fleet of remotely controlled ships aims to shoot down the Guardians' ship. Frequent peril and danger; fights against huge, scary enemies. Many executions in which people are "spaced" (i.e. forced out of airlocks to die in the freezing cold of deep space). High body counts in a couple of sequences, particularly the scene with the executions and one with a special arrow that zips around, bloodily shooting through victims. Collateral damage as something begins to take over planets, destroying everything in its wake.

Did you know you can flag iffy content? Adjust limits for Violence & Scariness in your kid's entertainment guide.

Sex, Romance & Nudity

Peter's parents are shown kissing. The Ravagers are shown with scantily clad females (robots with human-like faces) who could be construed as prostitutes; some dance, while others sit on/with the pub/lounge's patrons. Continued romantic tension between Peter and Gamora, which leads to longing looks, a couple of almost kisses, and one moment in which an empath reveals that Peter has strong feelings for Gamora. Peter flirts with a high priestess by offering to show her how natural conception works. Drax wants to know about Ego and Meredith Quill's conception of Peter and recalls that his own father would annually tell the tale of Drax's conception. Drax and Mantis seem to share a connection that could lead to romance in future installments.

Did you know you can flag iffy content? Adjust limits for Sex, Romance & Nudity in your kid's entertainment guide.

Strong language isn't constant but includes "s--t," "bulls--t," "damn," several uses of "d--k" and "douchebag," "a--hole," "bitch," "son of a bitch," "idiot," "bastard," "crap," "prick," "jackass," "doofus," etc. More frequently, the words are said euphemistically, like "turd," "freakin'" or "a-holes."

Did you know you can flag iffy content? Adjust limits for Language in your kid's entertainment guide.

Products & Purchases

Brands seen in the movie include Sony, Zune, Dairy Queen, and Ford. Lots of off-screen Guardians and Marvel merchandise available: apparel, figurines, video games, and more.

Drinking, Drugs & Smoking

Ravagers and others drink at a pub (and on their ship) -- some to the obvious point of drunkenness. One Ravager pours an alcoholic drink all over little Groot, who seems a tiny bit out of it afterward.

Did you know you can flag iffy content? Adjust limits for Drinking, Drugs & Smoking in your kid's entertainment guide.

Parents Need to Know

Parents need to know that Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2 continues the adventures of Marvel's motley group of space outlaws first introduced in the smash hit Guardians of the Galaxy . Expect lots of interest from kids of all ages, but it's most appropriate for tweens and up. There's frequent fighting with weapons (swords, guns, and more), space chases/battles, executions that involve people being "spaced" (forced out of airlocks to die in the freezing cold of deep space), and more. Spoiler alert: A popular character dies. Language, while not frequent, can also be strong, with everything from "douche" and "d--k" to "s--t," "a--hole." There's a bit of drinking, characters have romantic tension, and a couple of scenes show scantily clad females; there are also references to explaining conception. But all in all, it's still a bit less edgy than many other superhero movies. Plus, unlike the Avengers , the Guardians always fight together and exemplify the spirit of teamwork, friendship, and unconditional chosen-family bonds. To stay in the loop on more movies like this, you can sign up for weekly Family Movie Night emails .

Where to Watch

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Community Reviews

• Parents say (77)
• Kids say (172)

Based on 77 parent reviews

A movie to fast forward, not skip, if your kid is a little too young.

What's the story.

GUARDIANS OF THE GALAXY VOL. 2 continues the story of the misfit band of space outlaws who originally banded together to save the universe in the first film . But instead of starting in 1988, it begins in 1980, when a space man (CGI-young Kurt Russell ) woos Meredith Quill ( Laura Haddock ). ( Possible spoilers ahead!) Thirty-four years later, their son -- half human/half "star man" former smuggler Peter Quill ( Chris Pratt ) -- is with his fellow Guardians: former assassin Gamora ( Zoe Saldana ); genius, genetically modified Rocket, who refuses to admit he's a raccoon (voiced by Bradley Cooper ); tree-like baby Groot (voiced by Vin Diesel ); and literal-speaking Drax ( Dave Bautista ). After a mission for the Sovereign -- high-tech, genetically engineered aliens who believe themselves superior to everyone else -- goes sour, the Guardians barely escape and are forced to crash. They meet a mysterious man, Ego (Russell), who helps them and announces that he's Peter's long-lost father. Ego, who has a bug-like empath sidekick named Mantis (Pom Klementieff), guides Peter, Gamora, and Drax to his home planet, where he reveals that he's an immortal celestial being with superpowers that can create -- or destroy -- worlds. Meanwhile, the Sovereign's high priestess, Ayesha ( Elizabeth Debicki ), hires Yondu ( Michael Rooker ) and his Ravager crew to retrieve the Guardians for her to execute -- but Yondu's fondness for Peter leads to a mutiny.

Is It Any Good?

Marvel's favorite motley crew of reformed outlaws is back for another space adventure full of classic tunes, epic battles, and charming comedy. While it isn't quite as awesome as the original, that doesn't mean Vol. 2 isn't good. Set to the soundtrack of Meredith Quill's Awesome Mix Tape #2, which she bequeathed to her beloved young Peter, Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2 moves the group's story forward -- primarily for the orphaned Star Lord, who's always wondered exactly who his Star Man dad was and why he left him and his mother behind on Earth. Russell is an ideal pick to play Ego, the celestial god (lowercase "g") who hired Yondu to bring his son to him 26 years earlier. Without getting into specifics, this father-son dynamic, in classic Marvel origin-story style, is the driving force behind the tension and action in the second half of the movie. It just isn't quite as interesting or funny or as the original's "assembling the Guardians" storyline. Father issues, of course, run rampant in superhero worlds, and the Guardians are no exception, whether they're missing the lack of one, bemoaning an evil one, or, in the case of Drax, mourning the father he used to be before his family was killed.

Speaking of fathers -- biological or otherwise -- Yondu, played by Rooker, is a standout supporting character in this installment. He and his magical arrow (and his straight-talking wisdom) are a highlight of the action and the dialogue. Yondu and Rocket enjoy a couple of meaningful conversations that depict their growth in a surprisingly touching way. Saldana and Pratt continue to exchange lingering looks as Peter and Gamora, but there's not a whole lot of romantic development, given that so many higher stakes are at play around them at nearly all times. This sequel passes the Bechdel Test thanks both to Gamora and Nebula's exchanges as sisters dealing with their abusive upbringing at the hands of evil Thanos and to new supporting player Mantis, even though most of her scenes are with Drax (who finds her laudably "hideous" and "repulsive," but in a "good way"). It almost goes without saying that Baby Groot steals the show with his big eyes and sweet demeanor. Even the Ravagers consider him "too adorable to kill." And then there's the music, which is once again a finely crafted compilation of '60s and '70s classics, with Fleetwood Mac's "The Chain" and Looking Glass' "Brandy" being the most memorable. But there's plenty more awesomeness to enjoy.

Talk to Your Kids About ...

Families can talk about role models in Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2. How do they represent teamwork and courage ? Why are those important character strengths ?

How does Guardians of the Galaxy compare to other superhero stories? Do you prefer hero movies with just one major star and sidekicks, or do you think movies with groups are better, like The Avengers or Justice League ?

Are all movies inspired by comic books created equal? Why do some stand out?

What did you think of the soundtrack to Vol. 2 ? Kids/teens: does the movie make you interested in music from the '60s and '70s?

Movie Details

• In theaters : May 5, 2017
• On DVD or streaming : August 22, 2017
• Cast : Chris Pratt , Zoe Saldana , Bradley Cooper
• Director : James Gunn
• Inclusion Information : Female actors, Black actors, Latino actors
• Studio : Walt Disney Studios Motion Pictures
• Genre : Action/Adventure
• Topics : Superheroes , Adventures , Space and Aliens
• Character Strengths : Courage , Teamwork
• Run time : 136 minutes
• MPAA rating : PG-13
• MPAA explanation : sequences of sci-fi action and violence, language, and brief suggestive content
• Award : Common Sense Selection
• Last updated : February 18, 2023

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Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2 Review

Back to save the galaxy..

The MCU: Where Are All the Major Players Right Now?

Avengers: Infinity War - Every Character Confirmed

Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2 is a fun go-around with characters we love to spend time with, but the second film is far denser and has a few more pacing and story problems than the first. Still, it's a very good movie with one of the most emotionally impactful endings of any Marvel Cinematic Universe story yet. Vol. 2 does a great job developing its characters and growing them over the course of the story, and does its best to address frequent criticisms of MCU movies, including throwaway villains and a lack of true consequences.

In This Article

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Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2

The Guardians struggle to keep together as a team while dealing with their personal family issues, notably Star-Lord's encounter with his father, the ambitious celestial being Ego. The Guardians struggle to keep together as a team while dealing with their personal family issues, notably Star-Lord's encounter with his father, the ambitious celestial being Ego. The Guardians struggle to keep together as a team while dealing with their personal family issues, notably Star-Lord's encounter with his father, the ambitious celestial being Ego.

• Andy Lanning
• Chris Pratt
• Zoe Saldana
• Dave Bautista
• 1.2K User reviews
• 610 Critic reviews
• 67 Metascore
• 15 wins & 60 nominations total

• Peter Quill …

• Stakar Ogord

• Meredith Quill

• Young Ego Facial Reference

• Sovereign Chambermaid
• (as Hannah Gottesman)

• Sovereign Pilot
• All cast & crew
• Production, box office & more at IMDbPro

More like this

Did you know

• Trivia Prop master Russell Bobbitt had difficulty finding the cassette decks used in the first film, and all of the Sony Walkman headphones they found were broken. Bobbitt contacted Sony to see if they had any available for filming. They did not, so he eventually created six from scratch.
• Goofs People exposed to the vacuum of space do not freeze in a matter of seconds/minutes. In a vacuum the only way to lose (or gain) body heat is through thermal radiation. It would take hours and hours. This is what makes a vacuum a good insulator. In fact, if you were to float in sunlight you'd sooner cook than freeze. Correction: The pressure is important: Your eyes, if left open, would basically boil and surface freeze because of lack of pressure on the liquid. Your tongue would be susceptible as well. The pressure issue would also make it impossible to hold air in your lungs, so you would pass out within a minute, but likely much sooner: "In 1965, while performing tests at the Johnson Space Center, a subject was accidentally exposed to a near vacuum (less than 1 psi) when his space suit leaked while in a vacuum chamber. He did not pass out for about 14 seconds, by which time unoxygenated blood had reached his brain. Technicians began to repressurize the chamber within 15 seconds and he regained consciousness at around the equivalent of 15,000 feet of altitude. He later said that his last conscious memory was of the water on his tongue beginning to boil. So, there's at least one data point about what it's like to be in a vacuum. It won't be pleasant, but it won't be like the movies, either."

[Yondu is floating in the air, hanging on his arrow]

Peter Quill : You look like Mary Poppins.

Yondu : Is he cool?

Peter Quill : Hell yeah, he's cool.

Yondu : I'm Mary Poppins, y'all!

• Crazy credits Cosmo the dog, Howard the Duck and the Grandmaster (a cosmic being from Thor: Ragnarok (2017) ) are seen in the credits
• Connections Edited into Nostalgia Critic: Mary Poppins Returns (2019)
• Soundtracks Brandy (You're A Fine Girl) Written by Elliot Lurie Performed by Looking Glass Courtesy of Epic Records by arrangement with Sony Music Licensing

User reviews 1.2K

• Platypuschow
• Mar 24, 2018

Sylvester Stallone's Most Iconic Roles

• May 5, 2017 (United States)
• United States
• Marvel (United States)
• Guardians of the Galaxy 2
• Cartersville, Georgia, USA (street scenes: Ego's spawn invading town)
• Marvel Studios
• Walt Disney Pictures
• See more company credits at IMDbPro
• $200,000,000 (estimated)
• $389,813,101
• $146,510,104
• May 7, 2017
• $863,756,903

Technical specs

• Runtime 2 hours 16 minutes
• Dolby Digital
• Dolby Surround 7.1
• IMAX 6-Track
• Dolby Atmos

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Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2 Reviews

The second installment richened the characters while also giving Michael Rooker’s Yondu one of its best character arcs.

Full Review | Feb 27, 2024

...quirky, mischievous and authentic...

Full Review | Jan 25, 2024

The humor and character relationships compensated for what I perceived as a slightly weaker story compared to the first film.

Full Review | Original Score: 4/5 | Mar 1, 2023

Attempts to make the characters more than incessant joke boxes pays off (for the most part), and despite the humor’s inconsistency, there are some truly funny moments.

Full Review | Original Score: 3.5/5 | Aug 21, 2022

It entertains by finding an equilibrium between diversionary thrills and emotional substance.

Full Review | Original Score: 3.5/4 | Apr 4, 2022

Like its predecessor, it stands on its own and might as well have 10 sequels without having to flirt with other Marvel movies. Paradoxically, despite being the funniest film in the MCU, it is, at the same time, the most emotional [Full review in Spanish]

Full Review | Original Score: 5/5 | Jan 2, 2022

Baby Groot steals the show...

Full Review | Aug 25, 2021

The jokey demeanor that informed the first film remains, even if writer-director James Gunn forces too many gags. But the freshness of the characters remains intact, and the actors continue to interact in a manner that supports the narrative spine.

Full Review | Original Score: 3/4 | Aug 17, 2021

You just can't help but have a smile on your face right away.

Full Review | Jun 24, 2021

Not all the pieces fit ... but what doesn't work never sticks around long enough to ruin the whole shebang.

Full Review | Original Score: 3/5 | May 19, 2021

A very watchable second slice of intergalactic fun.

Full Review | Original Score: 3/5 | Apr 23, 2021

With vibrant colors of the multiple planets, creatures, and space opera-like battles, Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2 is an eye-popping, visual rock concert.

Full Review | Original Score: 3/4 | Feb 15, 2021

An overdependence on CG and its wirework equivalent is disappointing, as it makes the already unbelievable stunts appear just that much more phony.

Full Review | Original Score: 6/10 | Dec 5, 2020

If you want more Guardians of the Galaxy, this movie is sure not to disappoint, even if it deigns to fly a little too high on its own excess.

Full Review | Original Score: 4/5 | Sep 24, 2020

Pretty close to everything I've ever wanted from a superhero flick.

Full Review | Original Score: 3.5/4.0 | Sep 9, 2020

Some can argue that the surprise factor has gone...The first film was a feel good exercise involving infinity stones with a sing-a-long and toe-tapping soundtrack. But the sequel felt like an overcooked and bloated indulgence.

Full Review | Original Score: 2/5 | Aug 26, 2020

By the final-act showdown with a much larger threat, you may find yourself inadvertently tearing up. Family can be tough, but then, love usually is.

Full Review | Original Score: 4/5 | Aug 26, 2020

How much mileage you get out of Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2 will depend a great deal on how you feel about the first movie, because this is more of the same.

Full Review | Original Score: B+ | Jul 1, 2020

Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2 is James Gunn's version of a Marvel Universe Empire Strikes Back: A film that retains everything the audience loves about the preceding movie, yet going deeper to expand the characters and story for further exploration.

Full Review | Jun 30, 2020

A sequel that I enjoyed as if I were a kid swimming in a sea of candies. It is even more fun than the predecessor. [Full review in Spanish]

Full Review | Original Score: 7/10 | Jun 27, 2020

Film Review: ‘Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2’

What do you do for an encore to the best comic-book movie in years? James Gunn's sequel is a witty and extravagant followup, but it works harder for less fun.

By Owen Gleiberman

Owen Gleiberman

Chief Film Critic

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The word “Marvel,” as in comic books or movie studios, has become a foundational term of our culture. Yet you could sit through almost every one of today’s comic-book movies and not find a whole lot to marvel at. That’s where “Guardians of the Galaxy” came in. In an era of overstuffed, taped-together blockbusters, it was supremely funny, exciting, and well-made — a rock ‘n’ roll space opera, spectacular yet lithe, without a stray shot or sequence out of place, and with a wildly caustic yet devotional interplay among its motley crew of renegades that recalled the original 1977 “Star Wars” (obviously its chief influence). The film wielded the machinery of big-budget franchise filmmaking and trumped it at the same time. So the question of what “ Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2 ” can do for an encore isn’t really, “Can it top the first film?” It’s more like, “Can it be as good?”

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Shot for shot, line for line, it’s an extravagant and witty follow-up, made with the same friendly virtuosic dazzle. Yet this time you can sense just how hard the series’ wizard of a director, James Gunn (now taking off from a script he wrote solo), is working to entertain you. Maybe a little too hard. “Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2” is an adventure worth taking, and the number of moviegoers around the planet who will want to take it should prove awe-inspiring. But it doesn’t so much deepen the first “Guardians” as offer a more strenuous dose of fun to achieve a lesser high.

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The film opens with the unintentionally disquieting image of Kurt Russell, digitally enhanced to resemble his much younger self, wooing the Missouri lass who will be Peter Quill’s mother to the 1972 strains of “Brandy (You’re a Fine Girl).” Instantly, this cues us to two things: Peter’s memento cassette tape entitled Awesome Mix Vol. 2, at least compared to Vol. 1, is going to be more kitschy than tasty; and the movie is going to be all about his daddy issues. The exhilarating credits sequence then shows us the Guardians in action: They’re out to slaughter an oversize tentacled monster that has four sets of angler-fish jaws, but the battle gets shoved into the background — in the foreground is the giant walking tree Groot, now Baby Groot (about a foot tall, still growing back from a lone twig), as he bops and dances to the sublime pop camp of ELO’s “Mr. Blue Sky,” letting us know that this is a movie with its background/foreground priorities in the right place.

The first film was all about how the Guardians met and teamed up, and part of the beauty of it was that you could feel just how much Chris Pratt ’s trouble-shooting, ’70s-dancing thief Peter, Zoe Saldana ’s green-faced alien princess Gamora, Dave Bautista ’s splendidly dour tell-it-like-it-is tattoo-carved muscleman Drax, and Bradley Cooper ’s Brooklynese raccoon scavenger Rocket really disliked each other. The quips and the acid retorts were the opposite of forced; they were part of the enthrallment of seeing this team come together out of brutal (and plausible) necessity. All of which made “Guardians” feel like something more than an origin story. “Vol. 2,” on the other hand, is an origin story. The Guardians are now a seasoned team, but the movie is all about how Peter got to be who he is.

Early on, there’s a stand-off between the Guardians and Ayesha (Elizabeth Debicki), the Golden High Priestess of the genetically perfect people of the Sovereign (who have yet to discover sex). The Guardians enrage her by stealing a handful of precious batteries, and she comes after them with an army of remote-controlled golden attack pods. Yet she figures into the film only peripherally — it’s all just a setup for the next sequel. Ditto for Sylvester Stallone, altering his look and acting style not one slurry iota, as Stakar, a Ravager leader who turned against Michael Rooker’s blue-skinned bandit Yondu when he learned that Yondu was selling child slaves on the black market.

Yondu’s got problems of his own — his men, who think he’s gone soft, launch a mutiny — but the film really gets underway when Russell lands in his ’60s Pan Am flying saucer to inform Peter that he’s his dad. (No, that’s not a spoiler; it’s the basic premise of the movie.) Peter was always a bit like Han Solo and Luke Skywalker in one body, and “Guardians Vol. 2” would like to stand in relation to the first “Guardians” as “The Empire Strikes Back” was to “Star Wars.” It’s yet another tale of an overgrown space kid finding his father, and his legacy.

Peter takes his comrades over to his dad’s planet, and once they arrive, there is much back-slapping Kurt Russell bonhomie, but there are also cues that something isn’t right. The name of Russell’s character is Ego. His planet, which he literally created, looks like a series of medieval French landscapes posing as Led Zeppelin album covers. He acts out his past to Peter with mannequins made of porcelain. Did I mention that he’s a self-proclaimed god who wants Peter to step up and rule the universe with him? You do the math.

Pratt, through it all, keeps his badass-lite swagger irreverent and commanding. In the right role (like this one), he knows how to express disdain and exuberance in equal measure — in other words, how to play an a—hole you can’t help but like. Yet it’s easy to feel that the conflicts in “Vol. 2” are a bit rote, whether it’s Peter upping the ante on his feisty flirtation with Gamora (he explains that their unspoken bond makes them just like Sam and Diane on “Cheers”) or Gamora duking it out with her seething bionic adoptive sister Nebula (Karen Gillan). It’s all impeccably staged, yet stuff happens because the movie needs stuff to keep happening. One is grateful for the comic relief, especially from Bautista, who makes Drax so literal-minded — and so up front about his imperious male gaze — that his every judgmental utterance feels spontaneous. As for Rocket, Cooper burrows ever more hilariously into his babbly hostility (“Hope daddy isn’t as big a dick as you, orphan boy!”) and the ratty self-hatred beneath it.

The gods of sci-fi spectacle must, of course, be served, and the climax of “Vol. 2” is exorbitant, rousing, touching, and just obligatory enough to be too much of a good thing. (That isn’t even counting the half-dozen post-credit teaser scenes, which make the film feel like…TV.) Baby Groot, as cuddly as Poppin’ Fresh, gets to scurry and plant a time bomb, Gamora gets to wield a machine gun the size of a refrigerator, and Yondu gets to do ever more dizzying flights of damage with his loop-the-loop arrow of death. The person who turns out to be the film’s lord of darkness morphs into all sorts of liquid digital forms, and there’s an in-the-middle-of-space farewell between Peter and someone close to him that’s beautiful and moving. If only the film could have left it at that! The fallen character winds up being given a light-show funeral worthy of a Communist head of state. The difference between the first “Guardians” and “Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2” is that the new movie is flush with what a big deal it is. Ironically, that makes it a smaller deal.

Reviewed at AMC Empire, New York, April 17, 2017. MPAA Rating: PG-13. Running time: 135 MIN.

• Production: A Walt Disney Studios release of a Marvel Studios production. Producer: Kevin Feige. Executive producers: Victoria Alonso, Louis D’Esposito, Nikolas Korda, Stan Lee.
• Crew: Director, writer: James Gunn. Camera (color, widescreen): Henry Braham. Editors: Fred Raskin, Craig Wood.
• With: Chris Pratt, Zoe Saldana, Bradley Cooper, Dave Bautista, Vin Diesel, Michael Rooker, Glenn Close, Karen Gillan, Sylvester Stallone, Pom Klementieff, Kurt Russell, Elizabeth Debicki, Nathan Fillion, Tommy Flanagan.

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Guardians Of The Galaxy Vol. 2 Review

28 Apr 2017

135 minutes

Guardians Of The Galaxy Vol. 2

The first Guardians Of The Galaxy ’s chief weapon was surprise. When the quirky quintet made their debut back in 2014, they represented Marvel Studios’ biggest gamble to date. Sure, it was the company that had taken an Aussie surfer, given him a magic hammer and still created another hit to add to its roster of box office behemoths, but the received wisdom was that a sci-fi film featuring a talking raccoon, a sentient tree, an ex-wrestler, a green warrior woman, and a roguish bloke best known for being the tubby guy in Parks And Recreation would be a step too far.

Well, received wisdom can go hang. Driven by the indie, often delightfully deranged sensibilities of its director, James Gunn, Guardians was a joy, combining humour and sci-fi action in a manner that out-Star Warsed most Star Wars movies, danced a jig at the global box office, and became a fixture on many ‘Best MCU films’ lists. In short, we were Groot.

Gunn has done it again.

But when you’ve lost the element of surprise, following that is no easy task. Happy to report, though, bar a few last-act wobbles and the odd tonal shift, Gunn has done it again, crafting a sequel that keeps the focus on the characters we fell for first time around while pumping up the volume.

After the success of the first one — and perhaps learning from the travails of Joss Whedon who, by his own admission, had to endure a fair amount of interference and second-guessing on Avengers: Age Of Ultron — Marvel has handed Gunn the keys to the kingdom. And that confidence is evident from the film’s credit sequence, which presents an action set-piece in a hilarious and highly unorthodox manner, while giving the incredibly cute Baby Groot a glorious moment in the spotlight and serving notice that 'Awesome Mix Vol. 2', the mix-tape that drives the film’s soundtrack, is going to be every bit as earwormy as 'Vol. 1'.

And, for the terrific first hour or so that seems to be the case with the movie as well. If the first film was about bringing this group of A-holes together, then convention dictates that the sequel should be about forcing them apart. But Gunn is clearly uninterested in what he should do and so this is actually a film about the group realising that, despite their huge differences, they function best as the universe’s most dysfunctional family. Yes, family — thematically this has a lot in common with Fast & Furious 8 , with the F-word said so often it would overheat Dom Toretto’s carburettor. Almost everyone here has daddy, mummy, or sister issues, with Quill in particular finding himself in a weird version of My Two Dads , torn between the dependably swaggering Russell’s aptly-named Ego and Michael Rooker’s gnarly space pirate, Yondu. But the emotions this engenders are unexpected and genuine. Beneath the film’s sass — and there’s plenty of that again — there’s a real beating heart.

Beneath the film’s sass, there’s a real beating heart.

Vol. 2 is at its best when this motley crew are bickering and bantering amongst themselves (with Bautista’s wonderfully unfiltered Drax getting the lion’s share of the best lines again, including the T-shirt-worthy, "I have famously huge turds") and outside parties, this time including Ego, Pom Klementieff’s sweet Mantis and Gamora’s aggrieved sister, Nebula (Karen Gillan), given more to do this time around. Hanging out with them is so much fun that it’s a shame when Gunn finally makes a concession to convention and remembers that films like this typically have to have a) a plot and b) a villain.

With the introduction of both, that’s when the movie starts to falter. What was previously assured becomes a little abrasive and, at times, unappealing. Jokes that landed unerringly start to miss the target, including a running gag about a bad guy called Taserface that’s not as funny as it may have seemed on paper/on set/in the edit, while one sequence which is meant to be a moment of triumphant heroism comes across as a tasteless misstep. And the final battle, try as it might, can’t help but become a greenscreen jamboree.

Still, even when the pixels threaten to overwhelm, Gunn finds refuge in his main characters. There’s plenty to enjoy here, whether it’s the perfectly deployed Baby Groot moments, or a general strain of anarchic weirdness that runs all the way through the credits and which still feels unique to this franchise, not just within the MCU, but blockbusters in general. It’s easy to overlook the odd off note when a mix is this awesome.

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'Guardians Of The Galaxy Vol 2' Review: A Soulful And Surprising Superhero Movie

At times, the plot almost feels nonexistent in  Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2 . Whether during an extended gag, a moment of backstory, or a sincere heart-to-heart, writer-director  James Gunn  is clearly more invested in character than the sequel's simple doomsday plot. There's a looseness, almost a shagginess, to the Marvel sequel that allows the characters to shine brightest in some eye-popping environments.

Like the first film, Vol. 2  begins with a strong emotional hook. The opening sequence is full of life. Set on Earth, it's every bit as vibrant as the colorful,  Yellow Submarine -esque settings we journey to with the Guardians of the Galaxy, who are now more familiar with each other than before. Between the first movie and the sequel, their bond has tightened, which is even made clear by how Drax ( Dave Bautista ) reacts to one of Rocket's ( Bradley Cooper ) jokes after they complete another job.

When Peter Quill ( Chris Pratt ), Baby Groot ( Vin Diesel ), Gamora ( Zoe Saldana ), and the others first show up, they're attempting to protect some Anulax batteries from a wormy space beast. The sequence shows Gunn has stepped up his game considerably with the action, which isn't one of the first movie's strong suits, but it also illustrates what's changed and what hasn't with the gang. They're still bickering underdogs prone to make mistakes, but only together can they still manage to get out of a jam.

They're doing a job for the High Priestess of the Sovereign ( Elizabeth Debicki ), who has an awfully high opinion of herself. She's not as charmed by the Guardians as we are, either. Although her role is minimal in the film, her golden presence elicits more than a few laughs, and she does, of course, help lead Quill to his father, Ego the Living Planet ( Kurt Russell ) – which is the only underwhelming relationship in the sequel. Emotionally, it's not as satisfying as what we see between Gamora and her sister, Nebula ( Karen Gillan ), or some of the other struggling characters. If any part of  Vol. 2  is rushed, it's Quill and Ego's relationship.

What Ego does in the third act doesn't come as a surprise. That's fine since Ego's awkward and tragic servant, Mantis ( Pom Klementieff ), helps spell out trouble is coming early on in her interactions with the Guardians. The reveal of Ego's plan, though, is more calculated than authentic. It's the one place where, dramatically, it feels like a box checked for a big third act fight to occur.

When Nebula tells Gamora about the pain she put her through, that's a real moment. When Yondu ( Michael Rooker ) reveals his regrets, that's another real moment. When Quill learns what Ego has done and what he's up to, it's a strangely cold reveal, despite what it means to Quill. The father and son scenes don't always have as much breathing room as the rest of the film. They're funny, and the two have a terrific discussion about Looking Glass' "Brandy," but their relationship doesn't ever feel intimate or emotional enough to make the reveal have more of a sting.

[Spoiler Over]

The ending still has emotional weight, despite the Ego problem. How Nebula, Yondu, and Rocket grow is a part of  Guardian of the Galaxy Vol. 2 's spectacle. We more often than not know what we're going to get from a comic book movie, but rarely do we know what we'll see these characters do or say next. They can surprise us, and they can surprise themselves, which is a part of the excitement of these movies.

Gunn is never in a rush to get the next action scene. Even when action is unfolding, he sometimes keeps it off-screen, both as a joke and to keep the characters always at the forefront of  Vol. 2 . The sequel's pacing and structure are a breath of fresh air to the start of this summer movie season. While Quill is sometimes the odd man out in the story, everyone else, including Mantis, gets the attention, time, and care they deserve from the filmmaker.

The plot's lightness allows for greater emphasis on the ensemble, and it also means we don't have to sit through too much exposition. The few major expository pieces of dialogue come from Russell, and he delivers it all with charm, grace, and his unforgettable laugh. The actor fits right in with the Guardians. He's, unsurprisingly, as charismatic and vulnerable as they are.

Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2  is a movie bursting with personality. Gunn doesn't try to top the first movie in scale, he attempts to surpass it with character – and he often succeeds. It's a little difficult to compare the two films since they both have their own strengths and problems, but they are both hilarious and heartfelt redemption tales, in which both the heroes and villains can change and grow. The fun cameos, the playful action, or the worldbuilding aren't what make  Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2  such   a satisfying sequel, it's the places Gunn takes these kindhearted A-holes. /Film Rating: 8 out of 10

Den of Geek

Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2 Review

Star-Lord, Gamora, and the gang are back, but can director James Gunn recapture the magic in Marvel's Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2?

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With planet-sized (pun intended) expectations surrounding its release, Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2 and writer/director James Gunn automatically face a tremendous challenge: can a second adventure starring Marvel’s most bizarre band of misfits retain the same quirky charm, sense of freshness, and overall weird and cosmically comedic tone of the first movie, while pushing the franchise forward? The answer is both yes and no.

There’s no question that Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2 is missing the sheer delight of discovering this corner of the Marvel Universe onscreen for the first time. The joke of seeing a potty-mouthed talking raccoon fire off snarky asides while blowing away enemies with high-powered weapons is clearly not a surprise anymore. And all the odd little denizens and Easter eggs lurking in every corner of Gunn’s richly imagined universe are, while not predictable, certainly more anticipated.

But Gunn wisely decides to focus on adding more depth to his team, not to mention their allies and enemies, and they’re still such a likable, entertaining bunch that Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2 succeeds more than anything else as a character piece. Everybody gets a turn at bat; almost all the arcs in the film are satisfying and in several cases, quite moving — and that is just enough to keep the movie compelling and captivating despite a generally slender plot and a structure that essentially consists of a terrific opening and a knockout ending bridged by a meandering second act.

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When we catch up with the Guardians at the beginning of the film, they’re as cantankerous as usual but have got their groove down: hired by an artificially created race called the Sovereign to get rid of some pesky extra-dimensional monsters, they work as well together as the Avengers but with sillier (I mean that in a nice way) one-liners. Peter Quill/Star-Lord (Chris Pratt) barely holds it together as team leader, while an exasperated Gamora (Zoe Saldana) tries to keep the boys in line. Drax (Dave Bautista) and Rocket (voiced again by Bradley Cooper) march to their own drums in battle while Baby Groot (voiced by Vin Diesel) successfully walks the thin line between overly cutesy and hilariously naïve.

The Sovereign, led by their high priestess Ayesha (Elizabeth Debicki), have captured Guardians nemesis (and Gamora’s adopted sister) Nebula (Karen Gillan), and the Guardians are interested in taking her back with them as payment for the job. But of course the team can’t do anything without getting in trouble, and they soon find themselves pursued by an entire space armada (amusingly controlled from what looks like a massive game arcade on the Sovereign planet).

Things look grim until a new figure injects himself into the situation: Ego (Kurt Russell), who saves the Guardians and makes a shocking revelation — he is Peter’s long-lost father, who impregnated Peter’s mother back on Earth and later sent Yondu (Michael Rooker) and his Ravagers to retrieve his son. But Yondu adopted Peter as a potential Ravager along the way, and Ego has been searching for his progeny ever since. 

Meanwhile, Yondu is also searching for Peter at the behest of Ayesha but finds himself dealing with his own personal crises as well. What happens after that is best left for viewers to discover themselves, but several conflicts are set up that revolve around the central idea of family. Alliances shift and more is revealed until the expected big finish, which is capped by a genuinely moving conclusion.

With the exception of one laugh-out-loud jailbreak, the middle section of the movie is where it runs into trouble. Gunn dishes out a lot of exposition here, but he’s lucky enough that he’s got Russell to deliver it. With a twinkle in his eye and an enigmatic yet regal quality to his manner, the veteran actor is eminently watchable even if other characters are basically standing around during Ego and Peter’s scenes together. Also helping things along is Pom Klementieff as the empathetic Mantis, Ego’s servant who brings a sweet-natured innocence to the proceedings.

Gunn eventually makes sure to not leave anyone behind; although she doesn’t get much to do for the first two-thirds of the movie, Nebula has a searing, powerful speech which Gillan — who’s excellent — delivers with a piercing undercurrent of hurt and anguish. Saldana almost matches her, giving Gamora a vulnerability we didn’t quite see in the first film. Another utility player, Rooker’s Yondu, is shown to have more depth and emotional complexity than the first film let on as well; his storyline may be the most poignant of all, and the vastly underrated Rooker — one of our best character actors — gives it everything he’s got.

The film’s final third turns into a somewhat more predictable onslaught of CG and pyrotechnics, but at least Gunn is smart and talented enough to mostly keep the focus on his characters and integrate their own personal stories into the raging battles and explosions. Without his eye for that, as well as his skill at filling the screen with all kinds of interesting visuals and his unerring instincts with musical cues, Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2 could have easily gone too big for its own good or simply rehashed the tricks of the first film without adding anything to them.

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Instead, Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2 answers questions posed by the first movie by exploring its cast of colorful miscreants in a way that almost makes it an anti-blockbuster. The strange pacing and stop-and-start plotting may feel awkward compared to the headlong rush of the previous film, but spending a little over two hours with these folks is still a hell of a lot of fun. It will be intriguing to see how the Guardians emerge from the coming apocalypse of Avengers: Infinity War , and even more fascinating to see what lies ahead for them in their own third adventure. If the biggest challenge facing Gunn, his cast and Marvel is keeping us interested in this weird little gang, they’ve met it handily.

Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2 is out in theaters May 5.

Don Kaye | @donkaye

Don Kaye is an entertainment journalist by trade and geek by natural design. Born in New York City, currently ensconced in Los Angeles, his earliest childhood memory is…

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Review: ‘Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2’ Wants That Loving Feeling

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By Manohla Dargis

• May 4, 2017

“Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2” has all the digital bells and whistles as well as much of the likable, self-aware waggery of the first. In many respects, it’s not much different except it all feels a bit strained, as if everyone were trying too hard, especially its writer-director, James Gunn. Most of the ragtag futuristic fighters who powered through Vol 1. three years ago are back on board and led by Peter Quill (Chris Pratt), a cheerily roguish type who calls himself Star-Lord. The name still brings a light smile, even if the movie can’t help but feel as deadly serious as any other lucratively branded Marvel property.

It’s tough being a hitmaker who isn’t weighed down by corporate expectations, but for a while, Mr. Gunn does a pretty good job of keeping the whole thing reasonably fizzy, starting with an opener that winks at the audience with big bangs and slapstick. The movie begins in medias res, with Quill and the gang facing down a blobby adversary with fat, snapping tentacles and rows of nasty teeth — the better to eat them with or just tear them limb from limb. The Guardians take whacks at the blob, jumping and thrashing around a patently digital environment that’s vaguely far-out and indeterminate.

Anatomy of a Scene | ‘Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2’

James gunn narrates a sequence from the film featuring zoe saldana and karen gillan..

These introductions are fairly chaotic, which is the usual blockbuster way. The point is to telegraph the movie you’re about to watch — the threats, fights and winks followed by more threats, fights and winks — as well as to reintroduce the crew members, their skills, traits and foibles. Alternately bulgy and sleek, hairy and shticky, they make for often-amusing company, even if this time Zoe Saldana, as Gamora, the green-skinned Amazon with grave daddy issues, feels more sidelined than before. One problem, it seems, is that Mr. Gunn is still holding off on developing the romance between her and Peter that was teased in the first movie, probably because he’s saving it for the next installment.

The larger problem, as it becomes progressively evident, is that this series lacks a resonant origin story, a myth, on which a world, multiple stories and a fan base can rest. The Guardians’ personal stories are continuing to emerge, and the meme that’s in circulation is family, which at times makes it feel as if the movie is taking cues from the “Fast and Furious” franchise. This explains the testy, at times violent and generally dreary exchanges between Gamora and her sister, Nebula (Karen Gillan), a bald badass itching to deliver payback for their rotten childhood. The performers look fierce as they slam around, squaring jaws and giving good side-eye, but it just feels like narrative filler.

For the most part, Mr. Gunn puts much of his storytelling energy into filling in Quill’s origins, after having already dispatched Mom in the first movie. This doesn’t sound promising and isn’t, alas, despite the good will that Kurt Russell brings to the part of Quill’s father, Ego. At one point, Mr. Russell, or some version of him, assays the role with a weird, disrupting digital face-lift that’s meant to suggest the young Ego, but really only makes you contemplate whether this Benjamin Button-style age-reversing is going to become an increasingly standard (and creepy) industry practice. It’s a distraction that shows a filmmaker making a bad decision mostly, it seems, because he can afford to.

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‘Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2’ Review: Marvel Space Opera’s Sequel Is a Blast

By Peter Travers

Peter Travers

Let’s face it: No one gave half a damn about Guardians of the Galaxy before the bastard child of the Marvel Cinematic Universe hit the multiplex in 2014. Then we all effing loved it. So what if the comic book, created in 1969, felt like Avengers -lite on the page; on screen, it achieved a near-perfect comic lift-off, thanks to cowriter-director James Gunn throwing out the rulebook invented to protect major Hollywood investments and just letting the craziness rip. You could see that anarchic spirit in the now-iconic image of Chris Pratt , in his breakthrough performance as wannabe Star Lord Peter Quill, busting dance moves in space to an Awesome Mixtape of 1970’s pop tunes. (It was left to him by his dying mom; we’ll get to his dad in a second.) GotG scored a worldwide box-office jackpot of $773 million by showing us how throwaway charm and runaway silliness could be just the antidote to the usual Hollywood formula. There had to be a sequel.

Be careful what you wish for. Guardians of the Galaxy, Vol. 2 can’t match the sneak-attack surprise of its predecessor. You can only do that once. The good news, however, is that the followup, while taking on some CGI bloat and sequel slickness, hasn’t lost its love for inspired lunacy. Hanging with Quill and his mercenary space misfits is still everything you’d want in a wild summer ride.

Besides Pratt, a virtuoso at lacing hilarity with heart, Zoe Saldana is back as Gamora, the green-skinned assassin who keeps cock-blocking Quill’s advances. And there’s wrestling champ Dave Bautista, a hoot as the hulking, tattooed and perpetually pissed-off Drax the Destroyer. But the MVPs in Guardians 2 are still the in-house computerized scene-stealers. I’m talking about Rocket, the gun-slinging, wiseass raccoon voiced by Bradley Cooper ; and Baby Groot, a cute chip of tree bark delicately spoken by Vin Diesel who, whatever the situation, squeaks out the same three words: “I am Groot.” It’s enough for comic immortality.

The plot? The first one involved stealing a magic orb from an evil dude intent on galactic genocide. This time, Quinn and his crew on the spaceship Milano are running from a gold-plated race of aliens who call themselves the Sovereign. Hired to protect the batteries that keep these extraterrestrials running, the Guardians incur the wrath of High Priestess Ayesha (Elizabeth Debicki) when Rocket steals a few batteries for himself. A doozy of a space battle ensues, resulting in the ship crashing on the forest planet Berhart. This new world is the kingdom of Ego, the Living Planet (the reliably terrific Kurt Russell), an astral being who happens to be – are you ready? – Quinn’s daddy dearest. Remember in The Empire Strikes Back when Vader told Luke, ” I am your father”? It’s just like that.

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I won’t journey further into spoiler territory, except to say that family ties are ingrained in this script’s DNA. Not just Quinn and Ego, but Star Lord and his surrogate father, the blue-skinned Yondu (Michael Rooker, most excellent), the Ravager leader who first kidnapped Quinn as a child and then enslaved the kid in the his bounty-hunting racket. Yondu is so soft on his adopted/abducted offspring that his former ally – called Taserface (Chris Sullivan, Toby on This Is Us ) and teased mightily for it – organizes a mutiny. It also turns out that Gamora has a sister, Nebula (Karen Gillan), a psycho sibling that our heroine yearns to bring to justice. And what of Mantis (Pom Klementieff), the hottie antennaed alien Ego keeps around for company? She can read feelings in others; why is the lady suddenly crushing so hard on Drax? And what is Sylvester Stallone doing sniffing around on the fringes?

I’m pleased to report that Gunn pulls back before Guardians 2 morphs into all-out Greek tragedy. Still, it’s no secret that everyone in this nutjob space opera is mysteriously linked, which makes Fleetwood Mac’s “The Chain,” a natural fit for the killer soundtrack. Quinn makes good use of another cassette tape from his mom – named, of course, Awesome Mix Vol. 2 – that’s packed with cheesy tunes with disturbing subtexts. You’ll never hear ELO’s “Mr. Blue Sky” in the same way again.

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Or you can banish all the psychological probing and just roll with the nonstop fun and games. Gunn never runs out of fresh funny business for the Guardians. There are monsters to vanquish (Abilisk, yikes!), hilarious bits to invent (Groot and the Death Button!), insults to fire off (Rocket to Quinn: “Hope daddy isn’t as much of a dick as you are, orphan boy”), and more sequels to set up (look for Avengers: Infinity War next year). Remarkably, Guardians of the Galaxy, Vol. 2 still has the loosey-goosey feel of a rogue epic that the kids made when the grown-ups weren’t watching. Only a turd blossom could resist it.

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Angela Watercutter

Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2 Is Great—But All Too Familiar

If there’s one truism in comic-book moviemaking, it’s that giant superhero team-ups are almost always sure-fire hits. (And then there's *Fantastic Four; *there are some things reshoots and wigs just can’t cover up.) What’s less true is that superhero team-up sequels will have the same good fortune. All the right ingredients can be there—good cast, same director, bomb-ass CGI—and for whatever reason, the movie just doesn’t ascend as high as its predecessor. Such is the case with Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2 .

Like any good mixtape, James Gunn serves up a steady vibe, and it's a familiar one to fans of 2014's GOTG . Peter Quill/Star-Lord (Chris Pratt) still has his cock-of-the-Walkman swagger; Gamora (Zoe Saldana) continues to kick ass and thwart Quill's advances; Drax (Dave Bautista) has perfected being the living embodiment of Big Dumb Fun; and Rocket (voiced by Bradley Cooper) managed to maintain a bottomless reserve of dickish rejoinders. The only perceptible difference this time around comes courtesy of Groot—well, Baby Groot, a marble-eyed CGI bundle of emotional manipulation who has been raking in the dawwwws since the first trailer dropped.

But as long as we're talking mixtapes, think back to the first mixtape your crush gave you. You remember the songs, the sequence, even the smell of the air wherever you listened to it. Now, quick: What was on the second mixtape they made you? You remember some of it, but chances are you're having a tougher time remember if the opening track was by Steely Dan or Stevie Nicks. Or, y'know, any non-1978 equivalent. That doesn’t mean Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2 isn’t fun. If you like superhero flirting, bonding, and not-too-graphic dick jokes, it’s a hoot. There might even be a tearjerker or two. But if you’re hoping for something radically different from the first Guardians , you might be disappointed.

By Christopher Null

By Mark Harris

By Caroline Haskins

By Dmitri Alperovitch

There is, of course, one new prominent member to the Guardians supergroup this time around—and he’s the one that causes all the drama and makes it all worth it. As Ego, Kurt Russell plays the role of Living Planet/Father of Star-Lord perfectly. The first film, you’ll remember, focused a lot on Quill not knowing who his father was and simultaneously finding a new family in his fellow Guardians. Side B is Quill meeting Ego, who claims to be his dad and also, by his mere presence, threatens to break up that family in its infancy. And Russell, being the most Kurt Russell he can be, walks the line between Charmer and Do We Trust Him? with ease. In fact, he brings more multi-dimensionality to Vol. 2 than anyone else (to wit: his analysis of the Looking Glass song “Brandy (You’re a Fine Girl)”).

Also new to the galaxy is Ayesha (Elizabeth Debicki), the leader of a superior(-acting) gold-skinned group known as the Sovereigns, who are out to get the Guardians for stealing some of their highly-valuable batteries. It’s her quest for retribution that ultimately brings back fan-favorite Yondu (Michael Rooker), whom she sends after the Guardians and who loses favor with his fellow Ravagers for seemingly going soft on Star-Lord, and leads to the movie’s final showdown. (Speaking of which, see this movie in 3-D, if you can, it’s really quite beautiful.) Ayesha will, no doubt, also play a role in the larger Marvel Cinematic Universe, so keep an eye on what she does.

All of this adds up to a movie that is, no doubt, a joy. The humor—even if it, like Drax’s laughter, feels forced—is there. So is the camaraderie, and the stunning visuals, and the super-fun soundtrack. There’s no reason to think that fans of the last Guardians movie, and Marvel movies in general, won’t love it. It just might feel like the second time around the same dancefloor. Towards the end of Vol. 2 someone (we won’t spoil who) gives Star-Lord a “new” music device. The joke is that it’s a Zune. After marveling that it can hold “ 300 songs ?!” he scrolls through the menu and, like he did at the end of the last movie, fires up a track. It’s Cat Stevens’ “Father and Son.” Peter Quill—like Marvel, like James Gunn, like this movie itself—knows how to shut up and play the hits.

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Jennifer M. Wood

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10 movie characters who looked totally different in the sequel, the killer images reveal first look at john woo's remake of his own 1989 action thriller, guardians of the galaxy vol. 2 doubles-down on everything that audiences loved about its predecessor, to still-entertaining but diminished returns..

Shortly after making a name for themselves in the year 2014, the Guardians of the Galaxy - Peter Jason Quill aka. Star-Lord (Chris Pratt), Gamora (Zoe Saldana), Drax the Destroyer (Dave Bautista), Rocket Raccoon (Bradley Cooper) and now-Baby Groot (Vin Diesel) - are officially in the hero business and have become famous across countless planets for their galaxy-saving deeds. Old habits die hard, however, and so the Guardians find out during a mission in which they are hired by a genetically-engineered race of super-beings known as the Sovereigns, led by one Ayesha (Elizabeth Debicki), to protect their highly-valuable batteries in exchange for a recently-captured Nebula (Karen Gillan). One thing leads to another and the Guardians soon find themselves on the run from the Sovereigns, for some not-so-heroic behavior.

The Guardians are on the verge of being destroyed by the Sovereigns' drone fleet when, out of nowhere, they are rescued by a mysterious being who calls himself Ego (Kurt Russell)... and who claims to be Peter's long-lost father. Peter, Gamora and Drax in turn agree to accompany Ego and his associate, the empath Mantis (Pom Klementieff) to Ego's planet, while Rocket and Baby Groot remain behind to repair their heavily-damaged ship. Unfortunately for the Guardians, more trouble comes looking for them when the Sovereigns hire Peter's old boss Yondu (Michael Rooker) and his gang of Ravagers to hunt down and capture the "biggest a-holes in the galaxy."

Written and directed by James Gunn, Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2  is a sequel that fills in story gaps and paints certain plot points/characters from Gunn's first Guardians  movie in a different light, more than it progresses the franchise's overarching narrative forward. Vol. 2 similarly continues to expand the cosmic side of the Marvel Cinematic Universe, putting the pieces into place for more exciting developments (and, of course, fan-favorite comic book characters) to come, without delivering an equally satisfying standalone MCU film, in the process. In these respects, the second Guardians film is a solid-if-standard MCU followup more along the lines of Avengers: Age of Ultron , rather than one that sets a new benchmark a la  Captain America: The Winter Soldier . Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2 doubles-down on everything that audiences loved about its predecessor, to still-entertaining but diminished returns.

Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2 quickly re-establishes the now familiar, but still enjoyable dynamics between the core Guardians team members (Star-Lord, Gamora, Drax, Rocket and Groot), before jumping right into the first big action sequence of the film. The banter between the Guardians and revisiting of jokes/gags from the first movie (for example, once again a character dances to an "Awesome Mix" song - this time from Vol. 2 - during the opening credits) isn't as fresh here and come off more as attempts to deliver what is now expected from the  Guardians "brand", as opposed to offering something more inventive. This carries over to the majority of the movie's content, when it comes to the humor and interactions between characters: there's plenty in the way of fun spectacle and funny/touching moments to be had here, but the overt attempts to recapture the "lightning in a bottle" elements from the first Guardians movie, tend to fall flat.

On the other hand, from a directorial perspective, the experience that Gunn gained making  Guardians of the Galaxy  (his big-budget feature helming debut) serves him well here. This in turn gives him and his many artistic collaborators the confidence to assemble together multiple sequences and set pieces here that are more sophisticated in design than those from the original Guardians movie. Guardians 2 thus offers much in the way of delightfully psychedelic colors and clever visual comedy, as well as sharp cinematography that plays well in both 3D and IMAX (though of those two viewing formats, IMAX is the one that is recommended more for an enhanced theatergoing experience, in this case). The MCU's cosmos has never looked  more gorgeous and felt more three-dimensional than it does during  Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2 , using a nice blend of candy-colored practical sets and CGI to bring its intergalactic environments to life - not to mention, great makeup/prosthetics to create its various weird alien players.

The second Guardians of the Galaxy movie also leans heavily on the series' main characters and the actors behind them - all of whom are as charismatic and engaging as ever here - to keep its somewhat-disjointed narrative moving along. Whereas the original  Guardians  film has a tightly constructed three-act plot structure (one that was co-written by Nicole Perlman),  Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2  is more flimsy in design and doesn't weave its story threads together in the same tidy fashion (suggesting Perlman might have been more responsible for that element of the first Guardians than Gunn).  Vol. 2 brings to mind Age of Ultron again in this sense, as both MCU movies examine their characters with greater depth and explore richer themes - in the case of Vol. 2 , the dangers of hero worship and how personal trauma can blind people to the good things they have in their lives - but get tripped up a bit, in their efforts to juggle their MCU-building responsibilities while delivering "bigger and better" versions of their predecessors.

Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2 focuses on resolving Star-Lord, Gamora and Nebula's respective lingering "daddy issues" from the first Guardians of the  Galaxy  movie, setting the stage for them to enter more interesting character development territory in future MCU films. Yondu and Ego serve as flip sides of the coin in Peter's storyline here (both being father figures to Star-Lord), allowing for Yondu in particular to evolve into a more complicated character, and presenting an intriguing, personal journey for Vol. 2 's male protagonist to undergo. Meanwhile, Gamora and Nebula's relationship gets proper onscreen development time and attention in Vol. 2 , enriching both of "Thanos' daughters" in the process and providing the emotional foundation for the characters, which future MCU adventures can further build upon. As indicated before though, these elements work better in the context of weaving the larger MCU tapestry; less so taken on their own in the Guardians sequel.

Of the new character additions in Vol. 2 , Pom Klementieff's charmingly awkward Mantis is the biggest standout. The Guardians of the Galaxy sequel banks heavily on Drax being a source of humor (which, thanks to Dave Bautista's performance, mostly works), though his best interactions are with Mantis, who makes for a welcome addition to the core Guardians ensemble here. Ego, however, only really leaves an impression thanks to his unique abilities and the performance from Kurt Russell - whose casting here makes sense in multiple respects - and less so, with respect to how the (literally) larger than life extraterrestrial is written. Similarly, Elizabeth Debicki as the self-serious Ayesha and the Sovereigns (antagonists who are played mostly for Looney Tunes-style comedic effect) are less interesting in terms of the role they have in the movie and more important, when it comes to setting up the MCU's future... for better or worse.

There are also many  Marvel Easter Eggs crammed into  Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2 , ranging from important supporting players in the world of Marvel Comics and possibly in the MCU down the line (Sylvester Stallone's character being the most publicized example), to locations and aliens that only die-hard Marvel Comics fans will fully appreciate or even understand. Vol. 2 splits up the primary team of Guardians for most of its running time, in order to compensate for this and cover more story ground. The downside is, Rocket Raccoon and Baby Groot (who are both entertaining during their scenes here) go on journeys here that are somewhat-literally separate from their peers, making the movie as a whole feel less connected and missing some of the great cosmic superhero team dynamic that its predecessor was built around.

Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2 provides all the non-stop comedy and zany cosmic action that audiences now expect from the Guardians film franchise, but winds up being more of a sturdy connective bridge to bigger adventures in the future than a great chapter in the larger MCU saga, on its own. The sequel leans more on its soundtrack and colorful imagery as part of its efforts to recapture the sincere heart and crackling energy of its predecessor, but comes up short all the same. Bearing that in mind: so long as moviegoers go in anticipating a Marvel Studios film that provides more time with their favorite characters, but serves more to fill the gap between Guardians #1 and the next major MCU event - namely, the Guardians' appearance in Avengers: Infinity War  -  rather than stand alone, then Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2 should meet their expectations. And of course, don't leave until the end credits for the film are completely done rolling.

Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2  is now playing in U.S. theaters nationwide. It is 136 minutes long and is Rated PG-13 for sequences of sci-fi action and violence, language, and brief suggestive content.

Want to talk about the film without spoiling it for others? Head on over to our  Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2 Spoilers Discussion ! Read our explanation of Guardians of the Galaxy 2 's post-credits scenes , along with a deleted credits scene , as well as learn about the easter eggs and trivia sprinkled throughout the movie.

Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2

Set to the sonic backdrop of Awesome Mix 2, Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2 continues the adventures of Star-Lord, Gamora, Drax, Rocket, and Baby Groot as they traverse the outer reaches of the cosmos. The Guardians must fight to keep their newfound family together as they unravel the mystery of Peter Quill’s true parentage. Old foes become new allies and fan-favorite characters from the classic comics reappear.

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Guardians of the Galaxy 2 : Twice Is (Still) the Charm

While not quite living up to the original, the Marvel sequel is again carried by its superpowered cast and soundtrack.

Perhaps the finest, funniest moment in Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2 is the first action sequence. Or perhaps I should put quote marks around that: “action sequence.” Because for most of its duration, the action is strictly an afterthought. The titular supergroup has been enlisted to defeat a giant star-squid, and its smallest member, Baby Groot (the twig-like offshoot of last installment’s arboreal giant), is hooking up some equipment in the foreground as the fight commences behind him. What is Baby Groot fiddling with? Some kind of space cannon?

Of course not. It’s a sound system, and no sooner is it plugged in than the Electric Light Orchestra’s pop jingle “Mr. Blue Sky” bursts forth in all its giddy, meteorological splendor. As Baby Groot’s companions battle the tentacular horror in the background, we’re treated to the delightful spectacle of the mini-veggie juking his way through the opening credits. It is, in its way, the perfect deflation of the time-to-save-the-world-again bloat that has grown customary in the superhero genre, and a worthy successor to the loose, goofy vibe of the first Guardians : You guys deal with the Latest Threat to All Life over there; us, we’re going to hang here and groove to some oldies.

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Alas, the magic can’t quite last. (As even the song warns, Mr. Blue, you did it right, but soon comes Mr. Night… ) The Guardians sequel and latest installment in the Marvel Cinematic Universe certainly has its moments—quite a few in fact—but too often it finds itself weighted down by just the kind of portentous themes and overwrought drama the first film was so careful to avoid .

The movie opens in early-1980s Missouri, with a young man and woman frolicking to “Brandy” by Looking Glass. (Have I mentioned that the soundtrack is, as before, a signal pleasure?) The woman is Meredith Quill, soon-to-be-mother of Peter Quill, a.k.a. Starlord (Chris Pratt). And the man is Kurt Russell . Or rather, circa 1980s Kurt Russell, his face impressively de-aged by a combination of makeup and light CGI. Russell plays Ego, the mysterious figure who will in short order be revealed to be Peter Quill’s extraterrestrial dad. (The interstellar hookup with Peter’s mom gives a clever undercurrent to the choice of “Brandy”—a song about a woman who loves a seldom-seen sailor—but later on the movie goes and ruins it by pedantically explaining this thematic connection.)

Cut to the Guardians—Quill, Gamora (Zoe Saldana), Drax (Dave Bautista), Rocket (voiced by Bradley Cooper), and Baby Groot (voiced by Vin Diesel)—and their tussle with the star-squid, and “Mr. Blue Sky.” Following the mission, the group suffers an unfortunate misunderstanding with their clients, a race of golden, genetically perfected beings (led, appropriately enough, by the six-foot-two Elizabeth Debicki). Following a close-call escape, they run into Ego, and the plot begins in earnest.

It may seem a strange complaint, but one of the drawbacks of the sequel is that it has a plot at all. The original Guardians was a series of picaresque episodes loosely strung together by a Marvel McGuffin (one of the seemingly infinite supply of Infinity Stones) and an emphatically forgettable villain (Ronan the Accuser). The relaxed, haphazard structure perfectly suited the adventures of a gang that includes a talking raccoon and an ambulatory plant.

This time out, though, we’re offered meditations on fathers and sons (real and adopted: Michael Rooker’s Yondu, who raised Quill, is heavily featured) as well as on sisters (Karen Gillan’s Nebula makes a reappearance). There’s talk of grief and loss, the imminent threat of multiple planetary genocides (including good ol’ Earth), and a final revelation by Ego that is as distasteful as it is unnecessary.

Happily, this is all somewhat mediated by the cast, which is nearly as much fun as the last time out. Rocket the raccoon isn’t quite the same unanticipated pleasure, but Bautista’s literal-minded Drax is sharp enough even to overcome early lines as painful as “I have sensitive nipples” and “I have famously huge turds.” And Baby Groot is a nice reimagination of—and improvement over—his full-grown self. Pom Klementieff is a likable addition as an antenna’d empath named Mantis. But love him as I might, Kurt Russell is badly miscast, his customarily scruffy affect a poor fit for the godlike Ego.

There a few nice David Hasselhoff gags, and return cameos by Howard the Duck and Cosmo the Spacedog. Multiple new characters are briefly introduced from the “Marvel Cosmic Universe” (Marvel Studios evidently having decided that one universe is no longer enough), including one played by Sly Stallone. (Alas, he and Russell never appear onscreen together to catch up on what they’ve been up to since Tango & Cash .) And director James Gunn keeps things moving with the aid of the aforementioned soundtrack, which also features “My Sweet Lord,” “Bring It On Home to Me,” and fight sequences scored, improbably, to both “Come a Little Bit Closer” and “ The Chain .”

It’s all enough to make one forgive—if not quite forget—the movie’s ponderous midsection and all its familial melodramas. This is especially true near the end, when Quill, whose beloved Walkman has been destroyed, hits play on his new state-of-the-art Zune , and the chords of Cat Stevens’s “Father and Son” spring to life. Quill shares an earbud with Baby Groot, we watch the latter’s curiosity turn into wonder, and all is right in the universe again.

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• DVD & Streaming

Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2

• Action/Adventure , Comedy , Drama , Sci-Fi/Fantasy

Content Caution

In Theaters

• May 5, 2017
• Chris Pratt as Peter Quill/Star-Lord; Zoe Saldana as Gamora; Dave Bautista as Drax; Vin Diesel as Baby Groot (voice); Bradley Cooper as Rocket (voice); Michael Rooker as Yondu; Kurt Russell as Ego; Karen Gillan as Nebula; Pom Klementieff as Mantis; Elizabeth Debicki as Ayesha; Chris Sullivan as Taserface; Sean Gunn as Kraglin

Home Release Date

• August 22, 2017

Distributor

Movie review.

The universe is mostly empty. Physicists tell us that just 4% of it is made of normal matter—molecules, dust, planets, stars, galaxies. And while they debate on what other strange, undetectable forces the universe might hold, there’s little question what it looks like to us: darkness. Cold. Absence.

Yep, it’s rare to find something warm and tangible in this infinite vacuum of ours. And when we do, it’s good to hold it close.

The Guardians of the Galaxy know that as well as anyone. They’ve spent a lot of time hopping through this ol’ universe. And each of them, in their own way, has felt its empty ache.

Missouri native Peter Quill (aka Star-Lord) lost his mother and never knew his father; he was raised, essentially, by space pirates. Gamora, the green warrior, at least knew her father; but alas, the guy’s kind of a jerk. A galactic supervillain, in fact. Blue muscleman Drax lost his family. Tree-like Groot might be the last of his whole race. The closest thing Rocket Raccoon has to a biological family might be a Pyrex petri dish.

They came together by accident and (despite their frequent protests to the contrary) are glad they did. Hey, what good is saving the galaxy if you don’t have someone to save it with, right?

But hold the galactic phone there, partner. Seems this makeshift family is getting some company.

The Guardians are soon called upon to defeat an interdimensional beastie at the behest of a race known as The Sovereign. Part of their payment? Gamora’s semi-cyborg sister, Nebula, whom the Guardians want to turn in for the substantial bounty on her head.

But when Rocket burgles a boatload of expensive batteries from the rather touchy Sovereign, the planet’s leader hires Yandu—the blue-skinned pirate who kidnapped a young Peter decades ago and essentially raised the boy—to haul the Guardians back to face their crimes.

And if that wasn’t enough to make for a super-awkward family reunion, in comes Ego, a turbo-powered galactic Celestial who claims to be Peter Quill’s father. Oh, and in addition to looking a bit like Kurt Russell, he simultaneously serves as his very own planet. Yep, in this case, the pull toward family is truly gravitational.

Ego knows he’s been a bit of an absentee dad all these years, but he’d like to make it up to Peter by taking him back home with himself, teaching him all he knows.

It’s a tempting offer. I mean, not many guys can say their dads have their very own time zones. But now that Peter’s found his father, what does it mean for his other family—the family that bonded over heroism, wisecracks and classic rock?

The universe can indeed be a cold, empty void. When you find someone to fill that void, it’s hard to let go.

Positive Elements

Hey, this motley band of misfits ain’t called Guardians of the Galaxy on a whim. They do a lot of, um, guardianing. Ing. They’re not only willing to put their lives on the line for each other (which they do regularly), but for the myriad beings who call the Milky Way home.

But the positive themes in play here go deeper than mere derring-do. Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2 is very much a family movie—that is, a movie about family. It asks us just what a family really is and uncovers some heartening, and perhaps even surprising, answers.

Take a look at the pirate Yondu, for instance. Now, the guy’s no role model, that’s for sure. But on the other hand, his blue skin doesn’t cover a pitch-black heart. Sure, Yondu essentially kidnapped Peter and turned him into a pirate: Why? Peter was small, we’re told. He could get into places other folks couldn’t. “Good for thievin’,” Yondu says. But as Vol. 2 unfolds, we realize that Yondu’s unsympathetic explanations hide genuine affection for the boy. He did more than turn Peter into a pirate: He raised him and taught him how to be a man (albeit imperfectly). He and Peter both come to a belated understanding of how much each means to the other.

Nebula’s also not the wholly evil person we might’ve thought she was. All the hate and anger she holds inside—much of it directed at her sister, Gamora—was the result of a forced sibling rivalry orchestrated by their father. “You wanted to win,” she tells Gamora. “I just wanted a sister.”

Spiritual Elements

Peter asks Ego whether he’s a god. “Small ‘g’, son,” Ego says. But he does indeed boast the sorts of powers that Christians reserve for our “big G” God, such as creation. He shares some commonality with the Demiurge in Gnosticism—a creator who, feeling himself alone in the universe, decides to start building. In Ego’s case, he fashions a planet from himself. And then, in an effort to get to know the rest of the universe a bit better, he fashions himself into a human being, too—down to the last detail.

Sexual Content

“Do you have a penis?” Drax asks Ego, leading to much discomfort for Peter. Ego says that he does. His relationship with Peter’s mother led, of course, to Peter himself. We learn that Ego had intimate relationships with plenty of other beings throughout the galaxy, as well. (We see virtual statues of a young, human Ego embracing a variety of species.)

Yondu and others visit a planetary brothel staffed by robots. Yondu is shown hitching up his pants, while others lounge around with their scantily clad synthetic lovers. Some other outfits can be a bit revealing, as well. Peter takes off his shirt a bit gratuitously, and Drax, of course, spends the entire movie shirtless.

Ego’s only apparent companion is Mantis, an antennae-sporting empath who can detect someone’s emotions via physical contact. She touches Peter and announces (much to Peter’s embarrassment) that he feels romantic, “sexual” love for Gamora. Though she does not express her own feelings toward Peter, the two dance, touch hands and eventually hug each other. Peter compares their relationship to that of Sam and Diane on NBC’s 1980s sitcom Cheers : Both like each other but can’t say so, because if they did the ratings would fall.

Whatever lurks between the two, though, does not stop Peter from flirting with Ayesha, a leader of the Sovereign. While their race is essentially created via genetically pure scientific know-how now, she suggests she’d be open to spending time with Peter and engage in more “primitive” mating practices. Peter says he’d be open to that.

Drax says that his now-dead wife “would make my nether-regions engorge.” In contrast, he tells Mantis that she’s “hideous.” He gags (or pantomimes gagging) when he imagines being physical with her. (But he may simply be hiding his true feelings.) There’s also a reference to men thinking with what’s “between your legs.”

Violent Content

Dozens of people are skewered by Yondu’s whistle-driven arrow: We see the rod dart through many a body, apparently cauterizing the mortal wound as it passes through (thus minimizing any blood). Several more die in the cold vacuum of space; we see a couple of victims close up as they expire from exposure and/or asphyxiation. Others string out behind a spaceship, their lifeless corpses floating grimly in the void. Still others tumble (or are yanked) from high bridges. A cave is filled with the bones of seemingly hundreds of innocent victims. “They didn’t feel a thing,” their killer says.

The Guardians fight a massive, toothy beastie, pummeling its tough skin with laser blasts. The skin’s too tough to punch through, so Drax decides to leap into the thing’s mouth and try to slice his way out from the inside. (Peter belatedly points out that the skin’s thickness doesn’t really differ, no matter where you slice it from; but we still see Drax in the creature’s innards, battering away at the thing’s flesh.) Gamora eventually finds a small cut in the creature’s skin and makes it larger, cutting the creature open and unleashing a tsunami of green goo (and a celebratory Drax).

Several people are shocked in the head, rendering them unconscious. (We see the electricity course through them, revealing their skeletal structure.) Others are technologically bounced into the air and left to fall, painfully, to the ground below. Rocket physically tears and scratches at a few would-be assailants, knocking them out. Someone is repeatedly skewered by what seem to be bands of energy. Others are wrapped up in these same energy tentacles. Some people are nearly buried alive. Gamora and Nebula fight—first with lasers (crashing a ship in the process), and later with their fists and feet. One nearly strangles the other and threatens to stab her face with a knife. Someone is seriously burned in an exploding spaceship.

Drax gets bounced through a forest rather roughly. People are hit and smacked and pounded. Groot finds a severed toe. A massive explosion proves very destructive. Gigantic blobs consume parts of Earth and other planets.

Crude or Profane Language

Groot still says nothing beyond “I am Groot.” But Rocket can interpret for the twig-sized Guardian, and he interprets one of Groot’s missives as “‘We are freakin’ Guardians of the Galaxy—only he didn’t say ‘freakin’.'” Elsewhere, we hear about four s-words and a smattering of other profanities, including “a–,” “d–n,” “h—,” “p-ss” and “d–k.” God’s name is misused four times. “Douchebag” is used as a demeaning epithet, too.

Drug and Alcohol Content

Groot is doused with bottles of what I assume are alcoholic beverages. Someone recalls being drunk.

Other Negative Elements

Rocket steals a bunch of batteries from a planet—a bad move that he, and everyone around him, later regrets. There’s some talk about Rocket planting feces into Peter’s bed.

Ego urinates. Poor Groot is mocked mercilessly by pirates. Groot—a toddler by Grootish standards—throws tantrums and sometimes hits his Guardian partners. He also beats up creatures whom he thinks looked at him funny.

We hear some talk about Drax’s “sensitive nipples.” Someone squashes and eats a spider. Groot tries to eat a fly. Groot tosses his metaphorical cookies during a long, fast journey. There’s a reference to a “scrotum hat.”

When the first Guardians of the Galaxy blasted into theaters in 2014, it was a surprise revelation. It came out in late July—a certain sign that producers didn’t expect much from the movie—and it featured a bevy of second-tier stars playing almost unheard-of Marvel characters.

Three years, a Chris Pratt supernova and three-quarters of a billion dollars later, Vol. 2 won’t sneak up on anyone. The movie’ll make a mint, and it’s a known quantity, for better or worse.

Just that familiarity takes some bloom off this frenetic sci-fi rose. The jokes, while just as frequent, don’t have quite the same impact. The action, though duly unhinged, feels like an extension of what we’ve seen before. Everything feels like it’s just a wee bit more than what we saw in 2014, but its impact is just a wee bit less .

The film’s problematic content is also incrementally worse, but not gratuitously so. The body count is huge, but the action is strictly by the comic book: a largely bloodless, painless excursion in fantastic excess. The sensual content and asides we see and hear are a skosh stronger. Language? Vol. 2 increases the s-word count from three to four.

So whether you saw or avoided the original Guardians , that choice will likely inform what you do with Vol. 2 , because this sequel flies in the same content universe.

But in the midst of that problematic starscape, strong messages of family also emerge. If there is a surprise to be found here, it’s in the emotional impact of the story, with moments of true poignancy lodged between the laser blasts and laughs. “We’re family,” Drax says. “We leave no one behind.”

And in the end, it suggests that the universe need not be so cold and empty after all.

Paul Asay has been part of the Plugged In staff since 2007, watching and reviewing roughly 15 quintillion movies and television shows. He’s written for a number of other publications, too, including Time, The Washington Post and Christianity Today. The author of several books, Paul loves to find spirituality in unexpected places, including popular entertainment, and he loves all things superhero. His vices include James Bond films, Mountain Dew and terrible B-grade movies. He’s married, has two children and a neurotic dog, runs marathons on occasion and hopes to someday own his own tuxedo. Feel free to follow him on Twitter @AsayPaul.

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Kinds of Kindness Review: All Star Cast Delivers a Film That is Equally Absurd and Disturbing

The exorcism review: russell crowe nearly saves a meta horrorshow, gladiator 2 first footage teases some of the 'biggest action sequences ever put on film'.

The first thing almost anyone will ask someone who has seen a new movie sequel, superhero or otherwise: "Is it better than the first?" By and large, it's an impossible question to answer, unless you're so in tuned with this person's taste that you feel comfortable enough in answering on their behalf. But, also, straight up, the number of sequels that are actually "better" than their predecessors are incredibly few and far between. The exceptions, like The Dark Knight and Spider-Man 2 are far outnumbered by the likes of Fantastic Four: The Silver Surfer , Batman Returns and even the MCU is not immune, with Iron Man 2 , not to mention the countless non-superhero sequels that fall far short of their predecessors. While a vast majority of the early reactions to Guardians 2 were positive, most believed it wasn't better than the original, but I just have to disagree. I do in fact think Guardians 2 is better than its predecessor, because it presents a highly-complex story that delivers on every emotional level, while advancing these a-holes' stories and setting up a true family dynamic that is unparalleled in the Marvel Cinematic Universe.

Without giving anything away, I just have to get it out of the way that, after a brief yet important prologue, the movie truly kicks off with one of the best opening sequences I've seen in years. You've seen bits and pieces of it in the trailers, quite a bit of it, actually, but when it all comes together, it's truly just a wondrous sight to behold, while serving as another reminder of how brilliant writer-director James Gunn is at picking the absolute perfect songs for each scene, which he demonstrates constantly throughout this movie. I can't possibly divulge any actual details about the scene itself, but I know for me, every time I hear Electric Light Orchestra's "Mr. Blue Sky" after this movie, I'll think of that scene, in the same way I think of either Fight Club or Observe and Report every time I hear "Where's My Mind Again" by Pixies. I could be wrong, but it also seemed to be an homage of sorts to Fatboy Slim's music video for "Weapon of Choice," which famously showed off Christopher Walken's dance moves... but perhaps I've said too much already...

Given how much attention was paid to the identity of Star-Lord's father after Guardians of the Galaxy became a huge hit, many were quite shocked when James Gunn and his cast unveiled the first footage at Comic-Con last year, which confirmed that Kurt Russell's mysterious role was none other than Ego the Living Planet, who was in fact Peter Quill's father. James Gunn would later admit that all of the footage from the trailers were scenes that happened very early in the movie, which was quite accurate. We do see quite early on that the Guardians have been hired by the gold-skinned snobs known as The Sovereign, lead by Ayesha, played to arrogant perfection by Elizabeth Debicki, to take care of that massive squid monster thing that Drax (Dave Bautista) is seen leaping into in the trailers. While their mission was a success, Rocket (Bradley Cooper) screws it up by doing something stupid, which sends them on the run from the Sovereign's massive drone fleet, and then that's when stuff really starts getting interesting, weird, hilarious and tremendously endearing.

I honestly wasn't terribly surprised to hear the early reactions about the sequel falling just short of the sequel, but after finally watching it, I just don't see it at all. Like many Marvel fans, I was "let down" by Marvel sequels like Iron Man 2 and Avengers: Age of Ultron , but those movies had unenviable tasks ahead of them, following up the MCU's first ever movie, Iron Man , a surprise hit in its own right, and the MCU's biggest and most successful movie still to this day, The Avengers . This is just one man talking here, but both of those movies suffered from the stakes and the scope being elevated so much that it became detrimental to the story they were trying to tell. None of that happens in Guardians 2 , in what might be the MCU's most balanced movie to date, delving into character arcs, juggling a complex story while still delivering the action and humor fans have come to love from the original. The only thing I could think if that critics might be "let down" by, was there wasn't quite as much humor this time around, but the story didn't call for it, and as far as I'm concerned, the continued character development of each main character more than made up for less humor, even though the humor that was there, was spot on.

Perhaps because it's literally set in a different galaxy, perhaps because it has a director who is still an indie kid at heart, but Guardians 2 never punches above its weight class, with James Gunn skillfully balancing scope with in-depth character development with as much adept precision as he has for picking the perfect song to go with each scene. The entire soundtrack is simply epic on its own, but each song paired with each scene, hand-picked by James Gunn , is honestly masterful. If you don't "catch the feels" (or whatever you kids say now) when Fleetwood Mac's "The Chain" comes up, then check your pulse. Every one of the main Guardians gets a bigger and more in-depth arc, along with some wonderful insight into Yondu (Michael Rooker), including some truly insane scenes with his Yaka arrow and bonding with Rocket, much more on Gamora (Zoe Saldana) and Nebula's (Karen Gillan) sibling rivalry, even more scene-stealing brilliance from Dave Bautista's Drax and, oh yeah, Sylvester Stallone in a fantastic role, and four (out of five, apparently) post-credit scenes that present some intriguing possibilities for the future of the MCU's cosmic universe. Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2 is not only "better" than its predecessor, but it's also one of the rare Marvel sequels that doesn't suffer from bloating the scope so much that it overshadows the story.

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Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2 Turns the Charm of the Original Into More Marvel Bloat

The saddest thing about the second Guardians of the Galaxy movie, which carries the official title Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2 , is that it’s going to make a lot of people think they’re happy. “Hold on,” you say. “ Think they’re happy? If they think they’re happy, then they are happy.” Which is often true, but not always. I think I’m happy eating a Quarter Pounder with Cheese and a large fries. But a few minutes later, when my salt/sugar/fat high has dissipated into self-disgust, I realize that what I’ve paid for is mainly bloat. The ruling aesthetic of the Marvel universe is now bloat.

Which isn’t to say that the first Guardians wasn’t fun. By Marvel standards, it was a modest affair, a goofy break from the dark nights of the soul/tortures of the damned experienced by Captain America, Iron Man, the Hulk, et al. (Never mind the kiddie Macbeths and Oedipuses in the even more grandiose DC universe.) Chris Pratt’s Peter Quill, a.k.a. Star-Lord, was a likable screw-up; the wisecracking raccoon had some good comebacks; and there was a jolly, B-movie vibe that brought me back to the days of the old (admittedly terrible) Flash Gordon serial, as well as the first Star Wars movie and Joss Whedon’s much-missed Firefly . The Guardians might have been saving the galaxy but for once what was absent was the weight of the world.

This one is heavier, man. It has, Gods help us, a theme, not to mention a god — or demigod, the deistic hierarchy of the Marvel universe being opportunistically elastic. He is played by Kurt Russell and is first seen, in a prologue, as a computer-generated version of his smoother, younger self — an image that hovers eerily over the next two hours, the CGI recreations of Russell and of Peter Cushing and Carrie Fisher in Rogue One being far more disturbing in their real-world implications than the fictional destruction of planets and galaxies. Russell later shows up in his current human form as “Ego,” who claims to be the father of Peter Quill and to possess vast knowledge and powers that he wishes to bestow upon his long-lost son.

This is what passes for drama in Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2 : Why, think his fellow Guardians, does Peter need his real father when he already has a surrogate family? Will he abandon Gamora (Zoe Saldana), muscleman Drax (Dave Bautista), Rocket the raccoon (voiced by Bradley Cooper), and Baby Groot (voiced, in a manner of speaking, by Vin Diesel)? What of his unresolved relationship with his volatile adopted father, the corrupt “Ranger,” Yondu (Michael Rooker)? Reinforcing the idea that biological fatherhood might be the galaxy’s greatest source of instability is the B plot, in which Gamora and her artificially enhanced sister, Nebula (Karen Gillan), prepare for a final face-off. Nebula has never forgiven Gamora for allowing their draconian father to pit them against each other as girls. It’s practically a John Hughes movie up there in space: They’re all adolescents with crushed souls.

But it’s not the weighty emotions that drag Vol. 2 down. It’s the plot that chases its own tail and the cluttered visual palette. The labored first action scene features the Guardians fighting some sort of space squid while making jokes that don’t land. The director, James Gunn (who’s also the credited screenwriter), doesn’t seem to know his way around a storyboard: The sequence plays as if each team of computer artists worked in its own country. People and ships get zapped and stuff swirls around the screen — a near-constant visual and aural assault to compete with the smartphones attached to the target audience’s hands. When Rocket makes off with some sort of all-powerful bulb (it’s hard to keep track of the all-powerful orbs and weapons of galactic destruction in these movies) from a peculiar gold-hued race led by the beauteous Elizabeth Debicki, an armada of remotely piloted little ships shower the Guardians’ bigger, more ramshackle vessel with missiles. But there’s no suspense. It’s all just fodder.

Meanwhile, the ratio of laughs to one-liners is lower than in the first Guardians . Drax boasts of his “famously huge” turds. The raccoon, apart from a hilarious peroration on the lame nickname “Taser Face,” is an irritant. Moments of drama are regularly deflated — as in second-rate sitcoms — by lines like, “Excuse me, I gotta take a wiz.” You can almost hear the laugh track. What you hear instead are more cannibalized ‘70s hits, starting with one of my old guilty pleasures, Looking Glass’s “Brandy (You’re a Fine Girl).” Now when I hear it I’ll think of Kurt Russell’s spookily computer-generated cheeks. And how about the dread spinoffs that litter Marvel movies like Drax’s famous turds — here Sylvester Stallone as “Stakar Ogord,” who leads a band of rangers played by actors palpably salivating for a Marvel paycheck?

No, it’s not all disposable. Little Groot — either the seed or the reincarnation of Big Groot — has a scene in which he’s dispatched by two imprisoned characters to retrieve a weapon that’s built like a series of silent comedy gags. There’s also a gorgeous shot of the little fella pressed against the window of a spaceship, staring with childlike wonder at a receding planet. A scene in which Pratt’s Peter and Russell’s Ego play catch with a magical glowing orb does just what it’s supposed to do: evoke the simplest father-son ritual. Although the core Guardians bring little that’s new to the party, three actors are impressive. Debicki’s childlike tantrums are in wonderful contrast to her imperial elegance. Rooker becomes more and more affecting as a man swamped by melancholy over a misspent life. Best by far is Karen Gillan, whose Nebula is anything but a cloud of gas. She has a core. Tall and slender, her face divided into human and artificial parts denoted by shades of gray, blue, and purple, she has a still but seething presence. And there’s fun in the performance, too. She can sling a Mae West come-on and follow through with a Clint Eastwood rasp. And while her character softens, her demeanor stays hard and feral.

To be fair to Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2 , the designers have made an attempt to give it a loopy, handmade feel, a touch of Tim Burton. One ship is like a white melon with a giant eyeball. When some characters are in the throes of multiple gravitational leaps, their eyes distend like Tex Avery cartoon characters. There’s a cute little Empath (Pom Klementieff) with black pupils and limp antennae who recalls grade-Z women-on-Mars movies. But the vibe is corporate, and of the most depressing kind: It’s not enough that you’ve paid for this product. You have to sit through commercials for the next one and the next and the next. (There are four — count ‘em — teasers during the credits.) The problem isn’t that I think this is empty-calorie junk food. It’s that, on the evidence, Marvel does, too.

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Guardians of the Galaxy stars reunite in first trailer for new action movie

Brooklyn Nine-Nine 's Terry Crews also stars.

Based on Jay Bonansinga's 1997 novel of the same name, The Killer’s Game will focus on hitman Joe Flood, played by Bautista.

Flood authorises a hit on himself when he is told he has a terminal illness but then discovers that he was misdiagnosed.

The film follows him as he fends off an army of assassins who are trying to kill him.

Related: Marvel boss calls Dave Bautista "one of the best actors" in the MCU

The trailer opens with Sofia Boutella's ( Rebel Moon ) character asking Joe: "How did you end up here?"

With that, we’re given a glimpse into their relationship as well as Joe’s secret life as a hitman, until everything comes crashing down when he’s told that he only has three months to live.

The footage also features an on-screen reunion between Bautista and Klementieff - who played Drax the Destroyer and Mantis, respectively, in Marvel’s Guardians of the Galaxy trilogy - as Joe asks Klementieff’s vengeful villain to order a hit squad after him.

Related: Dave Bautista teams up with Samuel L Jackson for new movie

"I’ve thought about doing this for years," she says. "You killed my father. This way, I kill you and get paid."

Although Joe tries to call off the hit after his doctor informs him that his patient file was switched and he’s not actually dying, the assassins continue to pursue him and won’t stop until he’s put in the ground.

The Killer’s Game is directed by JJ Perry and also stars fellow Marvel Cinematic Universe actor Sir Ben Kingsley and Brooklyn Nine-Nine 's Terry Crews.

The Killer’s Game will arrive in cinemas on September 13.

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Freelance Reporter, Digital Spy After completing her joint honours degree in Journalism and English Literature at Cardiff University, Iona joined Digital Spy as a Content Production Intern in 2022. In that role, Iona wrote across both news and features, specialising in TV and movies. Following her internship, Iona now contributes to DS as a freelance reporter. 

 Iona has reported from the Black Adam red carpet, and interviewed celebrities ranging from Love Island stars to the cast of Disney's live-action The Little Mermaid .

.css-15yqwdi:before{top:0;width:100%;height:0.25rem;content:'';position:absolute;background-image:linear-gradient(to right,#51B3E0,#51B3E0 2.5rem,#E5ADAE 2.5rem,#E5ADAE 5rem,#E5E54F 5rem,#E5E54F 7.5rem,black 7.5rem,black);} Guardians of the Galaxy

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