‘Guardians of the Galaxy 3’ creates connection, but lacks the freshness of the first films

When Guardians of the Galaxy was confirmed by marvel studios, many people turned up their noses: they thought that the characters were too exotic for the cinemas and that people would not buy the idea of ​​​​a team formed by Chris Pratt, a raccoon, a tree that barely speaks and a green woman. Those who did not believe in the potential of the Guardians, however, were wrong: the first film made US$ 770 million at the box office, the second surpassed US$ 860 million and, on Thursday, the 4th, another film in the saga hits theaters .

This time, however, everything indicates that it is to say goodbye. After two profitable films, and a Christmas special, the characters are approaching retirement. After all, they are already part of the old Marvel, which stayed in the past with Iron Man and the like, and will enter the wheel of renovations. Publicly, Dave Bautista (Drax), Zoe Saldana (Gamora) and Karen Gillan (Nebula) have already said that they do not intend to return to their characters – Bautista, by the way, even told the magazine QA that not reprising Drax is, after all, a relief.

Plus there’s the whole story involving James Gunn, the director, screenwriter and chief creative mind behind the entire conception of Guardians on the big screen. Between the second and third films, the filmmaker was fired by Marvel Studios after Twitter users dug up some problematic tweets from Gunn. Marvel thought it was the end of the line. However, the cast revolted and most of the actors said they would not return to their roles without the director. Marvel hired him for the film, but in the meantime, Gunn had already been co-opted by “competitor” DC to command the new cinematic universe.

Interlude

Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 3 It is thus a kind of interlude between Suicide squad, DC’s first work with Gunn’s signature, and this new phase of the filmmaker, commanding weighty projects from Warner Bros. Discovery and pioneering new heroes.

Interestingly, though, this farewell to the Guardians doesn’t focus on Quill, the leader of the group played by Chris Pratt, but on Rocket Racoon (a talking raccoon, with voice work by Bradley Cooper). It is he who concentrates the entire story around him when the film begins with Adam Warlock (Will Poulter), a powerful Marvel character, going after the talking animal. Rocket is injured and then the group will need to return to the raccoon’s origins to save him – and with that, breaking, the public finally knows Rocket’s story.

It is, therefore, a very emotional film. From this union around the injured character, Gunn works on elements of the script to talk about friendship, family and the importance of having people who are always by his side. In addition to a reasonable amount of minutes of the feature film, with its 2h30, which is dedicated to basically creating a dystopia about laboratory tests that mistreat animals. It’s full circle for James Gunn’s vision for these characters, as he tells the magazine. collider.

“It was really important for me to tell that story, that’s what drove me to write the first movie,” he said. “I had this vision of this really horrible past for this little animal that was taken, an innocent little creature, and turned into something that it shouldn’t be, torn apart and put back together again. His life was painful and he was incredibly alone because there’s nothing else like him. And so this Rocket idea was there from the beginning.”

The film is far from perfect, or even the best of the trilogy – it’s a job to do for many of those involved, most notably Gunn, Bautista and Saldana, who are tired of their roles. This ends up being reflected in the lack of heart in many creative decisions, such as the songs on the soundtrack – almost none of them stand out – and even in the interactions on the scene, without that freshness of the two other productions and other Marvel Studios films.

new heroes

Even so, Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 3 can create connection. Not only because it is one of the last remnants of this Marvel that is being left behind, giving way to new heroes, but also because of the lack of commitment to making the heroes more than they are. No multiverse, no complicated stuff. They are characters on the sidelines, as they always have been, and they conquer precisely because of that. They are simple, strange and fun.

And it can make you cry – at the press session, it was easy to see a few people wiping away tears and sniffling. But Gunn warns: It’s not always tears of sadness. “It depends on how easily you cry. I know there are a lot of people crying at screenings,” he explained to Collider. “But it’s not all sad tears, there’s a lot of tears of joy. There’s a lot of joy in the film. Everyone talks about the emotion, and it’s emotional, but there’s a lot of joy.”