Guardians of the Galaxy

This review is on Marvel's new film "Guardians of the Galaxy."  I would be surprised if any readers DON'T already know about this film, as the PR campaign for awareness was epic.


IMDB: http://www.imdb.com/title/tt2015381/

This film is about a lesser-known group of characters in Marvel comics from all the way back in 1969 when they first appeared in Marvel Super-Heroes.  They had later appearances in all sorts of different Marvel comics, and then finally getting their own comic in the 90's.

I had to look up writer/director James Gunn, who is apparently known for working on the Scooby Doo reboots, as well as 2004's Dawn of the Dead.

Gunn apparently really stepped up his game with GOTG, as the film as a whole is quite well done.
The characters have a stern/believable tension yet the comic relief isn't too cheesy and there were many times I laughed (LOL'd ?).  The story has enough depth ("don't give the bad guy the weapon!") without getting insanely complex ("a dream inside a dream inside a dream inside a.... ") and losing some of (a lot of?) the audience (though I personally loved Inception!).

I've already heard plenty of debate about whether Rocket (voiced by Bradley Cooper) or Drax (played by Dave Bautista) was the most "annoying" character.  It seems that the overly standoffish Rocket character was a bit difficult to handle (not to JarJar levels, but still...).  I found Drax's character to be a little boring, and some of the jokes about his intelligence vs muscle got old.  Mind you, these are relative nit-picky opinions and not detractors at all.  Chris Pratt as Peter Quill and Zoe Saldana as Gamora lead the cast with excellent acting, and really bringing the characters back-stories to life.  A few great cameos were quite welcome, and I especially liked Benicio Del Toro's character.  Oh, and some of the cool characters in the "collection!"

This film has all the ingredients of a high quality project -- the tragic lows, high speed action sequences, human flaws in a hero (which I love to see, ala Indiana Jones), a heroic ending, and villains that maintain their evil character at all times.  (That last one is a biggie for me)

The film is absolutely a computer-fabricated piece, though it shows well and I wasn't distracted by any visuals that looked too cartooney.  Because of this, everything is very "precise" -- almost a little too perfect -- and in some ways feels a lot like the Avengers film.  The colors are rich, and it feels like they were going for the JJ Abrams Star Trek feel, which is a little over-saturated in my opinion.

There was plenty of violence, but overall it was quite controlled for adult oriented topics including language and suggestive or blatant sexual imagery.  This is one you can take your kids to as long as you are ok with the violence and the kids don't have nightmares about talking Raccoons.

I give this film 4/5 tinned peaches.