“My sacred mission is to create the perfect society.”
The High Evolutionary(Chukwudi Iwuji)
Just another crackpot megalomaniac unfortunately in a position of power to try to establish a “counter earth.” Utopia didn’t work for the transcendentalists and myriad other movements, and it doesn’t work for The Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 3. It has been five years since Thanos snapped them out of life, now putting them as aliens to the suburban earth-like residents of the Utopian construct when Guardians return.
This new Guardians episode promises more of the same bombast, bombs, and banter as most other superhero adventures, with one exception:
A higher order of characterization, a pleasant emphasis on the relationships that matter, e.g., inebriated Peter Quill (Chris Pratt) and amnesiac Gamora (Zoe Saldana) or the anthropomorphic racoon, Rocket (Bradley Cooper voice), and his animal friends. Writer/director James Gunn has crafted a human-centered adventure where the object of the heroes is to remain together and enhance their relationships, albeit at 2 and ½ hours that include some banal banter and beaucoup bombs.
Drax (Dave Bautista) is another example: despite his world wrestling physique and penchant for violence, he evolves into a do-gooder much less provoking fights that satisfy his natural persona and more to a gradual change into almost a pacifist. At the opposite end is the High Evolutionary, who, besides a load of overacting, gravitates with lofty human-perfecting goals more toward Adolph Hitler and less toward Mother Teresa.
Gunn can’t let go of the formula, however, when it seems every other scene is larded with missiles and fisticuffs in the heroes’ quest for peace in the galaxy and survival for Rocket.
Quill adds a modicum of variety to Pratt’s eternal do-gooder persona. Gamora’s joining the Ravagers, headed by Sylvester Stallone's Stakar Ogord ( Sly always watchable), lends a bit of bad-girl cachet to her otherwise better-than-thou persona. Contrasting these limp plot enhancers are the harrowing scenes of animal cruelty as the plot pivots to Rocket’s early imprisonment with other captured animals for experimentation in High-Revolutionary’s dungeons.
Easter eggs are there but not as bountiful as before, making Vol.3 more accessible to newbie audiences. These amusement-park like riders probably don’t need to know what went before as they will be titillated by the Star-Wars-like bounty of eccentric side characters, some actually developed .
Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 3 is heavier than usual in the family-and-friendship-save lives category, but that’s not a bad thing. It is a theme of most super-heroes and always superior to a getting-rich or power-hungry motif, which Rocket succinctly characterizes about High Evolutionary:
“He didn’t want to make things perfect, he just hated things the way they are.”
Guardians of the Galaxy vol 3
Director: James Gunn (Guardians of the Galaxy)
Screenplay: Gunn
Cast: Chris Pratt ( Jurassic Park), Zoe Saldand (Avatar)
Run Time: 2h 30 m
Rating: PG 13
John DeSando, a Los Angeles Press Club first-place winner for National Entertainment Journalism, hosts NPR’s It’s Movie Time and hosts Cinema Classics as well as podcasts Back Talk and Double Take out of WCBE 90.5 FM. Contact him at JohnDeSando52@gmail.com
