Directed by James Gunn, Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 3 follows our beloved band of cosmic misfits who are settling into life on Knowhere. But it isn’t long before their lives are upended by the echoes of Rocket’s (Bradley Cooper) turbulent past. Peter Quill (Chris Pratt), still reeling from the loss of Gamora (Zoe Saldana), must rally his team around him on a dangerous mission to save Rocket’s life, a mission that, if not completed successfully, could quite possibly lead to the end of the Guardians as we know them.
The rag-tag team has come a long way in the MCU, going from the galaxy’s biggest losers to the universe’s greatest heroes who have captured the hearts of many with their comedic charm and their emotionally compelling story arcs. But now it is time for them to face the music as James Gunn has crafted their biggest adventure yet.
This film serves as a swan song to the team’s story as well as serves as a final farewell for some of the beloved characters and the cast members that play them. This was easily my most anticipated film of the year as I have loved the Guardians and their story ever since the first film. Knowing that this film was going to be the concluding chapter for some of these characters I felt like I was going to be an absolute emotional wreck by the end of the film. And that’s exactly what happened because James Gunn delivered an absolutely beautiful final chapter of the Guardians story as well as another masterful comic book film to add to the history books.
It is a perfectly crafted action-packed journey that is full of fantastic performances, great depth, gorgeous visuals, hilarious laughs, massive heartbreak, and many other emotions that don’t stop coming once they start. It was everything I wanted it to be while also delivering numerous surprises that I absolutely loved and was totally all in for. I’m so happy that Gunn was able to tell the story he wanted to tell without being held back by any restrictions and was able to complete the story with his own found family of cast members who gave their all to this film.
Every single character was written and acted marvelously, with the cast delivering strongly on their respective performances as well as delivering what is likely some of their final performances in the entirety of the MCU. Chris Pratt once again amazingly delivers as Star-Lord, really leaning into the strong emotional sides of the character in many ways, showing the range of what he can do when given the right material. And even though he still has the fun comedic charm, it was great to see how much the character has truly evolved over the course of the MCU as a hero and as a person.
Zoe Saldana returns as the alternate version of Gamora who is very different from the one we had grown to love, yet she was still a magnificent character in this film that Zoe gives a kick-ass performance. Initially, I was unsure how I was going to feel about her given the death of the version before her, but similar to the alternate version of Loki I immediately fell in love with this one and her arc in this film; Gunn was able to make it all work. Zoe’s emotional range and her ability to be an absolutely aggressive force of nature on screen are put on full display here, very much leaning into the violent warrior persona of her comic counterpart.
Dave Bautista once again is an absolute blast as Drax, delivering all of the biggest laughs in the film as he usually does but also managing to deliver some epic moments of action and tender moments of heart that make the character such a blessing to have in the team. He’s more than a titled destroyer. He’s a crucial member of the family that everyone wants to have no matter what they might be like.
Pom Klementieff once again really shines as Mantis, serving as a compelling member of the team and delivering some very solid scenes of her own that delivered laughs and cheers.
Karen Gillan absolutely rocks in this film as Nebula in perhaps my favorite portrayal of her since Vol 2. Here she has more levity as she starts to heal psychologically following the death of Thanos, who was the source of her abuse and torment. She beautifully fulfills her arc going from a minor villain to a member of the Guardians.
Groot of course is Groot, voiced brilliantly again by Vin Diesel, but damn it did he have some seriously awesome moments in this film, being more of an absolute badass in comparison to all his other outings and you can’t help but love him.
But the true heart and core of this film is Bradley Cooper’s Rocket who delivers the most phenomenal and powerful performance of the character by far. With the film being largely centered around him, we get to see his tragic story explored in such dark and graphic detail that had me as an absolutely emotional mess, especially when we see all the things that had been done to him that make him the way is. I felt like my heart was being torn apart over and over every time we explored deeper into his past and it was so overwhelmingly emotional for me, mainly due to Cooper’s performance and the beautiful but brutal writing of his character by Gunn. He truly has cemented himself as one of my favorite characters in the entirety of the MCU.
There are a lot of fantastic supporting performances from returning faces and several new ones that get introduced. The two major highlights for me in the supporting cast were Maria Bakalova as Cosmo the Space Dog and Will Poulter as Adam Warlock. Both of them may not have had as much screen time compared to everyone else but they both were absolute stars because of their performances and the great scenes they deliver.
I was happy to see Adam Warlock get such a fun introduction and showcase how incredibly powerful of a character he is even when it is just scratching the surface. It’s made very clear that he has a much larger future ahead of him in the MCU and that this was just the start of his journey.
Then we come to our villain of the film, High Evolutionary, played by Chukwudi Iwuji, who may quite possibly be the most hateful and cruelest villain the MCU has ever had. High Evolutionary is a cosmic Dr. Frankenstein who specializes in creating hybrid creatures and seeks to forcibly enhance all living beings and worlds into a “perfect society” on a perfect utopia in his image. What he does to achieve this goal is absolutely horrifying and I have never loved to hate a villain with so much passion in the MCU as much as this guy.
Chukwudi Iwuji masterfully delivers a villain that has zero sympathetic qualities compared to past villains and has full-on traits of narcissism, sociopathy, and zealous obsession that crawls under your skin in so many ways that you really wanted him to fucking pay for what he has done in this film. He is easily the best villain of the trilogy without a doubt and one of the best villains in the MCU.
(4) All the characters were amazing and compelling in this zany space odyssey, filled with large stakes that impact the characters on a personal level and impact the fate of the galaxy as a whole. It has plenty of exciting and funny moments that you’d expect but this film was a lot darker and more mature in comparison to the previous entries, especially with the tone it establishes right from the start.
You can’t help but feel like you’re in a constant emotional chokehold, not knowing what is going to happen with these characters on what could likely be their final mission together. But even with all that’s going on everyone manages to have fulfilling and concluding arcs that all felt earned after everything they have gone through individually and together.
This film has a lot of very well-written themes that it manages to tackle with every character involved, especially Rocket, and will definitely impact many people on many emotional levels. There’s the exploration of the inner self and found family bonds, which has always been an ongoing theme of the Guardians story but it is a lot more evolved here and is put front and center among all the crazy space adventuring that occurs.
There were also some very investing themes of PTSD that are handled so brilliantly here much like in The Suicide Squad and Peacemaker, showing that James Gunn really knows how to show the layers of damage these characters have all endured due to their individual pasts.
At the same time, Gunn also gives us a lesson through these characters that even though their stories may not have had happy beginnings it doesn’t make them who they are. It is the rest of their story and who they choose to be that is important. It’s such a beautifully well thought out lesson with so much depth to it that a lot of people will relate to and be very emotionally attached to it like myself. I’ve endured a lot of things in my own past and carry a lot of internal scars that have stayed with me all these years later but I never try to let them control my life going forward.
Volume 3 features the best action of the trilogy, going bigger and more intense yet still being very engaging and visually pleasing. We get numerous perfectly crafted action sequences involving close-quarter powered combat, epic space battles, and guns-blazing insanity that all feel so fresh and inventive and it is all shown in full glory in every frame thanks to fantastic cinematography that makes sure you don’t miss a single thing.
My favorite sequence of the whole film was this extremely masterful one-take that was everything I could ever dream of as a comic book fan and a fan of the Guardians.
The spectacle on-screen works so well because of the emotionally grounded story that is driving it as well as the extremely well-crafted effects that are on display.
There’s been a lot of debate over the effects in some of the recent MCU films and while I haven’t been as ruthless to some of them as many others have (mostly because I’ve seen worse effects in other films that were actually bad) I will say that this film easily triumphs most recent releases in terms of effects both digital and practical. A lot of it feels more finished and polished, showing Gunn’s tenacity for perfection when it comes to the visuals in all of his films making every environment and creature feel very real and investing whether they be practical or CGI.
Also, it should be noted that as of writing this review this film holds the new world record of using the most practical effects used on a single film or TV production. That is insane that they were able to pull that off and all of it looks absolutely amazing and detailed on screen. Serious props to everyone in the makeup and costume department for making everyone and everything in this cosmic adventure feel so alive and beautiful.
And then of course there is the music, featuring a perfectly chosen soundtrack by James Gunn himself and a very impactful score by John Murphy who replaces the previous composer of the other Guardians films. As much as I do love the awesome musical work that Tyler Bates did in the previous films I can’t help but absolutely love John Murphy’s work in this film a lot more as he really makes the score hit harder emotionally with a lot of sequences. He’s an amazing talented yet extremely underrated composer who deserves more recognition than he gets.
There are a lot of amazing song choices in this film that all fit perfectly for their respective scenes, some of which serve as incredible needle drops. I won’t go into all of the songs and how they are used but I definitely need to highlight the masterful use of the acoustic version of the song “Creep” as well as the use of the songs “No Sleep Till Brooklyn” and “Dog Days Are Over”. God damn did those songs hit me hard in the places they are used.
This film was a phenomenal and more importantly self-contained conclusion to this iteration of the Guardians. While some doors are opened for certain characters to follow, especially in the two post-credit scenes, we are likely never going to see this same group of characters on screen together again due to the way things end for them, as well as the fact that this is also James Gunn’s final outing in the MCU as he now moves on to helm the DC universe. It is a very emotional goodbye for him as it is for us but he definitely made sure to deliver a serious high note for the story to end on, one that we would love and feel truly impacted by. A perfect conclusion to an absolutely wonderful story spanning across several films with characters we will always love now and forever. I’m going to give Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 3 an A+ = 100.
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