"Are we savin' the galaxy again?"

Rating: 8/10 (7 May 2017)

As I watched the opening scene, I was caught up in the same glow of the original "Guardians of the Galaxy", with the rest of the movie playing out as a grand, epic, space colossus. Today however I'm having a bit of next day, post partum revisionism, to the extent that the picture went way over the top with the action sequences in the latter part of the story. I'm all for it when the situation calls for, but when it feels like a film is trying to outdo itself, it feels forced and I was feeling some of that stress with the battle scenes and the cosmic repercussions.
I rated this picture the same as it's precursor, and I see in the short run it's running a tenth of a point higher than Guardians One. We'll see how that shakes out, and whichever way it does I wouldn't be disappointed. The surprises here for me were seeing 'old timers' like Kurt Russell and Sylvester Stallone show up in a Marvel Comics flick. It didn't seem like they belonged here among the up and comers like Chris Pratt and Zoe Saldana, but they acquitted themselves well. Looks like we'll be seeing more of Ravager Stakar Ogord (Stallone) in future MCU films. A hint for film makers - I knew Stallone's character name by virtue of seeing it in the cast credits beforehand, but it didn't come across clearly to me in the theater. Might want to introduce new ones with better clarity.
Surprisingly, my favorite in this story turned out to be Drax (Dave Bautista). Not only were his lines humorous, but they were cleverly delivered with just the right touch of understated nuance. Like when he finally told Mantis (Pom Klementieff) she was beautiful - inside. His delivery was impeccable, as if he was a born comedian instead of an ex pro wrestler. Baby Groot was a hoot too, it's too bad he has to grow up, as seen in the fourth post-credit scene. I don't think he'll be half as cute in Guardians Three.
Speaking of those post-credit scenes, it looks like Marvel set a record here with five. A lot of future material to work with as revealed here - Kraglin (Sean Gunn) with Yondu's stinger weapon, Stakar stealing some s---, High Priestess Ayesha (Elizabeth Debicki) potentially forecasting an Adam Warlock appearance, the aforementioned teenage Groot, and my favorite Marvel guy, Stan Lee as an astronaut, boldly declaring that "I've got so many more stories to tell". You'd think he'd run out of ideas at ninety five, but he just keeps on rolling.