Guardians Of The Galaxy (2014)

Ashia R:

Hey friends, it’s Family Movie Night, and Q has convinced R2 to choose ‘Guardians of the Galaxy.’

Q’s most persuasive point? The six-packs. (R2’s really into men with well-defined abs.)

Since this movie kicks off like your standard Disney movie, we’re giving R2 a content warning about the death of a mom. Basic hero story – dead mom -> future hero.

Why do they do this? Does it make a dude ‘edgy’? Or tougher? Is this the only origin story we can use to make a self-centered white dude sympathetic? Feels like just another way to reduce women’s lines in movies so we don’t have to pay them.

Immediately after his mother’s death, little Bambi ::cough:: I mean – Peter Quill, runs outside, only to be immediately kidnapped by a flying saucer. Which isn’t a complete surprise, since Peter’s mom told him his absent father is a beam of light from space or whatever.

Fast forward, and Quill is all grown up. Oh shit – I forgot to do a content warning for animal abuse. R2, our resident vegetarian and animal rights advocate, is NOT COOL with all the little bitey rat things that Quill’s kicking around.

We’re trying to sell this as ‘they were trying to bite him and he’s just having fun while he defends himself’ but oof – it’s really hard to defend a guy who just casually kicks around small animals.

Between that and the ‘Oh hey – I forgot you were here, and also your name’ conversation he has with the woman in his spaceship, our character development is down. Peter Quill is a jerk.

Introducing our villain: Lee Pace, painted blue, going by ‘Ronan.’ With a brief profile view of his torso as he gets suited up in his ARMOR OF HATE AND DOOM, we get a short glimpse of Ronan’s external obliques.

Thirst trap count: 1.

(Although no where near the view we get in ‘The Fall’ – at peak Pace, but also, confusingly, his least sexy role). ((Sexiest Pace role: The brother in Wonderfalls, but only in that episode where he hooks up with the girl next door.))

Oh hey it’s Zoe Saldana as She-Hulk/Gamora, licking some sort of fruit. Despite not even a hint of her abs, thirst trap count: 2.

After a brief tussle, almost all of our heroes are conveniently introduced in a police lineup, including Groot, Gamora, Quill, and Rocket.

The earthquakes get really excited about Rocket. Both because he’s an adorable but grizzly talking Racoon, but also that’s the name of their older brother. He would turned 13 this summer.

Oh hey, I forgot about the ‘getting bathed in prison scene’ for another excuse to show our cast shirtless. Peter, predictably, is our thirst trap count: 3, but this time in orange (from the prison soap goo).

Unfortunately, R2’s too upset about the prison guard stealing Quill’s walkman to enjoy the view.

(Although I prefer ‘Andy’ from Parks & Rec’ – more doughy, and also we got to enjoy the dimples before we found out Chris Pratt was a conservative douchefart.)

Enter: Drax the Destroyer. He’s got too much makeup on to get a good look at his abs, but his pecs more than make up for it. He’s here for vengeance against Thirst Trap 1, who killed Drax’s family.

Thirst trap count: 4, but also WHY do all of folks need to make dead women like, their WHOLE personality?

Update: Thanos killed Gamora’s mom too. NO MOMS ALLOWED IN THE DISNEY MCU UNIVERSE!

Meanwhile, Ronan and Thanos have a very moody business meeting, during which Thanos calls Gamora his favorite daughter. But OH SNAP (foreshadowing MCU pun intended), he says it RIGHT IN FRONT of Nebula, his OTHER DAUGHTER.

Mission accomplished, we the audience immediately understand that Thanos is The Biggest Jerk in this movie. And OH LOOK, we didn’t have to kill his giant purple mom to develop his character!

(I guess that’s only for heroes).

Nebula, who I’m pretty sure is the child of Zotoh Zhaan from Farscape and Rachael Leigh Cook, somehow, is some sort of sexy robot alien. Could swim for days in those cold black eyes. Thirst trap count: 4.

While I was busy looking up the cast of Farscape, our cast of merry orphans do a prison break and beats everybody up. As they escape, we discover that Drax is Autistic.

Rocket: “His people are completely literal. Metaphors go over his head.”

Drax: “Nothing goes over my head. My reflexes are too fast.”

It’s mostly Dave Bautista’s timing – but the way he delivers that line makes me laugh so hard, all three times I’ve seen this movie. All this confidence but also nothing makes sense. I feel ya, Drax.

But also every interaction between Peter Quill (Chris Pratt) and Rocket the Racoon look like Pratt’s shouting at a styrofoam ball on a stick. Which is probably exactly what is happening. But he was paid SO MUCH FOR THIS MOVIE!

He tries SO HARD at acting! But it’s… it’s not working.

Lots of looking down, gently waving his hands, shouting “Whaaaat! You brought a BOMB on a SPACESHIP?!”

Rocket, our animated Raccoon friend, is carrying every scene where they interact, and it must be exhausting.

Up until now, Groot’s been more of a background character. But if you’ll pay close attention as he grows a flower for a young little street rascal, you’ll notice he’s kind of a hottie. If your type includes tall, dark, quiet bundles of dry kindling. Thirst trap count 5. 

Despite the fact that Groot is far hotter, our story developers have decided to ship Gamora and Quill. They have nothing in common, zero chemistry, Quill is a womanizing jerk, and there’s really nothing at all that Gamora should find attractive about him. But alas, movies.

Speaking of our exhausting need to provide a love interest for every character in every story ever – we might as well address the gender distribution and representation.

Groot is a dude, I think? Folks call him ‘sir’ and he seems cool with it. All our dudes are assumed to be heterosexual, and aside from all the dead moms and daughters, and a handful of forgettable women on Targeted Planet Victim, the sisters Gamora and Nebula are the only interesting women in this movie.

All women – including the sisters, wear either skin-tight pleather pants, Jetsons-style cocktail dresses, or the V-bikini Marshmallow sports on Bobs Burgers. I get that this comic was first published in 1992, but they could have tried to add some women with agency to the movie? And maybe show more than a single specific body type?

Hahahah j/k. This is the same cinematic universe that gave us Black Widow referring to herself as a ‘monster’ because of her infertility, and a really gross scene in Endgame where all the female superheroes fight Thanos together as a group for no other reason than they all identify as women. They’re all like “LOOK! WE ARE ALL THE LADY SUPERHEROES!” It’s a very #GirlBoss Disney Princess moment and it’s exactly as corny and cringe as it sounds, and I’m waiting for the next time when they decide to to segregate battles based on skin color or some other random bullshit like that.