Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2 (2017)
★★★ — Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2 (2017)
Baby Groot dancing through the opening credits to Electric Light Orchestra is, hand on heart, one of the most purely joyful minutes Marvel has ever put on screen. It's the kind of moment that makes you grin like an idiot and lean forward in your seat, and for a little while it makes you think James Gunn is about to pull off something special all over again. He doesn't, quite. But God, that opening is something.
The problem with Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2 isn't that it's bad. It's that it's a well-made, perfectly watchable, frequently funny film that keeps reminding you how brilliant Guardians of the Galaxy was. The first film had this scrappy, unexpected energy, a bunch of misfits thrown together in space, and it felt genuinely fresh. This one arrives knowing exactly what it is, and that self-awareness costs it something. It's polished where the original was rough in all the right ways. It's calculated where the original felt like a happy accident.
The story centres on Peter Quill finally meeting his long-lost father, Ego, a living planet given effortless cool by Kurt Russell. And for a good stretch, it works. Russell is magnetic, the cosmic visuals are gorgeous, and there's real emotional potential in the idea of a father and son reunion set against a backdrop of stars. Then the third act arrives with a twist that I won't spoil, but which manages to feel both telegraphed and undercooked at the same time. The setup promises something, and the payoff fumbles it.
Meanwhile, the film is doing a lot of other things simultaneously, sometimes too many. The Gamora and Nebula storyline, sisters working through years of resentment and trauma, has genuine weight to it and deserved more room to breathe. Instead it's competing for space with Drax and Mantis, whose odd-couple dynamic starts off charming and wears out its welcome somewhere around the second hour. Yondu gets an expanded role that actually lands well, I'll give it that. But the whole thing feels overstuffed, like Gunn was trying to honour every character from the first film while also introducing new ones, and the pacing suffers for it.
The soundtrack is still a highlight, obviously. If you're going to be bombarded with nostalgia, you could do a lot worse than the selections on offer here. The action is vibrant and colourful, the banter between the team still crackles often enough, and there are individual scenes that genuinely work. But a film built from great individual scenes without the connective tissue to hold them together is just a highlights reel, and Vol. 2 drifts in that direction more than once.
The emotional beats the film is reaching for, family chosen and otherwise, are the right instincts. The problem is the film keeps underlining them, circling back, making sure you've noticed what it's feeling. The original trusted you to keep up. This one keeps tugging your sleeve.
Three stars.
It's enjoyable. I laughed, I enjoyed the spectacle, and I'd watch it again on a lazy Sunday without complaint. But sequels that play it safe while pretending to go bigger tend to leave you a little cold, and this is one of those. I went on to see his third and final entry in the series, and if you're curious where the whole thing ends up, that's worth your time too. As for Vol. 2, it's good. Just not great. And with a first film this good, good isn't quite enough.
Rating: ★★★ | Year: 2017 | Watched: 2025-08-14
Where to watch
Watch in the UK
Stream: Disney Plus
Rent: Apple TV Store · Rakuten TV · Amazon Video · Sky Store
Buy: Apple TV Store · Rakuten TV · Amazon Video · Google Play Movies
Physical: Amazon UK · Zavvi
Watch in the US
Stream: Disney Plus
Rent: Amazon Video · Apple TV Store · Google Play Movies · YouTube
Buy: Amazon Video · Apple TV Store · Google Play Movies · YouTube
Physical: Amazon US
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