Monday – 07 July 2014
A few days ago, there was a notification on Facebook that people could attend a screening for Guardians of the Galaxy:
#GuardiansOfTheGalaxy
Anyone who’s known me for more than eleven minutes knows that I’m a comic book fan. It’s something of a given. And I am also a fan of well-done comic book movies. And maybe a few not-quite-as-well-done ones, too. As this movie is squarely rooted in the Marvel Cinematic Universe, I’ve been looking forward to it for “a while now.” So I clicked the link and decided to roll the bones (Ha! I worked a Rush reference! Go, me!) and see if I could get to a theatre in time to catch it.
What I neglected to pick up on, thanks in equal parts to not reading the notification past “YOU CAN SEE THIS ON MONDAY!!!!!!!!” and what I’ll attribute to some clever marketing/writing on the part of the company who sent out the invitations, was one key piece:
It was only 17 minutes of the movie.
Yep, didn’t suss this out until I reached the theatre. *sigh* But, I was there. I will admit that the whole “Bag it, I’m going home” thing did cross my mind. More than once…
I decided to stick it out and see what they had to offer. I’m glad that I did. The seventeen minutes that they showed were fun, witty, well-written and definitely well-cast. This last part might give people more ammunition to say that Vin Diesel is a “wooden actor.” I don’t have beef with the man’s chops, after all: He’s the one on-screen and I’m in the seat watching. It was nice to see a little more of what’s going on with some of the characters and how they interact.
There’s been a lot of talk that Bradley Cooper’s Rocket is going to steal the show. That speculation might not be too far off base. He might also have some competition from Diesel’s Groot.
It was good to hear Dave Bautista’s Drax have some dialogue – even if it differs quite a bit from his speech patterns in comics. His origin seems to be different, as well, but that’s something we can just set aside for now.
Zoe Saldana’s Gamora was also given a bit of screen time and showed herself to be a formidable woman. That’s a “good thing” since she’s known as “the most dangerous woman in the universe.”
And there’s Chris Pratt’s Star-Lord. He’s already been the “face” of trailers and other media, so it didn’t feel like he was given quite as much time as the other Guardians, although tonight’s footage did expand on the headphones scene in the prison. It plays out even more amusingly than it does in the trailer.
So, what did I think of what I saw? I’d be lying if I said that I wasn’t disappointed that we didn’t get to see the full movie. On the other hand, it was great fun – the seventeen minutes went by far too quickly. If the rest of the movie is as tight as what we got to see this evening, Marvel/Disney has another hit on their hands and has added a fantastic new area for expansion and exploration to their growing Cinematic Universe.
Now all I have to do is wait for another three weeks…
#GuardiansOfTheGalaxy