Guardians of the Galaxy V2- Review

So two nights ago I went to see Guardians of the Galaxy v2 and I'll be perfectly honest here, I had some mixed feelings about it before going to watch it. These general feelings were wondering whether I was going to enjoy it, because yes, the first one wasn't really a favourite with me and whether or not the sequel would bomb. Fortunately, all of those feelings were quickly quashed.

This movie was directed by James Gunn and features the talents of Chris Pratt, Zoe Saldana, Dave Baustica, Bradley Cooper and Kurt Russell (just to name a few majors here).

Without taking too much away from this film, your favourite Guardians of the Galaxy are back to kick more ass particularly instigated by Rocket, the wise-cracking 'trash rat' and begin a new search. One that still has Peter looking for his father.

The Performances: Before Guardians of the Galaxy, I had never fully become aware of who Chris Pratt was but I'm so glad to have finally witnessed who he is now. I find his role in this movie as Peter Quill to be that perfect combination of serious and humorous. His characterisation is brilliant and I believe he delivers to the audience what they would expect.

Zoe Saldana's acting in this movie seemed to be a little less than great this time around. Don't get me wrong, I think she is a brilliant actress, I just felt as though she could have had a bit more importance and plenty of opportunity throughout to make something more of herself. She did have some funny parts and some major breakthroughs but nothing that really screamed "notice me!"

Dave Baustica as Drax was brilliant in this film. I love his laugh and every time it happened, I couldn't help but fall apart. This time around, rather than Quill, Drax was the one who carried out the comedy with just a tad bit of seriousness.

Bradley Cooper is at it again playing the role of Rocket. Now, a serious question. Who relates to a racoon on an emotional level? No one right? So what about a talking racoon with feelings? Definitely. You'll see this in the movie mostly towards the ending and it will touch your soul, whether you have one or not. Bradley really did well with personifying an animal. I know I'm leaving a few characters out here, but I thought I would just touch on the main ones that appealed to me. So finally, we have Kurt Russell. He's the kind of guy I usually only envision maiming people with cars violently but here, he had a more important role. It would be so hard to avoid spoilers if I spoke about his role here but lets just say he was as awesome as always and I guess I would have just liked to have seem him completely sinister. I don't know why I'm like that with his roles...but yeah. The Cons: I didn't really have any issues with this film apart from the duration. At parts I felt like the movie was dragging a bit but then it managed to pick up its pace again which was good. I guess another con was that there just wasn't enough 80s music! I need more!

If you haven't seen the first one, definitely go and watch it so that you can keep up to date with this one. If you have seen the first, a rewatch might not be so bad but either way, I have to say that I enjoyed this sequel better than the first movie. Whether that's an unpopular opinion or not, doesn't matter to me. This one just had my attention the most.

8/10

M15+