It’s a peculiar note for a send-off-this ghoulish portrait of messianic tech, of disruption most foul-and especially jarring in the context of Vol. One longs for a film solely focused on that compelling, frightening premise, one that would have worked better in the middle of a trilogy, just as the bleakness of The Empire Strikes Back is nestled between cheerier fare. Each has a charming moment or two, but their development is hurried, tacked onto the film in an attempt at grandly summative closure.

While sketchily fleshing out (quite literally) a new villain’s ecosystem, the film attempts to give its stalwart heroes their due: Chris Pratt’s half-human captain Peter Quill, the semi-reincarnated Gamora ( Zoe Saldaña), lovable oaf Drax ( Dave Bautista), empath waif Mantis ( Pom Klementieff), stern cyborg Nebula ( Karen Gillan). 3 is a pale imitator of its predecessors, sloppily plotted and mawkishly concerned with legacy. Or maybe this is exactly the film Gunn would have made in any circumstance, and he’s just lost his touch. The days of digressive experimentation are gone franchise-sustaining synergy is now the prime directive. 3 has stumbled into being in more desperate times. Gunn’s past Guardians movies did not have to march in quite the same studio lockstep, but Vol.

Thus there is Warlock, perfunctorily crammed into the action and distracting the film from its true focus. Gunn’s Guardians series may not continue on in its current form, but Marvel still intends to use this final film as a springboard for tentpoles to come.

The introduction of a new character, Will Poulter’s Adam Warlock, also demands too much of Gunn’s attention. It’s an odd, lumbering patchwork of a film, occasionally fascinating but otherwise bloated and aimless. 3 is an outright drama, heavy with themes of loss and terror. At the same time, the film shoves the audience through the emotional wringer half of Vol. The film-like Ant-Man and the Wasp: Quantumania before it-pedals furiously (and often fruitlessly) to whip up a spirit of clever invention that once seemed so effortless. The film feels more like a digression than a finale, though, a journey into one character’s origin that then hastily, just before the credits roll, tries to manage a sense of broader completion.Īs has become the sorry hallmark of post- Endgame Marvel, Vol. James Gunn’s film has been advertised as an ending, anyway, the wrap-up to an often winning adventure saga about a ragtag band of space marauders trying, in their messy way, to do good. 3 (in theaters May 5), yet another mini-franchise within the broader Avengers universe has reached its reported end, leaving precious little left of what was once a mighty empire.

With the arrival of Guardians of the Galaxy Vol.

Broken by lawson