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Veknoid_Outcast on 29 December 2017
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Mandalore76 said:
mZuzek said:

So are you in?

Sure, count me in.

mZuzek said:

Nah most of the complaints I see are a lot more shallow than that. Like "it was too childish" or "too many jokes means you can't take it seriously" (I actually can't take seriously anyone who doesn't understand how GotG storytelling works) or even "too much drama". (edit: or actually in the case of Angelus here, which seems to be most people as well, simply "it wasn't as good as the original" or downright "it was bad" for no apparent reason.)

I disagree about the movie being congested, I think all of the subplots worked really well and all of the characters had a very well-developed arc that was fulfilling as hell by the end. I think the pacing is nearly perfect - there's at least one little scene I would personally remove from the movie, and one or another I'd trim down a bit or partially cut as well -, but those are so few it's basically nitpicking.

Funny enough, there's a certain other blockbuster this year that absolutely did suffer from a far too congested story with too many characters and too many subplots in a running time that, while not enough for everything, still felt much longer than it actually was (and also the subplots weren't well executed at all). But, I guess that's the sort of discussion we really don't need here.

I absolutely loved the first Guardians of the Galaxy.  I was amped just by the initial trailer alone, and the movie delivered beyond my wildest expectations.  It was a very hard act for itself to follow.  Having said that, I am one of those people who thinks that James Gunn did try a little too hard to capture lightning in a bottle twice when it came to the script of the sequel.  I'm not saying there were too many jokes, because yes, in the Guardians of the Galaxy format, that works.  But it works, when it is done well.  I get that humor is subjective.  But for me, part 2 had jokes and sequences that felt way more forced than the original, trying too hard to be funny without actually being funny.  The Taserface bit comes to mind.  I didn't find it as laugh out loud funny as Gunn apparently did.  And so for me, it was a joke that fell flat initially and then gotten dragged out and beaten to death.  Anyway, I don't hate the movie.  It had a very moving and impactful scene at the end, and plenty of light-hearted fun sprinkled throughout for me to say that I enjoyed it.  Some of the comedy bits just didn't feel as organic to me as they were in the original is all.

Wow, that sums up my thoughts perfectly, right down to the "lightning in a bottle" line. Gunn was trying so hard to recreate the sparkling chemistry of the first movie. A little too hard. It ends up feeling forced. 

I think the movie is also weighed down by a manic plot that chases its own tail for much of the running time.