When Screen Junkies’ Honest Trailers web-series was asked by fans to find fault with Guardians of the Galaxy, one imagines it was considered a serious challenge. After all, the Marvel film is one of the best reviewed films of the year and the biggest domestic hit. As it turns out, however, they found plenty about the movie to pick apart:
In the end, Honest Trailers - like most of us - concluded that Guardians of the Galaxy was a preposterously entertaining slice of blockbuster cinema, but that didn’t stop them from having some fun at the expense of Peter Quill, Drax the Destroyer, Gamora, Groot and Rocket. Basically, they surmised that Marvel only decided to proceed with Guardians of the Galaxy (which before this summer was a cult comic from the 1970s that hardly anyone read) because they no longer had the rights to X-Men, Spider-Man and the Fantastic Four. This is a point that it is rather hard to argue with. Marvel Studios would clearly have proceeded with films that revolved Wolverine et al, Peter Parker, Mr Fantastic, Invisible Woman, Human Torch and The Thing ahead of Guardians of the Galaxy if they could have. However, in hindsight and now that they are $771.8 million richer, they are probably extraordinarily glad that they were forced to make the film.
But what else did Honest Trailers find to be wrong with Guardians of the Galaxy? Its villains to start off with - and once again it's hard not to agree with their points. Lee Pace’s Ronan the Accuser was undeveloped to an almost laughable extent, while the supposedly huge and terrifying Thanos once again, like he did for his brief appearance at the ending of The Avengers, simply sits on his throne on top of a rock hurtling threw space barking orders. Honest Trailers also pointed out how similar each of the Guardians of the Galaxy were to other Marvel characters. Peter Quill is both physically buff and has been taken away from his life just like Captain America; Gamora deployed all of the sexy-kick-ass moves that we’ve become accustomed to seeing from Black Widow; Groot is a monosyllabic brut like Hulk; Drax misunderstands colloquial comments in a comical fashion; and Rocket and Tony Stark are both loud-mouth egotists.
Despite this criticism, Guardians of the Galaxy's director, James Gunn couldn’t help but see the funny side of the video. And he took to his personal Facebook page to show how much he liked it.
Post by James Gunn.
Kudos to James Gunn for embracing this amusing rebuke. Plenty of other directors respond to such criticism by lambasting their critics for having the gall to make such remarks. Joining in the fun has not only made Gunn look less curmudgeonly than these folks, but he’s also managed to underline what made Guardians of the Galaxy so much fun in the first place.
