Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2

A sequel to the first Guardians of the Galaxy, Vol 2 takes all the great things about the first one and makes it better. Even more funny than the first, a better and more personal villain, good character development and a touching ending, Guardians of the Galaxy 2 stands up in the top category of best MCU movies.

This has a surprisingly great story for a Marvel movie. All of the family lore isn't cheesy or anything, and it makes coherent sense in the story of the Guardians. The characters actually learn from their adventure and the movie even has a moral that you can learn from it. My main problems with it are how drawn out some of it is, and the occasional cringey joke.

The best MCU movie, but that isn’t saying much since most of the MCU is processed, boring mediocrity that the average Joe will mindlessly praise because it has a cool superhero in it. The most popular modern-day movies are ones that are specifically made by corporations to appeal to as many people as possible. In order to appeal to as many as possible, they make movies that are dumb, safe, and repetitive so that basically anyone from anywhere won't think it's weird/offensive. The best movies of the 2010s and '20s are ones that a lot of people don't like because they are layered, new experiences that either they don't understand (because they're stupid), or because the movies aren't in their taste. Everything Everywhere All at Once is a movie that has recently received the Oscar for Best Picture, yet the general crowd didn't like it because they were either too stupid to understand it, or because it wasn't in their taste. The most generally well-liked movies of the 2010s and '20s (such as Illumination or Marvel films) are bland and inoffensive, yet the general crowd loves them because they are simple, dumb experiences. To quote Adam Johnston, 'Superhero movies are the new Pro Wrestling. Sure, there's acting, music, lighting, and directing involved, but at the end of the day, you're not really there to watch theater, you're really just there to see your favorite mustly man in a colorful suit get mad at other mustly men in colorful suits before showing off their signature moves.' That being said, the Guardians movies are an exception. James Gunn cares about his movies, and this is the best movie he has made. Great action, perfect soundtrack, lovable characters, etc. It's a shame that this movie is associated with most of the rest of the MCU.