S456 ARCHIVES: "Guardians of the Galaxy" Trailer Releases Online

~~ the following is a piece I did for the 2013-14 school year of "The Ram Pride," Ringgold High School's school newspaper ~~

On Feb. 19, 2014, Marvel Studios put out the first trailer for the upcoming superhero film "Guardians of the Galaxy," which is set to release on Aug. 1, 2014. The movie stars Chris Pratt of "Parks and Recreation" fame as Peter Quill, along with others such as Vin Deisel as Groot and Bradley Cooper as Rocket Raccoon.

The trailer has a stark focus on comedy, with a myriad of jokes, as well as on science-fiction, with its setting in space.  A simple plot is established in the trailer: Peter Quill, taking on the name Star-Lord, along with his team of misfit superheroes, steals an important object that villain Ronan wants to get his hands on.

This film, directed by James Gunn, is another movie in the "Marvel Cinematic Universe" Marvel has been crafting since 2008, starting with "Iron Man." Each movie in this line takes place in the same fictional universe; all of the movies interconnect with each other.

The Guardians of the Galaxy has existed as a team in Marvel's line of comic books since 1969, first appearing in "Marvel Super-Heroes" #18. The team got its own comic book series in 1990 called "Guardians of the Galaxy," which lasted 62 issues. This series was relaunched in 2008, and then ended again after 25 issues. A second relaunch occurred in 2013, and as of right now, the series is still going with over 10 issues already released.

"Guardians of the Galaxy" is not a well-known property, but Marvel Studios' track record is financially successful. "Avengers" made $200.3 million in just its first weekend and is the third-highest grossing film of all-time, and "Iron Man 3" was the highest-grossest movie of 2013 as well as the fifth-highest grossing movie of all-time.

Man of Steel (Film) - Review

For the last five, maybe ten years, Batman has been the king of superheroes in the mainstream, as well as in the not-so-mainstream realm of actual comic books. Because of this, the hype for Man of Steel, a Superman movie directed by Zach Snyder and produced by Christopher Nolan, has been big. The movie is out today, and it's great. Snyder and co. have crafted a fantastic story that nails what makes Superman so special, and sets a pretty much perfect foundation for future movies, but some shoddy film-making takes away from the high quality of the story. 

This movie starts from the beginning of the Superman mythos, with Kal-El being born into a dying Krypton and put into a spaceship to Earth, where a pleasant country family finds and adopts him as their own. Krypton is filled with future-technology and dragon-like creatures and it's all quite cool. The premise is established clearly in this scene - Kal-El is being sent to Earth, and once he's there, he would be like a god to humans. His loving parents reluctantly say goodbye to their son, finding comfort in the possibility that he'll serve as a source of hope for humanity. 

Man of Steel nails the most important thing for it to nail - Superman's supreme moral goodness. Superman is much more powerful than anyone on Earth, but chooses to do good. Having these powers gives him a heightened sense of moral responsibility. Life is sacred to him, regardless of whether it be humans, or Kryptons, and he feels as though he has to help because he can. We see Kal-El, or as his Earth parents come to name him,  Clark Kent, struggling with his place in the world from a young age, to a teenaged age, to an adult age. Henry Cavill does the role flawlessly as well: There isn't much more one could ask from him. The various child and teen actors Snyder casts as Clark at earlier stages in his life do an equally impressive job for their respective roles. 

Not only does Clark have to figure himself out, but he needs to be accepted amongst the people of Earth, as he's potentially very dangerous from an outsider's perspective. Because of this, General Zod is the perfect villain to use first, because his philosophy towards Earth is the exact opposite. The movie smartly compares his mentality to cold, evolutionary biology - the dominant species will get rid of the inferior ones, and claim their land and recourses as their own. Michael Shannon's performance is nothing special but he does his job, and Zod's an intimidating villain, threatening the entire planet. It's through this character that humanity understands that Superman is not a threat. He's the perfect character foil, exemplifying Superman's supreme moral goodness.

The problem with the movie is that it doesn't have the punch that it needs. The movie has an excellent story and sets up an excellent world with an excellent hero-villain dichotomy, but it doesn't deliver the powerful cinema that it needed to. There are essentially two action scenes, both of which are quite long, and they're not that great at all. The first action scene is cleverly brutal, showing truly the first challenge that Clark faces, having been amongst mere humans his whole life, but it's really just a bunch of punching. A bunch of punching for a long period of time with buildings blowing up all over the place gets boring. The second fight scene, at the end, is mostly more of the same from the first, albeit with some cool things thrown in here and there - like Zod attempting to hit Superman with a girder only to have Kal's laser beams cut it in half - but it's not enough. Aside from just better action, more could have been done, like cheers or teary-eyed thank-you's from the people of Metropolis, but none of that is here. The only fist-pumpingly exciting scene in the movie is a small moment that a member of the supporting cast has. 

And then there are smaller things that I didn't like. This is a nitpick, but Snyder has Cavill doing a good bit of screaming in the movie, and it's a little annoying. Less of a nitpick, Amy Adams plays a very well-written Lois Lane, but she doesn't have the fierceness that I want a badass reporter like Lois to have. She has a soft voice and a welcoming gaze, and that's not what I want. And the comedy here is good but I could have used maybe a bit more to help cleanse my palette from all of the sternness. It is a movie about a dude that wears a big, red cape, after all.

But overall it really is great. Not only are Superman and General Zod brilliantly built up, but the supporting cast is excellent. Russell Crowe is a perfect Jor-El (Superman's actual father); assertive yet calm and collected. Diane Lane and Kevin Costner as Clark's adoptive parents are sweethearts. Laurence Fishburne as the editor-in-chief of the Daily Planet and Christopher Meloni (Stabler!) also stick out, especially the latter, whom steals the show with that fist-pumpingly good scene I mentioned earlier. Despite the action being nothing special, the special effects and the hammering score in the background are impressive. And the ending is cute. 

Like The Amazing Spider-Man from last year, Man of Steel is a great, but not excellent or fantastic movie, that lays a pretty much perfect foundation for sequels. This movie gives us an amazing Superman made even better by a brilliant character foil in General Zod. It just simply isn't as enjoyable of a movie as this story could have easily been, due mostly in part to action that is just okay. But it's the first movie in a series, and with that in mind, what Zach Snyder and Christopher Nolan delivered is admirable. 

Iron Man 3 (Film) - Review

Iron Man 3 may just be the best super hero movie of all-time. This flick is jam-packed with sweet action, near-perfect characterization and great laughs, all tied together with smart story-telling. Like Tony Stark's suit, it's not free of its rusty parts, but dude, it's still a freaking Iron Man suit.

Robert Downey Jr. is out of the suit quite a bit in this movie, which actually works to the film's benefit. The movie displays the man as the human being he is. As a line of dialogue accounts for, Tony is, on the surface, just a guy in a suit, in a world filled with aliens and super soldiers and demi-gods. Throughout Iron Man 3, it's made clear that Stark is a serious force to be reckoned with, and made more badass by the deck of cards he's dealt. It's awesome. This character is impossible for me to root against. He's the ultimate super hero.

His weaknesses really add to to his ultimate super hero status. Stark has developed severe cases of anxiety and insomnia from the events of Avengers, and when a terrorist called Mandarin is crafting disasters around America, he's pushed to the brink. Stark has severe panic attacks (which are depicted realistically, speaking as someone who has had panic attacks), makes some irrational decisions, and loses the trust of love interest Pepper. Instead of beating the character down in a way that makes him less compelling, this humanizes him, making him more compelling. Iron Man is the ultimate super hero because he's awesome despite the odds.

There's a major plot twist around half-way through the movie, and it just makes the main antagonist cooler and more intimidating. The origin of the bad guys actually ties in thematically with the demons and fears of Tony Stark, albeit not as strongly as it could. And it's just clever, and rather original. For the most part the performances for these baddies are great, creating utterly detestable faces to punch, but the most important role, while great, isn't superb. The character's performance is just one piece of the puzzle, though - the writing and placement in the story still rocks.

As I said, it's not without its issues here and there. The biggest issue is that the final fight scene, while purely satisfying from an emotional angle, is a lot to take in from a logical standpoint. After the credits rolled I was able to piece everything together to a point that made sense in my head, but that doesn't excuse the head-scratching. Besides that, the president of this film is frustratingly dopey, which is such a small complaint because, within the context of this movie, it doesn't really matter how smart he is, but I wish there would have been a joke or two thrown in or a scene of explanation to calm my mild frustration. And sometimes, I felt like it tried too hard with the comedy. 

But don't get me wrong, it's funny, and also just fun in general. Robert Downey Jr. follows up his stellar performances from before as a one-liner-filled powerhouse of amusement. Stark meets a tech-savvy kid that helps him out as the plot unfolds, and all of his bits don't miss a beat, at best managing to not only be funny but also charming. Don Cheadle is better than ever before as War Machine, and even Gwyneth Paltrow as Pepper gets an upgrade in some respects. The action is fantastic, with some invigorating set pieces of pure visual splendor. These set pieces are often quite creative, the best of which being the scene with the plane in the sky from the trailers, forcing Stark to link save everyone in a fashion similar to, as he says, the game "Barrel of Monkeys."

Iron Man 3 is such a great movie. It gives viewers the ultimate super hero, who's incredibly awesome despite the odds. It's funny and purely entertaining, but it's also compelling on more intelligent planes. It's not perfect, but to quote the man himself, "glitches happen." Director Shane Black and all others involved have crafted one of the very best super hero movies.