(4) GUARDIANS OF THE GALAXY

(2014-2023: GUARDIANS OF THE GALAXY 1-3)

Marvel Comics got cosmic, baby, with The Guardians of the Galaxy.

And it’s particularly striking that this film works as well as it does – given that it takes an ensemble from Marvel Comics C-list roster into its equally bizarre and eclectic cosmic setting. I tend to stay aware of a wide range of comics (albeit more so outside the DC / Marvel mainstream) and I hadn’t heard of the Guardians (although I was aware of elements of Marvel’s cosmic setting).

How does it work so well?

Well, there’s that cosmic setting with its visual effects.

There’s the funky sixties and seventies soundtrack on its protagonist’s impossibly durable mixtape (and for which he is prepared to risk death)

There’s Chris Pratt’s charismatic and comedic performance as the protagonist Peter Quill or Star-Lord (although the latter doesn’t quite catch on as well as he would like, much to his disappointment) – with such highlights as dancing off the villain.

There’s Zoe Saldana’s Gamora, with my personal favorite highlights including when she proclaims their heroism “we’re just like Kevin Bacon” (from a reference by Quill to Footloose) – and when she dances, ever so slightly, at the end (after rejecting the idea of dancing – prompting Quill’s Footloose reference).

There’s Dave Batista’s incredibly literal-minded Drax the Destroyer. (“Nothing goes over my head – my reflexes are too fast”).

There’s Bradley Cooper’s voiced (and spotlight-stealing) Rocket Racoon.

And then there’s Groot. Just Groot. I love Groot. Vin Diesel-voiced three-worded vocabulary tree-thing Groot. While the rest of the Guardians start off as rogues at best, Groot is the innocent and true hero amongst them – with a heart at big as he is.

And it’s turned into a cosmic comics space operatic franchise with two sequels in 2017 and 2023 – perhaps not as fresh as the first, but more psychedelic

RATING:

A-TIER (TOP TIER)

(5) THE SUICIDE SQUAD

(2021)

No, not the bad one or Suicide Squad (in 2016), but the good one with the definite article – The Suicide Squad (in 2021). Sadly, this won’t be the only time I have to make that same distinction between the bad one and the good one in an entry in this top ten – indeed, I have to do it for my top entry.

“The Suicide Squad is a 2021 ensemble superhero black comedy film written and directed by James Gunn, based on the DC Comics title ot the same name”.

The good one was presented as a standalone sequel to the bad one, but in many ways it was more a remake, done right this time by a writer and director bringing to the DC table what he had done for a similar ensemble superhero comedy film series for Marvel Comics. And as he did with Marvel’s cosmic setting for the latter, he also playfully brought some elements of DC’s cosmic setting – well, one in particular, with something of Gunn’s recurring alien invasion theme from his film Slither, which he would reuse, along with surprisingly literal project codename, in the spinoff TV series Peacemaker.

“The plot follows a new iteration of Task Force X / The Suicide Squad, a collection of boxed crook supervillains offered a simple deal by high-ranking government official Amanda Waller (Viola Davis): have a bomb temporarily placed in the base of their skull to assure they don’t try to escape and take on an increasingly deadly series of suicide missions in return for having their prison sentence reduced after each success. Their mission today? Survive being dropped onto Corto Maltese, a remote island filled with criminals and soldiers all guarding a massive secret that could spell doom for the entire world”.

Margot Robbie returned as Harley Quinn – although her Harley was one of the best things about the bad one, the good one effectively redeemed the character from that taint and became the character’s best cinematic adaptation, albeit I’d still rank her animated television series as best screen adaptation (which pokes fun at the bad Suicide Squad film).

Also returning were Jai Courtney’s Captain Boomerang and Joel Kinnaman’s Rick Flag among a whole host of new characters, including the one that was to get that television spinoff – John Cena as Peacemaker.

FANTASY OR SF

Definitely leans hard into SF, as both Gunn and comics films tend to do, albeit the softer end of the SF scale characteristic of comics films.

COMEDY

Very much so, of the black comedy variety.

RATING:

A-TIER (TOP TIER)

(6) SCOTT PILGRIM VS THE WORLD

(2010)

Adapting indie comic series Scott Pilgrim by Bryan Lee O’Malley and the first American film directed by Edgar Wright, this film, like its source material, is about the eponymous twenty-something Toronto slacker musician (in floundering garage band Sex Bob-omb) – versus, well not exactly the world, but the League of Evil Exes of the literal girl of his dreams, Ramona Flowers. Although in fairness, it did take the mastermind seventh evil ex some effort to get the League together – “Do you know how long it took to get all the evil ex’s contact information so I can form this stupid league? Like two hours. TWO HOURS!!!”.

Somehow Scott manages to go toe to toe with the League, although each of the exes seems to have mysterious superpowers – except of course for the third ex, Todd Ingram, whose superpowers originate from his veganism. “I partake of neither the meat nor the breast milk nor the ovum of any creature with a face…short answer, being vegan just makes you better than most people”.

The film itself is somewhat style over substance, but when that style is directed by Edgar Wright, who cares? It’s lovingly crafted style parodying comics and video games – complete with combo meters, written sound effects spelled out in mid-air, points and extra lives – while faithfully replicating the original comic (often panel for panel) and intricately inserting the numerological motifs (one to seven) for each ex (and zero for Scott himself). What more can I say? Adorable fangirl Knives Chau? Demon Hipster Chicks? Captain America’s Chris Evans as an evil ex

Sadly, it was a box office bomb – or is that bob-omb? – although critics liked the film’s visual style or humour, and it has since been redeemed as a cult classic.

“Sounds like someone wants to get…funky!”

RATING: 4 STARS****

B-TIER (HIGH-TIER)

(7) KICKASS

(2010. Yeah – I’m not counting the sequel, even if I don’t think it was as bad as the reviewers did)

“With no power comes no responsibility. Except that’s not true.”

Kick-Ass was a 2010 superhero black comedy, that similarly to Kingsman, was directed by Matthew Vaughn and was based on a comic of the same name by Mark Millar. And just as Kingsman was a playful and subversive parody of spy films (and James Bond in particular), Kickass was a playful and subversive parody of superhero films – “along the way it manages to deconstruct pretty much every superhero trope out there…and then reconstructs (them)”. Also like Kingsman, it had a sequel (in 2013) which didn’t quite live up to the original – but even more so hence I’m not counting it in this entry.

Dave Lizewski is an ordinary high school student, who sets out to become a real-life superhero. His first attempt…doesn’t go well, but the treatment for injury has the fortunate(?) side effect of invulnerability of sorts – slightly that is, with slightly more endurance to pain (due to damaged nerve endings) and his bones reinforced by metal. And having literally embodied Nietzsche’s aphorism that whatever doesn’t kill you makes you stronger (although more often than not, it doesn’t) – Dave sets out even more to embody Nietzsche’s superman, amusingly with a wetsuit as his costume and the imaginative pseudonym of Kick-Ass. However, he’s still not much better, but luckily gets a little help from a more experienced pair of vigilantes, Big Daddy and the awesome Hit Girl – but unluckily gets caught up in their bigger fight against a crime boss.

In the words of Empire magazine reviewer Chris Hewitt, Kickass (and to a lesser extent its sequel) was “a ridiculously entertaining, perfectly paced, ultra-violent cinematic rush that kicks the places other movies struggle to reach”.

FANTASY OR SF

Between the two, I’ll go with SF because of the complete absence of any fantasy or fantastic tropes, but this entry is the least fantasy or SF in my top ten as it is closest to our own reality.

COMEDY

Comedy – particularly superhero parody.

RATING: 

B-TIER (HIGH-TIER)

Shot (heh) from the best scene of the Kingsman film series (from the first film – you know the one)

(8) KINGSMAN

(2014-2017: KINGSMAN 1-2. Yeah, I don’t count the 2021 prequel, let alone 2024 spinoff Argyle. I do count that short film crossover with Archer)

Kingsman: The Secret Service is a playful and subversive parody of spy films in general and James Bond in particular – adapted from a comic by Mark Millar (similarly to another Millar work, Kickass, a playful and subversive parody of superhero film).

The film apparently originated when Millar and director Matthew Vaughn were at a bar discussing how the spy film genre was too serious and they wanted to do a fun one. And oh boy did they deliver on that premise – as Guardian writer Jordan Hoffman quipped, “no one in the production can believe that they’re getting away with such a batsh*t Bond”. It takes all the elements of a Bond film and ramps them up with its tongue firmly in its cheek – Bond on crack.

Of course, there is the eponymous spy agency – stylish (“manners maketh man”) and quintessentially British (named for Arthurian characters), with Colin Firth’s Galahad in a superb action role. However, it is Samuel L. Jackson who steals the spotlight, hamming it up with his lisping, megalomaniac supervillain Valentine – such that he makes Bond villains look positively tame by comparison (although his blade-legged henchwoman Gazelle comes a close second). Valentine’s supervillain scheme is to fix global warming (yay!) by killing most of the world’s population (um – not so yay?) – the mechanism for this is revealed in an awesome frenzied continuous action scene.

Per Rolling Stone magazine – “This slam-bang action movie about British secret agents is deliriously shaken, not stirred … Even when it stops making sense, Kingsman is unstoppable fun”.

The 2017 sequel Kingsman: The Golden Circle enjoyably repeated many of the same beats, extending them also to the Kingsman agency’s cousins in the United States, the Statesman, but didn’t quite match the fun of the first film.

FANTASY OR SF

Leans to the SF side of the genre, as usual for comics films.

COMEDY

Also leans to the more comedic side for comics films, including spy film parody.

RATING: 4 STARS****

B-TIER (HIGH-TIER)

(9) LOGAN (2017)

(2000-2017: X-MEN / WOLVERINE – I’d count Logan as the fifth X-men film, skipping Last Stand and Apocalypse as well as not counting Dark Phoenix)

O Fox – why couldn’t you have capped off your X-men film series (that is, as your own studio rather than as part of Disney) with this film rather than Dark Phoenix? Or Apocalypse for that matter? It was even apt as a narrative conclusion, further into the grim future in front of the X-men.

Although that does illustrate the difficulty of my usual practice for counting off the films I like within the series in an entry – in this case, the X-men film series and its Wolverine spinoff. Arguably, both should also include the Deadpool films from my previous entry, particulary the third film Deadpool and Wolverine, but they have a sufficiently distinctive quality for their own entry. Essentially, I’d be prepared to count Logan as the fifth film I like in the X-men film series – that is, skipping Last Stand and Apocalypse as well as not counting Dark Phoenix, to go from the first two original films in 2000-2003 and the two ‘prequel’ films in 2011-2014 to finish with Logan. (Okay, okay – I’d also count the Legion TV series but that doesn’t really slot in with the continuity of the film series). As for the Wolverine spinoff films, well, I’d count Logan as the only Wolverine spinoff film.

Based on the X-men comic storyline Old Man Logan, the film is set in a dystopian future United States (rather than the post-apocalyptic future of the storyline in the comics).

Why do I like it so much? Well, it helps that it abandons the ensemble cast of the previous films of the franchise (always a difficult task to balance or juggle) to focus on its two most intriguing characters, fan favorite Wolverine (the titular Logan), played by Hugh Jackman and Charles Xavier (or Professor X), played by Patrick Stewart. As the film opens, Wolverine’s mutant healing factor (which includes longevity) has gone awry and he has aged, as he is being slowly poisoned by the adamantium in his skeleton. Charles Xavier has been even less fortunate – as the film opens with him a fugitive tended to by Wolverine, his former telepathic abilities now turned against himself (and others – to the extent that it has been classified as a weapon of mass destruction) due to neurogenerative disease. It also helps that both Jackman and Stewart are at the top of their game at portraying the depths of their respective characters.

The plot doesn’t always hang together (and is hard to reconcile with the previous X-men film franchise – what has become of the other X-men beyond those that were darkly hinted to have been wiped out by Professor X’s misfiring telepathy?!). It helps that it mixes genre effectively as a neo-Western superhero road movie. The Western elements particularly loom large, with the classic Western film Shane a point of reference on a number of occasions – not to mention the cybernetic Reavers (who, as one of those aforementioned plot points, don’t appear to actually be any good at, ah, reaving).

Above all, it has more heart than any other film in the franchise, even if at times it is a raw and broken one. And I have a particular soft spot for stories of heroes at the end of their days, but who still rise to the call of heroism one last time (or for one last chance of redemption) – or in the context of the Western, one last ride into the sunset.

FANTASY OR SF

Probably the most SF-flavored (or SF-grounded) of the X-men film series. I know the X-men series is meant to be SF, what with its mutants and all, but in much of the series the various mutant powers or abilities feel like outright magic.

COMEDY

With the exception of one other entry, probably the least comedic of my comic films.

RATING: 

A-TIER (TOP-TIER)