“Guardians of the Galaxy Vol.2” has all the digital effects and scenes as well as much of the enjoyable vandalism and humor of the first volume. In many aspects, it is not much different from the first, except that it feels forced and strained, as if director James Gunn was trying too hard to replicate the first volume’s success.

The movie begins in media res as the old gang of futuristic fighters led by Peter Quill (Chris Pratt), who calls himself the Star-Lord, fight a fat blobby creature with enormous rows of teeth placed in a digital environment that is vague and confusing. Gunn, does not seem to understand the sequence of the storyboard, the first scene plays out as if every designer had been working on their own, and for nearly 10 minutes the only thing seen are people and weapons being swirled around the screen with no context.

As usually done by Marvel, the movie is full of intense fighting scenes that often make no sense and are only used to show the Guardian’s strength and massive weapons, the ultimate way to make the audience forget that the series lacks a real origin. There is no myth, world or story on which watchers can find context for the story and, although the character’s personal stories are a bit more developed than in the last volume, it seems as if the Guardians are only present to shadow Peter Quill’s background.

For the vast majority of the movie, director Gunn focuses on filling into Quill’s origins, introducing his demigod father Ego who believes his purpose in life is to reproduce constantly to produce infinite demigod offspring, and who then tries to kill Quill when he refuses to follow. The development of this plot is not only ridiculous and plain weird, it also shows a desperate attempt by Marvel and Gunn to spike the audience’s interest, which is done unsuccessfully

The sad thing about the sequel is that it turns the charm of the original “Guardians” into yet another one of Marvel’s common bloats. The likeable traits of the characters and the easy going nature of the first volume in which the “Guardians” only strived for the salvation of the galaxy is long forgotten in the second volume, which seems to only care about cartoonish fighting and childhood trauma. The main focus of the storyline is on Mr. Quill choosing between his newly found biological demigod father and his surrogate family, especially when on and off lover Gamora (Zoe Saldana) disapproves, seen as she is also dealing with her own family trouble after her vengative sister Nebula (Karen Gillan) tries to constantly kill her because of  childhood drama with their evil father. Basically, the whole film is one big teen drama in which everyone has destroyed souls from their childhood.

It’s not all disposable though. The character Little Groot often has scenes that make the audience melt in a cuteness overload, and his one liners probably elicit the most laughs from the audience. Little Groot has a scene in which he is asked to retrieve a weapon by Rocket Racoon and Ranger Yondu that is built like a comedy gag, and another in which he stares with childlike wonder out of a spaceship window which makes the theater echo with “aw”. The movie does have its fair share of punch lines and humor, with Rocket Raccoon’s incessant teasing of “Taser Face”, Drax’s bragging about his “giant turds” and the overall sarcasm that all characters demonstrate at one point or another.

To be fair to Guardians of the Galaxy Vol.2, the designers did make an attempt to give it a foolish feel, playing with the animations and digital effects to create a different kind of setting. It’s not entirely the director or the crew’s fault, in fact, they have little to do with the movie’s firm and stiffening vibe. The problem is that Marvel apparently believes that the storyline is supposed to be empty trash, ruining yet another one of many sequels with great potential. 

Stars: 2