As Greg D. Smith explains, with its second entry for 2014, the MCU took a pronounced left turn, settling on a movie from Troma alumnus James Gunn about a group of characters even many comic book fans knew little to nothing about, and branching out firmly into deep space with a movie almost completely lacking in Earth-bound content or context. As fragile peace breaks out between the warlike Kree and the Nova Corps, one extremist seeks revenge for what he sees as the betrayal of his people. His actions will set in motion a chain of events that will give the Galaxy its most mismatched team of heroes ever.

It’s odd to consider now, in hindsight, that Guardians of the Galaxy was ever viewed by anyone as a risk by the studio. Released to worldwide acclaim and incredible box office numbers, it’s almost as if the studio knew what it was doing. For me, it always did, and the talks of what a shot in the dark the film was going to be never rang true. Think back to the marketing, the series of trailers, the slow drip-drip release of the soundtrack via those same trailers, and the enormous amounts of hype, toys, T-shirts and various other memorabilia as the film neared its release date. Marvel under Disney don’t take chances, and Guardians certainly wasn’t one.

Nevertheless, it’s surely takes the hardest of hearts not to be impressed with Gunn’s achievement. Tasked with creating an Avengers-style ensemble movie involving five wildly different leads in a setting which had received no attention at all to that point and making it feel like a part of the wider MCU was daunting enough. Handling both the introduction of those characters and levering in a three act dramatic narrative as well? This seemed a big ask, especially with characters nobody really knew much about outside of a hardcore comic book fanbase, and from a director who had never helmed a multimillion dollar blockbuster before.

But boy does it work. Gunn took the cosmic side of the MCU and ram with it, producing something that at once feels unique and also slots seamlessly into the wider MCU.

The opening couple of minutes is the only time that the movie spends on Earth. This is important – even the first two Thor movies spent significant chunks (the first one a majority) of their time on Earth, giving us a setting with which we could easily identify and characters with whom we were familiar. Here, we get a tragic snapshot of our only human protagonist as a young child, losing his mother and then being kidnapped in a spaceship. It’s important to note that even with this early sequence, Gunn sets the tone for his movie – it will be by turns emotional, ridiculous, fantastical and economical. There is not a wasted line of expositional dialogue here, we are shown exactly what we need to see, and left to piece together the rest.

It then shoots forward 26 years and re-acquaints us with the exact same protagonist, in a routine in which he raids an ancient temple while dancing to an old funk rock tune. Dancing. On his own. The juxtaposition of the sweeping, beautifully rendered set and the stunning colour palette of the FX with the utter ludicrousness of Pratt’s dancing and the song chosen is a strong indicator of how the rest of the movie will play out.

Another thing which quickly becomes apparent from this opening scene on the deserted planet Morag is the pacing – at two hours dead on, this is a movie that had the potential to feel long, but it cracks along at a breathless clip, barely pausing from scene to scene. Part of this feeling is of course attributable to the sheer amount of setup that the film has to get through – in its opening half hour the movie jumps from one location to the next like a frantic Phineas Fogg, the succession of title cards with made-up co-ordinates becoming almost dizzying. This is seldom a good sign for a movie in my experience, and credit to Gunn that he manages to put together enough entertainment that he gets away with it.

And of course there’s the humour. This is of course an MCU trademark, doubly so since Whedon’s involvement in the franchise, but here it takes a different tone. The Earth-bound heroes snark at one another, and defuse awkward silences with one-liners. Here, the humour takes a darker, more adult tone. Sure, there are the regular laughs like the bemused reaction to Peter’s declaration that he’s Star Lord (which might have landed better had the line not been shown in the earliest trailers) but there are also many examples of humour that really doesn’t sit well in a family franchise – Peter’s Jackson Pollock comment being one such – it’s likely that it would go over the heads of most younger kids watching, but as an older audience member, I have to admit that first time around it struck me as perhaps a little too far for a film of its type.

Still, at breakneck pace the movie introduces us to its various protagonists and in short order they go from trying to outdo one another (Rocket and Groot trying to capture Peter for a bounty, Gamora trying to rob Peter of the Orb and Drax trying to kill Gamora in prison for revenge) to working together as a team. The first really big action piece in the movie is the prison breakout which unites them all, and it’s a thing of savage beauty to behold. Inventive too, the specific method of actual escape showing off the smarts of Rocket without the need for someone to sit down and tell us how incredibly smart and talented he is. It’s also remarkably violent – the film manages to gloss over this but when you sit down and start to actually think about the number of prisoners and guards brutalised and/or killed in the course of the escape, it becomes clear that this is not a movie about goody-two-shoes heroes. That the entire population of the prison is then slaughtered by Ronan’s men, led by Nebula, simply serves to distance our heroes from their enemy by virtue of how many they kill and what sort of pleasure they take from it.

Ronan himself is often cited as a poor villain in the endless halls of moaning on the subject of MCU antagonists. It’s true that Lee Pace doesn’t get much screen time, but I’d argue that he uses it well. It’s not easy to portray a part which goes from arrogant dismissal (with Nebula and Gamora) to nervous obeisance (in his first encounter with Thanos) to all-conquering power (when he obtains the Infinity Stone) and he does a good job, considering. We never get any background to the war between the Kree and Nova, save that it’s over, the Kree have signed a peace treaty and Ronan isn’t happy about it. And we don’t really need anything more than that. It’s a recognisable enough story that Gunn can trust his audience to fill in the gaps, and Pace’s performance is important in assisting that. He’s ruthless, but he also believes deeply in what he’s doing, as all the very worst bad guys do. He feels that his people – a proud warrior race – have been insulted by the peace treaty, and he wants his vengeance. Pace also has the sheer physical stature required to still appear intimidating stood next to the 5’11” Karen Gillan and fighting the ex-professional wrestler and heavyweight set of muscles that is Dave Bautista as Drax.

But the truth is that Guardians of the Galaxy isn’t really a story about a bunch of good guys fighting a bad guy – it’s a story about family. Were it to be any more explicit on this point, it would stray into Fast & Furious territory. Peter has been adrift since his mother died and he was kidnapped and inducted into the Ravagers. Even at this early stage, the bond between him and Yondu is clear, the other members of the Ravagers growing impatient even then at the leniency Yondu showed his human protégé. The final shot of Yondu smiling as he looks down at the Troll Doll sitting where his infinity stone should be reinforces this. Peter spends his time looking for distractions because he thinks he just wants to be alone, when in fact nothing could be further from the truth. Drax has no family, his wife and child having been murdered by Ronan, and despite the blunt nature of the character, the sadness that he carries with him is well-realised. Gamora was taken from her family and raised by Thanos alongside Nebula – the closest thing she has to family is a sociopathic intergalactic warlord and a ‘sister’ who wants to murder her. Rocket is a creature who doesn’t even know what he is, only that he never asked to be it, and Groot is the strong, lonesome companion he pals around with, one suspects as much for company as for his usefulness as muscle. All are individuals trying to hide from their pain, yet inextricably powered by it. That pain is what causes them to join together, each finding the family they never quite want to admit to themselves that they need in others as damaged as they are.

That very human story is what binds the movie together. The fantastical locations, the outrageous colour palettes and the weird and wonderful sights that lurk in every scene are not alienating because we can relate so strongly to the characters we see on the screen. When the crew land on Knowhere, a giant disembodied skull floating in space, the first inhabitants we see are ragamuffin children, one of whom approaches Groot and is given a flower. This spontaneous act of kindness to a child in need is a relatable moment, and grounds the location which is still a giant floating skull in space.

It isn’t without its flaws. For all that it mostly dodges exposition, there is one quite chunky part in the speech given by the Collector with regards to the provenance of the Infinity Stones. This is necessary not just to give context for the stone at issue in the movie itself, but also as a setup for the whole idea of Infinity Stones in the MCU, what they are and what they mean. It’s also helped by the silky delivery of Benicio del Toro, but in undeniably serves as a bit of a pace-breaker that stands out against the rest of the movie.

There’s also some problematic stuff (why does Drax refer to Gamora as a ‘green whore’, especially when he’s billed as being completely literal and, to our knowledge, doesn’t have any basis for the comment?) and a few bits where the film just asks you to go with it and not ask questions (like why the four are incarcerated together at the Kyln: Rocket and Groot are bounty hunters, presumably licensed, Peter is a known thief and Gamora is a known associate of the Mad Titan – these are not equal crimes and sending all four to a prison together to be held in the same place seems odd). But it tends to get away with the flaws it has because of how much it does right.

The soundtrack is of course the final piece of the puzzle, recognisable pop tunes thudding along over the insane colours, weird aliens and bizarre landscapes to once again give the audience some sort of recognisable hook and keep the movie relatable. It’s no coincidence that it became such a major part of the film or the marketing for it.

The Final Act is in danger of falling into the standard action movie finish of ‘blow up the big bad before he can do the thing’ but it mercilessly undermines that trope by its execution. When the Nova Corps ships interlock and form a shield to hold back Ronan’s ship, it’s so far so cliched, but when Ronan destroys them all and the Dark Aster begins to descend, all bets are off. The fight between the gang and Ronan on the ship is short and goes badly, before Rocket drives his ship through the Dark Aster and Ronan and seals the fate of the ship to fall to the ground. When Ronan reappears again, he’s defeated by a big boom, yes, but also by a dance. You can’t really get more subversive than that.

It’s a hell of a journey, and one that still isn’t quite suitable for kids of all ages. The moments of violence cut with humour will appeal to those with the right sense of humour, but put others off (Groot smiling to camera after brutally murdering a whole hallway of enemies being one example) but it sets it stall out early and its execution, while not flawless, is certainly top tier among its peers.

My own personal feelings for the movie eclipse any flaws that I know it has, but that’s not what this series of articles has been about. For me, it’s the joint best MCU entry (and we’ll get to the other one in due course) and a film I rate higher than almost any film of any genre I’ve ever seen. Objectively, it crams an awful lot in and uses some sleight of hand, a glorious soundtrack and a dark sense of humour to paper over the cracks. One thing’s for damned sure – there ain’t nothing else like Guardians of the Galaxy, ‘cept Guardians of the Galaxy!