Wonder Woman captured a lot of girl-power fancies, but it's simply not very good. This is of course not the fault of the girls in power; it's a DC film and so contains extended sequences of dull exposition, punctuated by plodding, ham-fisted action pieces. Honestly, it's a wonder they keep trying when even the weakest Marvel offerings clean their clocks.
In the interest of finding something good to say, I would point out the quasi-buddy-cop combo of Chris Pine and Gal Godot had its moments. Chris Pine is that rare thing in a DC film: an actor who can deliver comedy if needed. And Gal Godot is easy on the eyes, for sure. But there's little beyond that that isn't pure formula -- blockbuster by committee. Yawn.
Guardians of the Galaxy Vol 2 is also disappointing, but it's disappointing for a Marvel film which means it's still a cut above most other action movies. Lost was the organic storyline of the first film with the misfits coming together into the Guardians. The arc here is more forced, and therefore less fun. The Guardians are already the Guardians -- wisecracking, anti-hero buddies -- so efforts are made to mix them up into different combinations, but no special chemistry forms. Starlord gets his origin story via Kurt Russell as his father, but it is clearly contrived to forward the overall Marvel Universe narrative. All in all, it feels much more like a product, than a work of inspiration. The music selection is worse than the original, the writing dropped off, the snappy dialogue falls flat for the most part, and there is a certain clash of tone. Still it never descends into the level of suckitude of the DC films. The troop are still a strong comic ensemble and their sharp readings and personal charisma come through despite the poor script, although the only one I laughed out loud at this time was Dave Bautista.
The next superhero flick for me will be Spiderman: Homecoming, which I have high hopes for, then Thor: Ragnarok, then more Avengers will follow. It really is a treat getting to relive all these characters and stories from the comic books of my adolescence. Now that I am barrelling down on 60 these stories have officially lasted a lifetime. I don't know if it means adults today are more immature or adolescent nerds back then were sharper than we were given credit for, and I don't much care really, just glad I lived long enough to see an unfashionable devotion of my early teen years bubble up to the cultural top.
