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By, Jacob Krueger

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Guardians of the Galaxy, Volume 2: A Dance Between The Head and the Heart

Podcast Transcript:

This week we’re going to be looking at Guardians of the Galaxy, Volume 2, written and directed by James Gunn.

 

If you listened to my podcast on Guardians of the Galaxy, Volume 1, you know that I’m a huge fan of James Gunn’s writing. Not just for the brilliant execution of pretty much every moment of his scripts, but also for his overarching use of Theme to give real emotional resonance to these goofy action sci-fi comedies.

 

So, it’s interesting to watch Guardians of the Galaxy, Volume 2 to see James Gunn both succeeding and struggling in the places he’s most strong.

 

Guardians of the Galaxy, Volume 2 starts off with a scene that’s classic James Gunn -- a scene that takes a very typical action sequence, and turns it on its head in order to breathe new life and new fun into it.

The Guardians have been charged with protecting some very precious batteries from the giant creature that keeps on draining them. This setup, of course, is a very typical action-movie-big knock-out action sequence beginning. We’ve seen this a million times in everything from The Avengers to Batman.

 

Except this time, rather than focusing on the epic battle sequence-- you know, the thing that’s supposed to get the adrenaline of the audience pumping, the thing that action movies like Guardians of the Galaxy are supposed to be delivering-- rather than focusing on that sequence, and those supposedly life-or-death stakes, James Gunn instead points the camera at Groot.

 

Which is to say, James Gunn points the camera at what actually matters to him, the thing that the scene is actually about: not the battle sequences which we’ve seen a million times before-- but a scene about a bunch of Guardians who’ve come together as a family, to protect and raise this little baby Groot, the reincarnated version of their old friend.

 

And by not allowing himself to get distracted by the baloney of what the scene is supposed to be, he not only creates a hilarious sequence for the audience-- where we get to watch little baby Groot jamming it out to some good old 70s rock music while the epic battle plays out barely visibly behind him-- but also sets up a potentially powerful theme for the movie: a theme about family, a theme about connection, a theme about caring for others.

 

He takes a scene that we’ve seen a million times, and says, That’s not what’s interesting about this scene to me, what’s interesting about this scene to me is right here.

 

And this is the first tool that you should take from James Gunn.

 

Writing a movie is not about serving them it’s about serving you.

 

It’s about focusing in on the things that really matter to you. When you learn to do this, you not only discover the key to specificity, you also find the cure for cliché.

 

The truth is, these scenes are archetypal. Big action movies do start with big action movie sequences, at least most of them do. But your big action movie sequence does not have to play by the rules as other big action movie sequences.

 

In Guardians of the Galaxy, Volume 1, James Gunn proved this point with the death of Peter Quill’s mom, by playing an emotionally-dramatic scene at the very beginning of a goofy ol’ action movie.

 

And here in Guardians of the Galaxy, Volume 2, James Gunn again controls that tone by keeping the camera strictly focused -- not where it’s supposed to be -- but where he wants it to be. By asking himself some important questions all writers ...