I am Groot!
In honor of the Guardians of the Galaxy franchise culminating with its third instalment this spring, I'm ranking the 10 greatest moments from the franchise (this topic was suggested by my friend Jonne, who was part of our merry company who went to see Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 3 in the cinema earlier this month!). With so many groovy scenes to choose from, I decided to make things slightly easier for myself by limiting myself to the three main feature films in the franchise - therefore scenes from other Marvel films that feature the Guardians of the Galaxy characters, as well as scenes from the silly-but-worthwhile Guardians of the Galaxy Holiday Special (2022), will be excluded. These are the greatest scenes from Guardians of the Galaxy (2014), Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2 (2017), and Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 3 (2023).
And a spoiler alert is in order for all three films!
Here are my honorable mentions: "A bunch of assholes, standing in a circle" from Guardians of the Galaxy (2014), The Howard the Duck post-credit scene from Guardians of the Galaxy (2014), The Yondu's Arrow mayhem sequence from Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2 (2017), Ego's villainous reveal from Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2 (2017), and the Emotional Disbanding from Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 3 (2023).
10. Meeting Thanos from Guardians of the Galaxy (2014)
The build-up towards Thanos (Josh Brolin) as the big bad of the MCU was just so well done! Amidst the end credits of the first Avengers movie (2012), we see him for the first time, in an appearance so sinister and badass that it just screams "this guy is the real deal / main villain / true endgame". After that, people were dying to find out more about the mysterious villain, and finally the first Guardians of the Galaxy film delivered.
There's immediately a scene-stealing presence to Thanos, when we finally see him speaking dialogue and interacting with other characters. While this is a very worthwhile introduction, I do appreciate that his role in the film ends up being very minor as his motivations and backstory are left very shrouded in mystery, so that they could be more properly explored in Avengers: Infinity War (2018). A classic example of "show them what they want to see, but leave them wanting more".
9. Star-Lord at his most emotionally charged and badass from Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 3 (2023)
Towards the tail end of the newest instalment in the franchise, the big bad has been defeated and the climax is starting to wrap up as the main characters, as well as the children and animals they rescued, rush towards the safety of Knowhere from aboard the crashing High Evolutionary ship. Star-Lord (Chris Pratt) himself is almost left behind, after he sentimentally rushes back to retrieve his beloved cassette tape. This leads to a sequence of pure, emotionally charged adrenaline, as our protagonist runs, jumps and ducks various obstacles while navigating his way off the mid-destruction ship, with the visuals and soundtrack being massively dramatic.
Sure, the slightly out-of-place character Adam Warlock (Will Poulter) saving him in a moment of redemption wasn't quite as powerful as it would've been if his character arch had been more fully fleshed-out, but still, the sequence as a whole is an absolute winner, because emotions were running so high in the adrenaline rush of Quill making his way out.
8. The Collector from Guardians of the Galaxy (2014)
Once again, we return to how intricately connected and well-built the MCU's Infinity Saga was, as much of this worldbuilding was integrated into the first Guardians of the Galaxy film. One moment that had the long-game full-experience fans like myself all riled up and intrigued, was the meeting between the main group of rag-tag heroes and The Collector (Benicio Del Toro), where the concept of the Infinity Stones was finally explained to the audience.
We had seen many of the Stones neatly sprinkled into various interconnected MCU films - the Space Stone / Tesseract in Captain America: The First Avenger (2011), the Reality Stone / Aether in Thor: The Dark World (2013), the Power Stone / Orb in this film, et cetera. Here we learn the lore and context behind the stones, while getting a pretty good picture of where things were headed - Thanos' plan to obtain all six stones in order to become unstoppable. Fantastic long-term storytelling right there.
7. "I'm done running" from Guardians of the Galaxy: Vol. 3 (2023)
When Peter Quill uttered the words "A trap isn't a trap if you know you're being trapped, it's a face-off", I was positive that this was going to be the best and most hard-hitting line of the franchise's first instalment. However, a later line had an arguably even bigger impact, and it came from the focal point and true hero of the third film - Rocket Raccoon (Bradley Cooper). While today's #9 moment was in the aftermath of the film's climactic fight, then this is the moment that lead up to it (funnily enough, both moments were more impactful than the actual fight).
The group is all ready to flee the scene of disaster, but Rocket has justice on his mind - the High Evolutionary (Chukwudi Iwuji), perhaps the most downright evil and hate-worthy villain in the entire MCU, is still at large. Much of the film's runtime was devoted to Rocket's heartbreaking origin story, truly capturing just how spiteful the villain was and how much suffering Rocket and so many others had to endure due to him - and this context makes it so damn powerful when Rocket utters the words "I'm done running", and turns back in order to fight. Chills, man.
6. 'We Are Groot' from Guardians of the Galaxy (2014)
Self-sacrifice to save others has been somewhat of a theme throughout the franchise, although the permanence of one's death has varied a bit in true MCU fashion. While this memorable scene wasn't the end of Groot (Vin Diesel) for good (and thank God that it wasn't, as his character contributed so much fantastic content to many subsequent films), it still manages to be a highly emotional scene.
With the Guardians about to crash-land onto the planet Xandar, Groot quite literally branches out his powers, shielding the others from damage while speaking "We are Groot", a line that feels 17 per cent delightfully silly and 83 per cent heart-melting, in the tradition of Schwarzenegger's "I know now why you cry, but it is something I can never do" in Terminator II: Judgement Day (1991).
5. "I'm Mary Poppins, Y'all!" from Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2 (2017)
Continuing on the themes of self-sacrifice, this one is even more of a gut-punch because in defiance of MCU tradition, Yondu (Michael Rooker) actually stayed dead.
While the second Guardians instalment is my least favorite out of the bunch, it is still a thoroughly decent MCU film - yet only one moment from it made it onto the top 10, despite many more being close. In this moment, Peter Quill has been more or less left for dead in the aftermath of the fight against Ego (Kurt Russell) - until, with one hell of a character-defining entrance, Yondu floats onto the scene and sacrifices himself in order to help Quill to safety.
With the film's themes centering on fatherhood, this moment is heavy - Quill's biological father has turned out to be a full-scale villain whose actions very nearly kill Quill, until the symbolic father-figure shows up to save him, at the cost of his own life. The most impressive element of this franchise might just be how the silly and comedic misadventures of Chris Pratt, a green alien, a violent blue dude, a talking raccoon and a one-sentence tree can have such a hard-hitting emotional core.
4. The One-Take Action Extravaganza from Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 3 (2023)
The two last films I saw in the cinema were, interestingly enough, two different films where Chris Pratt plays the lead role and at some point there's an action sequence to the backdrop of the Beastie Boys classic No Sleep Till Brooklyn. In the more recent out of the two, we see our unlikely heroes charging into battle as the song starts to play - and the sequence is a majestic one-take feat of cinematography and stunt coordination. The end result is as wildly entertaining as it is sharp and technically impressive, with the perfect choice of soundtrack being the icing on the cake.
3. The Grand Escape from Guardians of the Galaxy (2014)
If you had to pin-point one moment where they stopped being five weirdo individuals and became the Guardians of the Galaxy, it would have to be this massively thrilling escape sequence from the first (and, let's face it, best) film. After Quill, Gamora (Zoe Saldana), Rocket, Groot and Drax (Dave Bautista) have all been imprisoned in the Kyln prison, they manage to pull off one hell of an escape sequence, with just so much sci-fi fun going on - the zero gravity stunt, Star-Lord's clever Orb switcharoo, and the inevitable 'Quill puts everything on the line in order to go back and retrieve his goddamn mixtape' moment.
2. Ain't No Mountain High Enough from Guardians of the Galaxy (2014)
After blasting us with non-stop fun for two hours and solidifying itself as one of the most downright likable and entertaining films in modern cinema, Guardians of the Galaxy gets all mushy and heartfelt for a second - before giving us one more blast of ultimate feel-good vibes.
After the climax of the film is settled, Peter Quill / Star-Lord sits down to read an old letter by his mother, written before her death while he was just a child. It's enough to choke one up, just as Quill finishes reading, opens up the Awesome Mix cassette tape his mother left for him, and with tears in his eyes, plugs it in as Marvin Gaye & Tammi Terrell's Ain't No Mountain High Enough starts to play. This is the perfect transition from touching and sweet back to good-time fun, as the impact that Quill's mother's favorite music had on him as a motif throughout the film suddenly carries a lot more weight while still feeling like a neat gimmick at heart.
To the backdrop of this all-time great Motown song, we see a perfect ending montage - Quill's love interest Gamora appears just as the lyrics go "If you need me call me, no matter where you are I'll be there in a hurry", we check in with the Ravagers to see how Yondu finds out that Quill tricked him with the fake Orb (I love it how Yondu isn't even mad, but rather reacts with a snarky "that's my boy" smile), and we see the Guardians blasting off into new adventures. An amazing wrap-up, sure to leave the viewer smiling.
1. Saving Rocket from Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 3 (2023)
I just had to go with this at first place - while the ending of the first film feels like the franchise in its truest form and would've been a worthy #1 in many ways, there's just no getting around how insanely emotional this moment was. People in the cinema were not just crying but audibly gasping, and understandably so - this sequence really gets deep into your heart. Each Guardians of the Galaxy film is more emotional by nature than the last, with Vol. 2 finding new depths that the first film didn't reach and Vol. 3 going even further, and that all comes to a head in this moment.
After spending much of the film's runtime on a mission to save their beloved Rocket Raccoon, the Guardians are faced with the possibility of losing him as time seems to run out. The mounting intensity and drastic, panic-fueled desparation is off the charts as Rocket starts to flatline, with the group fighting against time - and all of this feels a thousand times more gripping due to the flashbacks seen throughout the film, with the viewers now having the context of what Rocket has already endured and how he'd deserve to just catch a break after the grim events of his origin story. As his near-death experience escalates, he has visions of his old friends, telling him that it's not his time yet, and while this may sound like the world's biggest Hollywood cliché on paper, the film just makes it work. The scene is so intense and emotionally driven the viewer will forget all about "this is Marvel, of course he's going to make it" for a while, and it will feel like the beloved Rocket is dying.
And this sense of reality makes it into one sledgehammer of a payoff when Peter Quill disables the kill switch and saves Rocket's life. Like I said, people in the audience were audibly gasping, and I was one of them. The third instalment of the franchise made the audience invested in this already-beloved character on a whole new level, tricked us into actually believing he'd be killed off, and then pulled off a majestic moment of relief as he gets saved, which is enough to bring any MCU fan to tears of joy. The Guardians of the Galaxy films may be silly and obscure adventure flicks that play fun with sci-fi tropes and goof off with pop culture references and dance sequences, but dammit if they don't have more heart than most of the films out there.
Thank you for reading! Tune in next week as I rank the top 10 greatest movies and television shows written by my all-time favorite screenwriter, Aaron Sorkin.
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