The buildup might be “clear” if you already know the universe and the characters, but if you don’t, it’s not clear at all. Furthermore, even if that’s the intention, there’s nothing to stop the writers providing some more context for people who aren’t in on the story.
The difference is that, in Game of Thrones, Frey’s introduction came with considerable explanation about the backstory of his relationship with the Starks. When Rob Stark’s army arrives at the crossing for the first time, and has to go an negotiate for the right to use the bridge, we were told quite a bit about Frey, his daughters, and his personality and motivations. The Red Wedding might have come as something of a surprise, but it did fit with what the viewer already knew of the past tensions.
I admit that was clear enough, but people need reasons. Why did he break with his government? Why is he so hostile to Xandar in the first place? If the “just because” explanation they gave is all you need, then good for you, but i would have liked more.
I think this will all tie together as we get more movies. I can’t see how it won’t. I do agree that we’ve got a couple of thinly characterized villains with a need to go after the movie’s MacGuffin in the past couple movies, namely the Dark Elf and Ronin, but I also see how this is laying the foundation towards the Infinity Gauntlet. All of these MacGuffins tie into that, so it’s leading us there.
We did get quite a bit of explanation of the Infinity Stones in GotG, which is nice.
I liked this movie a lot. I’d almost say that I liked it better than Avengers but I’m still trying to decide on this. I thought a lot of the stuff was funnier and more clever without dipping too far into quippy territory, which I think Avengers does a little too much. I thought the Nova energy net was s dumb idea that was designed to fail but I suppose that’s an effective blockade for smaller ships or something.
Seeing Howard at the end was great though I then had to try to explain him to my 7 year old son and I couldn’t get much farther than “he’s a talking duck from the comics.”
I’m not going to get nitpicky about Quill’s tape player or anything. I’m going to assume that with all the space faring technology that he has access to, someone would be able to keep a Walkman from eating his tape and give him two small cylinders that provide 3Vdc to power it. Maybe even reverse magnetize the tape so it doesn’t wear out. Some of his Earth comments were post 80s as well, but just because he works in space, doesn’t mean he can’t head to Earth now and again to intercept some HBO satellite broadcasts or whatnot.
What reason did we need for Hans Gruber to take over the Nakatomi Building? It got maybe what, three lines of dialog? We didn’t need to see how he was ignored as a toddler and bullied in gym to know he was a Bad Guy. Ronan got his motivations explained quite clearly. Thanos will be the Big Bad in GotG 2 and/or 3, so nothing needs to be explained about him yet.
Well Gruber wanted a ton of money. That’s motivation anyone can understand :).
I think that motivation for moral purposes need to be explained more - a lot of folks have complained that Ronan is kind of boring and one of the reasons seems to be that we don’t really know why he hates the Xandar so much.
As I mentioned in my last post, I* don’t* know the universe and the characters. I like the Marvel movies a great deal, but the next superhero comic book I read will be my first. And my contention is not that what they’re building up to is clear, merely that it’s clear that they’re building up to something. The Thanos subplot in GOTG is very obviously setting things up that will not be paid off until later films. What is being set up is besides the point - we can’t really judge how successful they are at that until the payoff actually happens.
In other words, we’re basically at the midseason point of a serialized television series right now, and Thanos’s subplot is the long simmering big bad, while Ronan is the episode’s Monster of the Week. The Thanos plot could certainly turn into the last season of Lost, but it’s way too early to tell.
That level of detail is the sort of thing you can afford to cover in a ten episode season. When you’re making a 2 hour movie, you have to cut the fat somewhere. And GOTG, like the Avengers before it, is a movie about its heroes, first and foremost. The villains are there to provide a force to push the protagonists together and give them a reason to fight together. Would you really have wanted another half hour going into Ronan’s tortured backstory? Would that really have added anything to this movie?
Again, I disagree with your characterization that “just because” was the only explanation. Economical storytelling does not equal lack of explanation. The writers establish that Ronan is a zealot. Thus, the reason he broke with his government because they signed a treaty that he could not abide. Pretty simple (and, it must be noted, explicitly stated multiple times). He’s hostile to Xandar because the two worlds have been at war for years, and, again, zealot. That’s already far more backstory than we got for, say, the Joker.
I’m rather in mhendo’s corner on this one. There was a brief interlude with Nova Prime and someone in the Kree government. Are Kree as a whole cheering for Ronan? If so, what was so special about this treaty that they agreed to it? It’s all fine and good for stuff to be left for subsequent movies, but I still think more development could have been spared for the first movie.
Is GotG just like Game of Thrones in its lack of exposition? Because that’s what you implied in your previous post. Or is it different, but excusable, because it’s a series and not a movie?
You don’t get to have it both ways, just to make your position more convenient.
Anyway, people are acting like i’ve slammed the movie. I’m not doing that. I’ve said on multiple occasions that i had loads of fun. I just think it would have hung together better as a story if they had focused on explaining things a bit more.
And silenus, Hans Gruber gave us his motivation right there in the movie itself.
Is there a more readily comprehensible motive than greed?
Ronan is a militant Fundamentalist Kree. He is the “ISIS/Osama Bin Laden” of Kree. He cannot accept anyone who does not adhere to his fundamental interpretation of Kree beliefs and intends to destroy all those who do not accept his way. This includes Xandar for being diametrically opposed to those beliefs and his own government for signing a peace agreement he cannot/will not support. He comes out and explains that directly in the movie.
Yeah, for what it’s worth I found Ronan to be a scary villain immediately because of the religiony talk in his opening monologue. I thought, “Uh oh, we got a Kree-sus freak here. No reasoning with this guy. Can’t even convince a guy like this when he’s acting against his own self interests.”
The religious fundamentalism was clear to me at the start and explained everything I needed to know about this guy’s motivations.
If Thanos is making a move towards the Infinity Gauntlet does that mean the powers-that-be are intending on bringing in Galactus and the Silver Surfer? Haven’t all of the Infinity Gem storylines had Galactus showing up? No one else exists to challenge Thanos once he has the Gauntlet, and even Galactus falls.
If not who does Marvel have that can be used to tie ALL of the movies together?
Doctor Strange sets a time-travel plot in motion, retroactively tasking our heroes with missions in their respective classic back-when-problems-could’ve-been-solved days?
I just saw this movie today and was all excited to talk about it on the board but after wading through some of the negative nancy posts on here it’s killed my spirit. Seriously, the things that some of you get hung up on…
Yeah, I was trying to piece that together – I didn’t think he had opened the present, but the Star-Lord thing would have been too much of a coincidence for him not to have read the letter at all first… and I was trying to absorb a lot on the first pass through the movie, so I missed whether he tore open the envelope or just reopened it.
One funny thing I was distracted by – I was in IMAX (big screen!) and thus started to read the actual note on the paper … and I swear what the overdub said didn’t match the opening of what was on the paper… I only got to read about half the page before the visual cut out. I think it said something about what a bond they had because they were similar or something.
Some of his Earth comments were post 80s as well, but just because he works in space, doesn’t mean he can’t head to Earth now and again to intercept some HBO satellite broadcasts or whatnot.
