Guardians of the Galaxy Vol.3 and Animal Rights
Yes, I know this is a bit late, but, suck it, I still have something to say about this movie.
SPOILER ALERT: IF YOU HAVEN’T SEEN GUARDIANS OF THE GALAXY VOL. 3, THIS GIVES AWAY A LOT
I, I assume like most people, like a good Marvel movie. Also, I assume, like most people, I have my favorites, and that would include the Guardians of the Galaxy franchise (though the second one was a bit out there). I am, I should say, a casual fan. I don’t generally remember all the characters’ names, most of the subtler plot points and, to be honest, probably a lot of the more obvious plot points. But I do enjoy sitting in a theater (or at home if necessary) and letting the mayhem wash over me while I, sort of, follow the story line.
My fondness for Marvel movies started during the pandemic, when I made it a project to watch them all, in chronological order. I will forever be grateful for that experience, as I will be for anything that helped pass the days for me and Rose the Pit Bull during that fraught and lonely time.
Anyway, though I meant to catch it in the theaters, I only just managed to watch Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 3, and it definitely didn’t disappoint. I had heard it had something to do with animal rights, and that the main protagonist was Rocket, the enhanced raccoon. But, you know how it is -- I didn’t really think it would be a big deal. Excitement about cultural developments vis a vis animals isn’t often warranted.
But, the fact is, it was really good. If you haven’t seen it, and you don’t hate Marvel movies, I recommend it. Of course, the animal heroes, including the victims of horrific abuse (one reason you might not want to see the movie is that these parts are really hard to watch) -- particularly Rocket, but also some friends of his from his early life -- were supposed to be genetically enhanced, so they weren’t really animals. They were more like the talking animals you might run into in children’s books and cartoons.
Sometimes it’s hard to understand whether those depictions make people think about real animals or whether it makes real animals disappointing in comparison, because they don’t talk, etc. They are, in a lot of ways, more stand-ins for people than animals.
But for one thing, those aren’t the only animals who are involved here. There is a horde of animals who are released at the end (Don’t yell at me. I gave you a spoiler alert!) who were being held for experiments, but we never find out if they were enhanced. And I actually don’t think that matters one way or another to most people who watch the film. We are all rooting for all of them to get out.
In fact, and probably more important, I am not sure that the enhanced animals, including Rocket, are, in most people’s minds, standing in for people. Instead of standing in for people, I think, for at least some viewers, they may actually be standing in for real animals, but in a way that people can relate to them more clearly. So I’m actually not sure at all that they are irrelevant to people’s attitudes toward real animals.
So, perhaps most important, I think, is that all of these depictions, whether realistic or not, may be a sign that the culture accepts that animals matter, that animals are suffering, and that the good people care. Honestly, the details might not actually matter that much. What we need more than anything is to keep hammering at the idea that it’s normal to care about animals, so when you do, you don’t have to bury that feeling. You can act on it, and lots of people will think that’s ok. People want to be normal. Making it normal, even admirable, to care about animals gives people permission to act on the feelings that most of them already have.
That’s why I think this movie was significant. Which brings me to the biggest reason for that conclusion, i.e., the incredibly disappointing mid-credits tease. For Marvel non-watchers, the movies are well-known for these clips inserted during the interminable credits that generally foreshadow movies to come. And in this one, the filmmakers, in my mind, chose to completely and utterly undermine the message of the movie. In showing the new Guardians group (will there really be a Guardians movie without Chris Pratt?), their project for that moment in time is to protect some innocent humanoids from a herd of aggressive animals about to attack them. What possible reason could there be for this weird piece tacked onto the end? It was not entertaining or appealing or really particularly comprehensible. I can’t imagine it made people think, wow, this next movie is going to be amazing!
Then I realized. This has got to be what we refer to on the Our Hen House podcast as “Rising Anxieties,” i.e., a realization by the powers that be that people are catching on to what is happening to animals and, if they continue to do so, and actually wake up, it could change the way that the world works, so we had better do something about it.
Basically, I think it must have dawned on someone, at some point during post-production, that the story of the movie itself, while compelling, and likely to appeal to audiences, was leaning a bit hard on the animal rights message. And that might have some weird implications, because, as far out there as the Marvel movies may be, there was really nothing in Volume 3 regarding what folks were doing to animals that someone wouldn’t do right here on earth, if they could and there were money in it. I mean if we are willing to torture animals just to eat their dead bodies, certainly it would be ok to do it to create the much better world that was the megalomaniacal goal of the animal experimentation seen in the movie.
It's my guess that, at some point, someone must have realized that this could make people uncomfortable. So, call me paranoid (you won’t be the first), but I am willing to bet that the word was sent down from on high to temper that message by using the mid-credits coda. So it isn’t that the Guardians are protecting animals, just that they are protecting any kind of innocent victims. And sometimes the perpetrators of evil against such victims are monstrous, monomaniacal genius humanoids. And sometimes they are a herd of animals. And the Guardians will protect us from all of them. I mean, the Guardians aren’t vegan, for chrissake.
dear mariann and jasmin,
thank you as always for your thoughtful pieces!
i didn't even realize there was a venn diagram sweet spot for my experience of veganism and the marvel cinematic universe, but here it is!
this is funny:
"I don’t generally remember all the characters’ names, most of the subtler plot points and, to be honest, probably a lot of the more obvious plot points. But I do enjoy sitting in a theater (or at home if necessary) and letting the mayhem wash over me while I, sort of, follow the story line."
this is meaningful:
"This has got to be what we refer to on the Our Hen House podcast as... a realization by the powers that be that people are catching on to what is happening to animals and, if they continue to do so, and actually wake up, it could change the way that the world works, so we had better do something about it."
thank you for sharing as always!
love
myq