To be honest, I initially never wanted to see this movie. A lot of people, myself included, thought  that this was going to be the first Marvel flop (worse than Iron Man 2). But as always Marvel knows how to entertain people. Guardians of the Galaxy is now one of my favorite Marvel movies. The film is directed by James Gunn and stars Chris Pratt (Parks and Recreation), Zoe Saldana (Avatar), Lee Pace, Dave Batista, and features the voices of Bradley Cooper (Silver Linings Playbook) as Rocket and Vin Diesel (Fast and Furious movies) as Groot.

Unlike the Avengers, the movie did a great job of introducing the individual characters in under 5 minutes (each character introduction was about one minute). Also, the characters were all unknown to everyone–they began as criminals and brought together in prison by accident. Eventually that accidental joint grew to friendship and teamwork. This was especially evident when they agree to stop Ronan from destroying the planet Xandar. Ironically that’s where the Guardians were imprisoned for the first half of the movie, so it was a (somewhat) awkward situation when Quill asks for their help.

Another thing that made the movie entertaining was the music. As a big music fan, I got really excited when I saw the Awesome Mixtape on iTunes because I knew most of the songs on there. The way the movie incorporated the songs were also very entertaining I actually giggled every time I saw a musical scene!

Lastly, Guardians of the Galaxy brought a lot of Marvel-style humor. Humor is one of the main components of Marvel entertainment so there’s no question it had a LOT of it, with the majority coming from Peter Quill and Rocket. Honestly, I think Rocket deserves an award for the Best Scene Stealer ever.

The only problem of this movie was the post-credit scene. I was expecting a scene that’ll lead to a future movie, like Ant-Man, but I thought this scene was completely random (unless Marvel is secretly setting up a Howard the Duck movie).

So I don’t know if it was a smart idea or a stupid decision for Marvel to include what they did in the trailer. Either way, I thought that the movie was phenomenal. I’d definitely recommend it to other Marvel fans and superhero fans in general.

When I saw The Maze Runner back in September, I did not read the books. This was one of my times where I come to the novel-to-film books blind. I was very impressed with the acting and the story. Although I heard that the movie was different than the book, I’m sure the changes were for a good reason (and it was!). The movie stars Dylan O’Brien (Teen Wolf), Will Poulter (We’re the Millers), Thomas Brodie-Sangster (Game of Thrones), and Kaya Scodelario (Skins, Clash of the Titans).

Here’s a quick rundown: after Thomas’s memories are erased, he finds himself deposited in a community of boys. They soon learn that they’re trapped in a maze that requires Thomas to join forces with the “runners” to find an escape route.  I liked how the movie commented on the government’s inability to handle an epidemic, especially one that has spread worldwide. In the case of the movie, the organization WICKED tries to eradicate the Flare disease by establishing the Glade.

The movie is a modern day Lord of the Flies with an element of Survivor in there. I’d totally recommend this movie to anyone. My goal before the sequel is to read the books. I want to see the changes they did from the book and also read the next two books to know what to expect (sort of because I know that the sequel is gonna be slightly altered because of the previous events of the first film).