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Guardians of the Galaxy Vol 2 is a slick space adventure film that combines stunning visuals, well-paced action, and genuinely funny comedy to create a great superhero film. Relying on solid acting and James Gunn’s playful scripting, the film is able to provide a credible story built around the theme of literally and figuratively overcoming the Ego.

As we discussed in a previous article, the first Guardians of the Galaxy film was built around the quest of each character to obtain power. The heroes eventually learn that giving up their self-interest and dedicating themselves to others is the only way to obtain supreme power, which is not found in any Infinity Stone. However, neither Thanos nor the Infinity Stones are found anywhere within the sequel.

This is symbolically important; once the Guardians have given up their need for physical power, they are able to grow as a team and become true heroes. The real problem they face is built around their attempt to find purpose, and self-interest is more corrupting than personal power.

Within the film, many of the characters are motivated by an attempt to discover their place within the universe or re-obtain the place they once found. It is a search for meaning. There are possible spoilers to follow.

The Two Freudian Concepts

Ego is the literal and figurative villain of the film. Under a less skillful director, using a character named “Ego” might be too on the nose (or on his face, as it is). However, Gunn downplays the name, incorporates most of his themes into the background, and uses action to prevent the film from becoming too heady. That doesn’t mean “ego” doesn’t play a role.

The character represents two important Freudian concepts: the Oedipal and the Ego/Superego/Id.

Of course the film does not match the traditional Oedipus story. Peter Quill (Chris Pratt) does not want to sleep with his mother; she is long dead. However, the first film shows him fleeing from her death yet becoming obsessed by her life. It was only in the end that Peter was able to let go by, ironically, grabbing onto surrogate, Gamora (Zoe Saldana).

However, in classic Freudian psychology, a male is supposed to channel his desires for his mother into a future mate, and the sequel reveals that Peter does have romantic feelings for Gamora.

But that does not mean that his mother is not still in play. The film is built around Ego (Kurt Russell) being Peter’s father who abandoned her a la the sailor of “Brandy (You’re a Fine Girl).” While Peter is willing to accept the tutelage of his long lost father at first, he eventually turns on the god following the reveal that it was Ego who gave his mother terminal cancer.

The final action scene is informed by this Freudian impulse to defeat the father, but Peter’s attack is based on far more than a biological imperative. He wants to save the universe from his father’s evil plot. This leads directly into the Ego/Superego/Id aspects of the film.

Overcoming the Self

Ego’s central motivation within the film is to find purpose. He is a celestial being of significant power but with no actual place. He was originally just a brain, a symbol of consciousness removed from all other considerations, and he serves as the manifestation of “ego” itself.

Peter is also looking for a place within the universe. After learning the lesson of the first film that true power comes from sacrifice, he starts on a quest to become a “guardian.” But there are still many questions: what is he guarding against? how will he know he has succeeded? and who will care?

Parental issues are primarily aspects of the superego, but Ego, the character, is both Peter’s father figure and his own internal struggle. He can be seen as Peter’s ego.

Ego provides Peter with a purpose. He explains to Peter that they are celestials, lower forms of divinity that have great power. He even helps Peter unlock his own power, and it becomes clear that both are necessary to completing Ego’s original quest. However, the cost is to join in an action that would destroy the universe and remake it in their image.

Peter struggles against Ego, using the same celestial power against the other, but Ego’s power cannot be defeated by his own power. Instead, it must be given up, and Ego’s threat that to defeat him would mean that Peter must become mortal shows that power is once again on the line. Peter chooses mortality, an easy choice following the first movie.

Return of the Family

To give up power and glory requires one to give up the self, and Peter uses everything Ego has given him to allow his friends to escape. It is his battle, and it is his choice to die. However, Peter is not the only one who learns to give up power and glory.

Just as Gamora serves as a surrogate for Peter’s mother, Yondu (Michael Rooker) serves as a surrogate for Peter’s father. Yondu did many bad things, and he was obsessed with his own reputation as a Ravager. However, he gives up his personal glory and ambition to save Peter in the end.

Symbolically, Yondu represents the other half of the father that Ego is, and he is necessary to overcoming the celestial. Yondu teaches Peter to stop “thinking” and rely on his subconscious to control his power, which is the denial of the ego and allowing the Id to take over. It is one of the many lessons that Yondu imparts to Peter over the years, but it is not the final one.

Ultimately, Peter is unable to win on his own, as he faces certain death through victory. It is only through Yondu’s sacrifice that the father is completely purged from Peter’s life. It is a death that reinforces the lessons of both films and shows that heroism requires something greater.

Peter can only move forward, in the Freudian sense, when he can overcome his father. Having both father figures die allows Peter to become his own man with his own destiny, and the sacrifice of Yondu encourages him towards the right path. In essence, the external battle is representative of the internal battle.

The Chain

On another level, there are two songs that are battling for supremacy within the film. “Brandy” is Ego’s anthem, and it represents the nature of love as existing across long distances without a need for physicality. Hidden under a seemingly sweet and beautiful song is the idea of abandonment, and it hints at the emotional trauma that comes from obsessing over the past.

Fleetwood Mac’s incredible song “The Chain,” with one of the most recognizable guitar rifts and base lines, serves as a foil to “Brandy” and reveals the darker side at play. Instead of a sailor who abandoned a young woman and left her to pine forever, “The Chain” is a raw and forceful tune that has two singers almost screaming at each other in torment as they are bound together yet emotionally distant.

When looking at the two songs, it becomes apparent that love cannot merely be a word but a commitment, a series of actions dedicated to helping others instead of using them. Both songs reveal a poisonous obsession, differing only in the distance of the lovers, and they suggest that people justify their obsession by calling it love.

True love requires an act of self-sacrifice, which is antithetical to Ego’s whole purpose. In the end, Peter overcomes his family (the superego) and his glory (the ego) to become something greater. Perhaps it was through Peter’s mortality, or possibly from the lessons he learned through both movies, that he is able to reject his father on a primal level (id) and recognize just how destructive selfishness can be.

Gunn’s multilayered approach in portraying this theme was expertly done, and every little detail of the the film reinforces this ultimate lesson on sacrifice. The story of Peter obtaining true power and finding true purpose in both films is a story of heroics in general, and Yondu’s memory will always live on while Ego’s will be a legacy of nothingness.