Groot! I have a tendency to love silent or largely
taciturn characters (see Sunny Baudelaire, WALL*E, or Bang Bang from The Brothers Bloom,) and Groot is a
fairly lovely, awesome example. A
delightful, surprisingly rich character was created from stellar CGI and dozens
of delivery variations of the same line.
From
the moment we meet him, it seems obvious that Groot isn’t the lynchpin of the
operation. As Rocket scopes out passerby
in search of potential bounties, everyone’s favorite walking, (sort-of) talking
arboreal lifeform is busy drinking water from a public fountain – the
toss-a-penny-in kind, not the
drinking kind. When Rocket catches him
in this less-than-hygenic display, Groot denies it, badly. The dynamic is instantly clear: Rocket, not
Groot, is the brains of the outfit. This
bears out numerous times throughout the movie.
Rocket reminds us through the regular aspersions he casts on Groot’s intelligence,
and Groot affirms it pretty well when he dives into a plan when only half of it
has been explained, returning to Rocket like a dog with a treat who has no
awareness that he’s just complicated a prison escape tenfold.
So, if
Groot can’t be the brains, that leaves him to be the muscle. And muscle he most certainly is. It’s not just his enormous size; Groot knows
how to throw down with his branches, which he can grow and extend at will. And while he never comes across as the
brightest bulb, he does seem to have
a good instinct for knowing when a massive show of force is needed. When Rocket has to exasperatedly feed him his
instructions, it’s usually less physical directives like, “Put that guy in that
bag” (it’s okay, Groot – genders can be confusing.) As far as intimidating dangerous inmates or
efficiently dispatching a mess of bad guys go, however, Groot doesn’t need
telling. I’m not sure if it’s because
Rocket has him well-groomed at this point on fighting or if it comes more
naturally to him, but he and Rocket are like a well-oiled machine on this
front.
Which
can seem bizarre because, despite his bulk and lethalness, one of the first
things you notice about Groot is how gentle he is. (Granted, at least some of that is the fact that all he can say is, “I
am Groot.” I think we have a tendency to
infantilize people/tree-based aliens who don’t speak well, particularly those
who can only utter one simple sentence.
Groot’s gentleness still holds up as a general characterization,
though.) While he can get down to
business quickly enough during the action scenes, his usual demeanor is more
“take time and smell the roses.” He
moves and speaks slowly, he enjoys simple pleasures (like fountain water,) and
he offers up touching displays of beauty with little prodding (like growing a
flower in his palm to give to a beggar child.)
And even when he’s at his most dangerous, he’s liable to turn around a
second later and give a sweet smile, again reminiscent of a proud dog coming to
his owner for approval.
And in
the end, the fighting and strongarming is in aid of his greater goal: protecting his friends. At first, his loyalty is reserved only for
Rocket – when everything hits the fan, he can found on multiple occasions executing
smooth, seamless movements to get Rocket to safety. It’s so fluid, it’s hard to tell if the two
are well-choreographed or if Rocket doesn’t have anything to do with it at all,
if Groot instead just picks him up or shields him with Rocket hardly even
realizing it. And later, as he gets to
know the others a little better, it’s not long before he gets into a similar
state of mind to always put their safety ahead of his. The other guardians tend to disregard Groot a
lot, but they shouldn’t, because there’s nothing he wouldn’t do for them.
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