American James Gunn (b.1966) is known in the industry and among specialized critics and worldwide cinephilia for having made two of the funniest films in the Marvel Cinematic Universe, the two volumes of Guardians of the Galaxy, and for having known how to transfer that hooligan humor to the DC Extended, saving it a bit from its inconsistent drift with Suicide squad, who has joined Wonder woman (Patty Jenkins, 2017) and The Justice League (Zack Snyder, 2021) as the most decent of this irregular superhero saga.
Of course, with his curriculum focused on the most commercial cinema above all, has not been able to obtain any award in the most prestigious competitions; and has even been nominated in the anti-Oscars, the Razzie Awards, for his participation in the episode film Movie 43 (2013).
Critics’ assessment of James Gunn’s feature films
This is the ranking of James Gunn’s best films based on area information Rotten tomatoes for critics:
- Guardians of the Galaxy (2014): average grade of 7.8 out of 10 on 333 reviews.
- Suicide squad (2021): half of 7.5 in 341 reviews.
- Guardians of the Galaxy, vol. 2 (2017): half of 7.2 on 422 reviews.
- Slither: The Plague (2006): half of 6.9 on 141 reviews.
- Super (2010): half of 5.7 on 124 reviews.
The opinion of Rotten Tomatoes moviegoers
We went to Rotten Tomatoes again, but this time for the first ranking of James Gunn’s films according to the votes of its users:
- Guardians of the Galaxy: average grade of 4.4 out of 5 with more than 250,000 votes.
- Guardians of the Galaxy, vol. 2: half of 4.1 with more than 100,000 votes.
- Suicide squad: half of 4.1 with more than 2,500 votes.
- Slither: half of 3.4 with more than 100,000 votes.
- Super: half of 3.3 with more than 5,000 votes.
The opinion of IMDb moviegoers
On the other hand, these are the data that IMDb also provides us on the opinion of the public about the work of James Gunn:
- Guardians of the Galaxy: average grade of 8 out of 10 with 1,090,013 votes.
- Guardians of the Galaxy, vol. 2: half of 7.6 with 607,533 votes.
- Suicide squad: half of 7.4 with 179,873 votes.
- Super: half of 6.7 with 77,552 votes.
- Slither: half of 6.5 with 78,112 votes.
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The opinion of Filmaffinity moviegoers
And finally, here is the information that Filmaffinity offers us about James Gunn:
- Guardians of the Galaxy: average grade of 6.9 out of 10 with 58,904 votes.
- Guardians of the Galaxy, vol. 2: half of 6.7 with 35,802 votes.
- Suicide squad: half of 6.6 with 7,440 votes.
- Super: half of 6.2 with 7,140 votes.
- Slither: half of 4.9 with 4,806 votes.
Conclusions about the best and worst of James Gunn
The almost total unanimity Among the specialized critics and the moviegoers who vote online, it is extremely atypical, and it occurs with the work of James Gunn. Some reader could say that he has only shot five feature films and, if there were more, things would be difficult. But it is enough to make a comparison with the data of other directors in a similar situation, such as Darren Aronofsky or Alejandro González Iñárritu, to verify that it is not so easy.
The fact is that both the critics and the public of Rotten Tomatoes, IMDb and Filmaffinity consider that Guardians of the Galaxy stands out as the best of the filmmaker American. And the only disagreement is on the worst movie of the same: both film critics and Rotten Tomatoes users point to Super for that dubious honor; and, when it comes to IMDb and Filmaffinity voters, they lean towards Slither: The Plague.