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Gamora has volunteered, and manipulated Ronan into sending her, for the mission to retrieve the treasure Peter is trying to sell. She's a good fighter, but Peter has obviously been through attempts to steal his goods before he sells them, because he unleashes his gadgets to get away from her and an new threat, a large, talking raccoon named Rocket, and Rocket's assistant, Groot.
Much has been made of Groot's only line, "I am Groot", mostly because he constantly repeats it throughout the movie, and in different tones of voice, which the other Guardians eventually learn to translate. Groot is the movie's idiot savant, asleep for the danger, awake for the money, a study of innocence but loaded with lots of defensive measures and a little bit of magic. He's powerful, and varies between passively taking Rocket's abuse and kicking ass against Ronan's minions. The movie starts with Groot appearing to be Rocket's long-suffering sidekick; the movie ends with Rocket, as well as the other Guardians, nurturing Groot's offshoot with love and devotion, impressed with the original's power, and awed by Groot's courage.
When Rocket, Groot, Peter and Gamora all get caught by The Nova Empire's Police/Air Force, and thrown into the planet Xandar's loathsome and hopeless prison, the Kyln. Gamora is a rock as the other prisoners describe the hellish revenge they plan for all she's killed in service to Ronan. She's not so impassive later, when a group of them manage to kidnap her for summary execution. Two people save her: Drax, a blue humanoid with red markings, dressed like a pro wrestler, stops the original executioners, but only so he can kill her himself. Peter, who snuck up on Gamora's kidnappers, intrigued that she tried to steal his treasure and maybe hoping he can learn what exactly it is from her. manages to convince Drax that keeping Gamora alive will eventually bring Ronan to Drax.
They succeed that night, but Gamora and Peter realize they better get out of prison before Drax gets impatient. Rocket and Groot are willing to help, but only for money, which Gamora comes through with; she has another buyer for the treasure Peter acquired, and the money is astronomical. Gamora's pretty sure it's legit, and that she can be free of Ronan with the money. When their escape is rocky at first, Drax comes through to help them successfully break out, but he insists on staying with Gamora for his promised revenge against Ronan. Peter agrees to let him and the others out on his ship. They get away, with Peter in control of the treasure, and Gamora in charge of arranging the hand-off and payment. Their escape features a sequence where Peter has to risk re-capture to recover his Walkman, and the Awesome Mix Tape Volume 1 inside. Which would he consider more important? A treasure worth enough that he can retire, or the music?
While Peter and his new friends have been in prison, Ronan's been conferring with Gamora's foster father: Thanos, last seen at the end of the original Avenger's Movie. Ronan is angry that Thanos' foster daughter is a traitor. Thanos is angry because he needs Peter's treasure to destroy the world Ronan wants revenge on. Thanos agrees she must be killed, but pines for her already. Thanos' other foster daughter, Nebula, burning over the traitor being favored over her, faithful to Thanos and whoever he sends her to serve. Thanos insists on the treasure Peter has, and Nebula will help Ronan recover it and kill Gamora. Ronan and Nebula's forces invade the Kyln prison just after Peter, the treasure, and his new frenemies have left; all they can do is brutally torture people into giving answers, and kill everyone left.
The newly formed Team Peter reaches a mining colony named Knowhere. Like the old mining towns of the Wild West, this place is an anything-goes spot, with plenty of drunken arguments and litter. Peter unsuccessfully tries to woo Gamora with his Awesome Mix Tape and his sob story about his mom dying, and all he has of her is the tape. Gamora's story is more traumatic; Thanos destroyed her world, her people, and her family, sparing her only so he could torture her into killing for him. With the treasure they've recovered in the hands she's about to put it in, the treasure cannot be used to destroy another world. Peter's a little more successful in stopping Rocket and Drax from whaling on each other while drinking and gambling.
Rocket, drunk and angry regales the entire establishment with a deep, shattering account of how every slight and humiliation over his obvious genetic mutations rips him apart inside, producing the sarcastic, selfish, quixotic creature he is. Peter tells him that by not keeping his shit together, he plays into the hands of people who would use him. They all do. No wonder they creep from job to job, prison to prison.
While they banter, Yondu meets with the same buyer who turned Peter down. Played by Michael Rooker, Yondu isn't some tortured good guy in a life of crime by bad circumstances. He loves being a bounty hunter and the head of the Ravagers, which is basically like an interstellar motorcycle gang. He repeatedly likes to remind Peter that when he at first kidnapped Peter as a kid, the other Ravagers wanted to eat Peter. He also loves whistling to control the magic arrow he keeps tucked in his belt. We'll get to see just why so many people are frightened of this arrow, including the buyer who will now tell Yondu just who he wanted to sell Peter's treasure to.
The buyer turns out to be from another post-credits Marvel movie scene - The Collector, played by Benicio Del Toro, has been collecting numerous oddities of the galaxy for... well... quite a while. It's a museum of artifacts as well as living things, including Cosmo, the Soviet space dog. The Collector helps us all out by explaining just what Peter's been carrying around.
It's an infinity stone. It was one of a few involved in the creation of the universe, and contains a ridiculous amount of energy, an infinite amount to be exact. Ages ago, six incredible people tried holding hands while one touched the infinity stone, thinking they'd be able to contain and use the energy. It fried them all. If an infinity stone touches organic, carbon-based matter, it will destroy it. It's been locked in a metal orb, so Peter and the gang have been safe from it, and the Collector will now keep it locked away forever. And everyone, except Drax, who went missing and couldn't be bothered to follow them here, will now get paid.
The Collector's poor, unwilling servant decides that the movie needs to last a little longer, and makes a grab for the Infinity Stone, thinking she'll be powerful enough to escape The Collector with it. When she touches it, the Stone demonstrates its power by basically electrocuting her and blowing up portions of The Collector's gallery. Which is good for Cosmo, because his glass cage is destroyed, and he's last seen wandering out of the gallery. It's bad for everyone else, even though they make it out without staying to see if they'll get paid. Before they go, they manage to re-close the orb around the Stone.
Peter and Gamora are now convinced that the only safe place for the Infinity Stone is back on Xandar, where they met, where the government there will protect the stone from anyone who wants to misuse it. Rocket is furious they didn't get paid. Groot is Groot. Just when they miss Drax, he appears, and behind him is the last group of people they want to see- Ronan, Nebula, and the Kree fighters backing them up. Drax, tired of waiting for Ronan to find Gamora, called Ronan himself. Horrified, Peter and Gamora head into mining ships, one-person craft with some minor equipment for cutting up rock, and not made to withstand going into space for any amount of time. Rocket and Groot make it to Peter's ship.
Drax, after plotting his revenge against Ronan for years for the death of his family, manages to get some face time with the guy, but it's totally unsuccessful. Not only is Ronan fifty bazillion times stronger, he doesn't even remember killing Drax's family, and gloats that he'll forget killing Drax, too. Drax ends up in the local fountain, lucky to be alive, even if he doesn't think so yet.
Peter and Gamora end the battle with their miner ships useless in space, Gamora's ship shot out, Gamora floating in space, Nebula racing off with the Infinity Stone, and Peter willingly leaving his ship to save Gamora, and get them both taken aboard the second-to-last place Peter wants to be: Yondu's spaceship, full of angry Ravagers.
Ronan, now in video conference with Thanos, and having the upper hand as he has the Stone and all think Gamora is dead, decides to double-cross Thanos by keeping the Infinity Stone for himself, grasping it in his bare hand, surviving the ordeal, and then placing it in his giant stone club. He's all ready to destroy Xandar himself, without Thanos. Nebula promises to help him destroy anything if he'll now kill Thanos. Someone has Daddy Issues.
Peter and Gamora, once awake and realizing the Stone is now in Ronan's hands, manage to get Yondu to cooperate, on the condition that Yondu will get the Stone in the end to sell as originally planned. When Peter and Gamora get back to Peter's ship, Rocket thinks it's a terrible deal and wants to bail. Gamora and Peter are totally dedicated to getting the Stone to Xandar and the Nova government; the galaxy they all live in is at stake, and they're totally ready to die trying.
Rocket is just as totally unconvinced. Drax, realizing he can't defeat Ronan on his own, and bitterly regretting not being a team player, is willing to die trying. I get the feeling Drax will always be willing to die trying. Played by Dave Bautista, Drax is a bundle of anger and honor. He's not bright, but Peter always seems to know how to reason with him. His species' inability to understand metaphors contributes a few jokes, but his job is to kick ass while simultaneously getting us to feel his inner pain, pain he can't avenge on his own and needs his new friends for.
The ensuing scene, where the rest of the group, including Groot, must convince Rocket that it's worth their lives to try to stop Ronan, is staged as the beginning of the Guardians. Sure, they worked together to escape prison. But now, they're so in tune with each other that everyone can translate for Groot now. Gamora, after a life of being raised by her greatest enemy and his lackeys, is just thankful to be with people who she cares about at all. Peter is desperate to save a galaxy he loves to traipse around. Drax wants to help after screwing them all so royally before. In the end Rocket realizes that he's not getting out of this, and that this crazy group of suicidal hero types might be his only chance at real friendship. He's reluctant, but once he's in the pilot's seat of Peter's ship, he's fully committed to getting the job done, or at least die doing as much damage to Ronan as possible.
Peter sets up the last battle by notifying Xandar's Nova Force that Ronan is coming. Nova Prime, played with the perfect amount of seriousness and good fun by Glenn Close, badgers Peter's contact in Nova Force, played to perfect bureaucrat perfection by John C. Reilly, into deciding that Peter is telling the truth, and they'd better take the warning seriously. It's a scene that demonstrates how Nova doesn't fuck around, doesn't take forever to make decisions, and at least tries to make some sense when governing multiple planets. In other words, they're the people who should really hold on to Infinity Stone.
The last battle involves over the top flying, both in space and atmosphere, a golden net formed by the Nova Force's Air Ships, pilots valiantly holding the line while The Guardians board Ronan's ship to deal with him personally. In the fight, Gamora must personally defeat Nebula, Rocket has a blast directing the battle from Peter's ship, and Yondu crash lands on Xandar. There, Yondu is confronted by multiple Kree fighters, only to demonstrate just how fast and deadly his whistle-controlled arrow is.
Nova Force, netted together, all goes down together, after buying the time the Guardians needed. Ronan simply blows their glowing net and ships to pieces. Fortunately, the Guardians are already confronting Ronan, and might have time to stop his genocide.
They bring Ronan's ship down, but the Guardians are all aboard at the time, and facing certain death. That is when Groot comes in, and brings the awesomeness. He has the ability to regrow himself, but demonstrates that he can do even more, slowly surrounding them all with a globe of newly-grown branches and vines, strong enough to protect his friends. Rocket is terrified, pointing out that Groot's move won't save Groot. Groot's only response is to smile and set out little glowing particles, so they won't be in the dark in his protective globe.
As the Guardians, surviving the crash on Xandar look through the remains of Groot, they can already call themselves the Guardians of the Galaxy. They've already earned the title. But we get an unpleasant surprise. Ronan, who survives the crash of his ship on Xandar, strides out to the horror of the civilians who have gathered at the crash site. With Ronan inches away from killing them all, Peter decides that he'll go out dancing. Reliving his favorite movie, Footloose, he sets out to teach Ronan how awesome dancing is. Gamora is just confused, but at least one other Guardian realized what was up. Ronan turns around to find himself hit. The Infinity Stone somehow gets out of Ronan's weapon, and Peter makes a grab for it before it can hit the surface of Xandar. He grabs it, and despite the movie's warnings, even survives holding it.
But he won't contain it for long. Mixed in with the scene where Peter's mother begs Peter to hold her hand seconds before dying, is Gamora's pleas for Peter to join hands with her before he dies. Peter understands his actions now as his attempt to correct his deeply regretted choice to abandon his mother as she died; he and Gamora try to hold the Stone's power together. Drax joins them, then Rocket. And they hold it together, despite all evidence they ever could, long enough for Peter to re-direct it's energy at Ronan, killing Ronan, and then re-contain the Stone in its metal orb.
Whew. The rest is just clean up. For the citizens of Xandar, literally. Their capital city is a fucking mess, but it's better than the shithole it would have been. Yondu shows up to collect the Stone, and Peter holds it behind his back long enough, before handing an orb off to Yondu, so that we already know he switched the Stone on Yondu. Yondu probably already suspects as well; when he discovers the deception, he's seems pleased, and can rest assured that Peter will be all right without him. He and a pal reminisce about kidnapping Peter years ago, and Yondu off-handedly admits he was hired by Peter's father to bring him to Dad after his Mom died.
The mystery of Peter's dad deepens when Nova Force, in thanks for his help, reveals that Peter is not entirely human, explaining why he could grasp the Stone for so long. He is partly an unknown creature, but strong and powerful enough to grasp the energy of the universe's beginning without dying. Peter's intrigued, but has nothing else to go on, and doesn't seem especially curious enough to make it his next quest. Instead, he suggests to his new crew, the rest of the Guardians, that they do something a little bit good, a little bit bad. Gamora, finally calling him the name he's wanted to be known by since the beginning of the movie, tells him to lead. After all, he started the party.
Finally called Star-Lord by someone who wasn't laughing at him, Peter feels he's finally earned the right to open a box. It's a going-away present from his mother, given to him moments before she died, and the only thing besides the Walkman and the his Awesome Mix Tape he had when taken from Earth years ago. And yes, it's a new Awesome Mix Tape. Volume 2. We float away to the sound of the Jackson 5, and Rocket holding onto a budding new Groot Jr., all of the Guardians already attached to their newest member. Even Drax, who is going to catch him dancing one day.
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