GOTG3 Does The Netflix Marvel Shows Proud With The MCU's Best Hallway Fight
Contains spoilers for "Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 3"
What is it about hallways and heroes? From "Oldboy" to "The Matrix" and "Inception," movies are rife with amazing hallway battles that aren't just amazingly designed and choreographed action, but rank among the best individual moments in their respective movies. The hallway action scene is a staple of superhero franchises and sci-fi movies, and since "Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 3" is both, it's only natural that the movie set out to feature a hallway fight for the ages.
That's not an easy feat, either. The Netflix Marvel shows wrote the book of what can be done with a cool costumed crusader and a murky hallway, with Daredevil (Charlie Cox) in particular leading the way. These fight scenes have become so connected to the blind superhero that "She-Hulk: Attorney at Law" explicitly parodies them, and though other Marvel characters have also dabbled with the concept on occasion, the superhero hallway fight is most clearly connected to the good people in the "Defenders" saga.
At least, that's how it used to be. With its third-act hallway battle, "Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 3" marries the hallway concept with the big-budget "one-shot" battles major MCU movies use every once in a while ... and the end result is easily the best MCU hallway fight yet.
Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 3 hallway battle is a combination of great concepts
The one-shot hallway battle is a classic of the genre, thanks to the aforementioned "Oldboy" and, of course, "Daredevil." However, this version of the hallway fight is a hard-hitting, gritty affair that keeps things as realistic as you can expect from a scene where a single protagonist defeats dozens of opponents. The MCU has also created a "one-shot" classic of its own in the "Avengers battle scene" — the huge, climactic battle where the camera often swoops from hero to hero as they strike up their pre-battle poses or unleash their signature moves against the enemies. The genius of the "Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 3" hallway fight is that it takes the best parts of both concepts and marries them into a smooth, bone-crunching sci-fi sequence.
The Guardians' battle against the High Evolutionary's (Chukwudi Iwuji) elite forces is a thing of violent beauty. The camera spins and soars all over the battlefield as it transitions from one team member to another as they punch, kick, shoot, dodge, and explode their way through the opposition, before finally ending with Gamora's (Zoe Saldana) miniboss fight against the biggest, baddest monster in the corridor. Like the rest of the movie, the scene is considerably more violent and gory than you'd usually expect from the MCU, which fits the classic hallway battle aesthetics perfectly ... and thanks to the painstakingly choreographed big-budget MCU swooping camera approach, the end result looks gorgeous.
Expectations for "Daredevil: Born Again" were already sky-high before "Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 3" arrived. Now that the threequel has dropped what just might be destined to become the definitive MCU hallway fight, the upcoming Disney+ show no doubt feels the pressure to give us something even cooler.