You'll be pleasantly surprised with the GoW story if you're expecting NG/DMC caliber story. It's not oscar worthy, but it's certainly better than the average action game.
Yeah, I'd go as far as saying that they had a better story than some actual story-drive games like RE and MGS. GOW doesn't have deep combat like NG/DMC but it's a much tighter package with platforming, puzzles, and great narration. Hell it has more puzzles than most adventure games out there.
On that note, GOWII does give you a mini rundown/narration of what happened in the first game. I didn't like the first game much to be honest, but GOWII was a blast from start to finish.