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Tuesday, February 25, 2014

Guardians Of The Galaxy: Gunn On CG Characters, Thanos, More

Since the debut of the teaser trailer for the film adaptation of Marvel's "Guardians Of The Galaxy" last week, director James Gunn's been chatty about the film...


The Guardians of the Galaxy comic book follows a US pilot who ends up in space during a universal conflict, then is forced to go on the run with a band of futuristic alien ex-cons.

Chris Pratt is Peter Quill/Star-Lord-The character is an interplanetary policeman and the Guardians leader who is born of a human mother and alien father.

WWE superstar Dave Bautista plays Drax the Destroyer who born as the human Arthur Douglas, whose family was attacked and murdered by the villainous Thanos (seen in the credt post-script of The Avengers). Arthur's spirit was then placed into a powerful new body by Kronos, which resulted in Drax the Destroyer's creation. The superhero's powers include incredible strength and the ability to emit energy blasts from his hands.

Zoe Saldana is Gamora a "green-skinned humanoid who is the last of a species that was exterminated by a race known as the Badoon" who also "happens to be a skilled assassin."

"The Walking Dead" fave Michael Rooker plays Yondu Udonta who first appeared in a 1969. He hails from the Zatoan tribe on Centauri IV, the first planet to be colonized outside of the Sun's solar system in the 29th Century. Yondu does not possess any super-human abilities, but he is a skilled hunter with a bow and arrow, and has a mystical "sixth sense" that gives him limited empathic abilities with other life forms. He is one of the founding members of the group.

The lovely Ophelia Lovibond plays "The Collector" who "gathers artifacts and beings in the hopes of saving them from a foretold galactic annihilation."

John C. Reilly has been offered the role of Rhomann Dey in the film who is said to be "Agent Coulson of the 'Guardians' movies," a human agent who serves as a go-between with S.H.I.E.L.D. This is quite different from the comic character, described as an alien centurion in the Nova Corps. There's were reports that the studio was interested in either Hugh Laurie, Alan Rickman or Ken Watanabe to play the role of a colleague of the Dey's.

Glenn Close is "playing a leadership role in Nova Corp, the intergalactic space patrol. ... Close’s role would be the closest thing to the one that Samuel L. Jackson plays in Avengers movie.

Benicio Del Toro is playing The Collector. who is billions of years old and does exactly that - collect rare or valuable items from across the universe. He also has the power of prophecy and created a museum of countless life forms to keep them safe from Thanos.

Lee Pace plays the villain Ronan The Accussor is an alien Kree with superhuman powers. He was a villain, but has become more heroic in the comics - so he'll probably have an arc in the film.

Actress Karen Gillan is set to play Nebula  a space pirate and the apparent granddaughter of Thanos.

Vin Diesel will be providing the voice for Groot who can absorb wood to gain strength, as well as control trees. The surprise here is that the is not as high as profile a role as many though it was going to be.

Bradley Cooper will provide the voice for Rocket Raccoon who has a penchant for big guns and is also a master tactician. He’s best friends with Groot and in the comics was captain of a starship.

Talking with Pointless Podcast Gunn discussed the flick's two CG characters--On Cooper's Rocket Raccoon:

"Rocket is a result of countless and cruel, illegal genetic experiments, where he's been turned--from an innocent little creature, where he has an IQ of three, and he becomes this thing that's completely alone; this gnarled little beast... he's pretty sad."

And then there''s the walking tree Groot who only says one line--About Diesel's performance, Gunn says:

"All of the 'I am Groots' that were earlier voices didn't sound very good at all, they sounded like sh#t. It just didn't work. Then Vin Diesel came in and, in one day, [laid] down all these 'I am Groot' tracks, and he's a perfectionist. He made me explain to him exactly what [Groot] was saying [before each delivery]."

Gunn was asked about adapting the 'Infinity Gauntlet' limited series from the comics:

"Here's the thing, truthfully the Marvel Cinematic Universe takes out of both the Earth-616
and Ultimate Marvel Comics universe, and then they recreate some elements themselves. What Thanos wants in the comics is not necessarily what Thanos wants in the movies; we don't know yet."

Finally, Gunn says he really liked that Guardians afforded him much more time to create awesome shots that both "Slither" and "Super" did not:

"There's one shot that I'm thinking of; the characters are imprisoned early on in the movie and there's this overhead shot of Peter Quill and he's sleeping on the floor in what we call the Locked Up Abroad shot. It's Quill surrounded on the floor with all these different aliens, disgusting, they're all sleeping, packed together like sardines. It was just a really beautiful shot and we have it overhead completely with the camera slightly revolving as he's sitting there wide awake and all these gross aliens are asleep around him. I was able to take time and compose the shot in the same way you would design a painting, and changing little guys. It wasn't like it took an extraordinary time to do it, but we took some time at doing and that was something that I'd had really never been able to do in my entire career."

Gregg Henry also stars in the film.

Screenwriter Chris McCoy was hired to rewrite Nicole Perlman’s original script.

The film arrives August 1, 2014.

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