Despite Groot sacrificing himself to save his friends in Guardians of the Galaxy, moviegoers were fortunately spared from having to go through the rest of the Marvel Cinematic Universe without the beloved talking tree. Thanks to Rocket saving one of his twigs, Groot began the slow process of regrowing, and Baby Groot will officially jump into action next year for Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2. However, there's been conflicting information about how much the newly-small Groot will remember of his "past" life, and the latest bit of news suggests he won't remember anything about his past.
One of the number of consistently-asked questions director James Gunn answered today on Facebook was whether Baby Groot has the same memories as Groot, to which he gave a straightforward "No." Right before that, Gunn listed the question "Is Baby Groot the same as Groot, or Groot's son?" He responded to that with a simple:
It's complicated.
It all seems pretty straightforward, right? The problem is that a couple weeks ago, Marvel Studios president Kevin Feige said that Baby Groot will remember what's happened to him before, saying that he's not mentally a baby. So then what's really going on here? Well, these nuggets of information appear conflicting at first, but maybe what's going on here is a bit of both answers.
When providing his own Groot information, Kevin Feige compared Baby Groot to how Spock was in Star Trek III: The Search for Spock, i.e. when the Vulcan's katra was reunited with his body after it was resurrected by the Genesis matrix. Following this event, it took a while for Spock to return to "normal" (as seen in Star Trek IV: The Voyage Home), so maybe Groot is going through a similar transition. Gunn said earlier in the Q&A that Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2 tales place only a few months after the first movie, so when fans reunite with the intergalactic heroes, Groot possibly hasn't recovered his memories yet. However, as the story progresses, he may finally regain them either on his own or through some kind of event. On the other hand, if this is indeed a brand new Groot, then it may be impossible to get those memories back.
However this memory situation resolves itself, moviegoers don't have to worry about Baby Groot not being entertaining in Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2. His personality will be different due to not having the wisdom and experience of the bigger Groot, but he'll still be a valuable member of the Guardians, like when he rescues Rocket and Yondu from a group of Ravagers, as seen in the San Diego Comic-Con footage. It also remains to be seen whether he'll remain small for the whole movie or if something will accelerate his growth so he goes back to being normal-sized.
Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2 flies into theaters on May 5, 2017.
