Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 3 was a movie that first we thought we were going to have seen a long time ago, before it became the movie we weren’t sure we would ever see at all. Now, it’s the movie that we will see before too long, and James Gunn is certainly as excited as anybody that the movie is on the way. He’s deep into the editing and post-production phase, and while he likes that part, he’s looking forward to actually seeing the people he made the movie with in a few months.
James Gunn shared a picture of the main cast of Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 3 from when production wrapped to his Instagram account. This marked the beginning of the post-production phase of the film, which Gunn says in the associated post, is his favorite part of filmmaking perhaps because filming Guardians 3 was actually quite difficult. And while that’s the case, he’s actually looking forward to his least favorite part of filmmaking in a few months, because it means he’ll be able to see everybody again.
It’s a great picture of James Gunn along with many of the cast members of the Guardians of the Galaxy franchise, including his brother Sean, Chris Pratt, Karen Gillan, Dave Bautista, Chris Pratt and Pom Klementieff. There is one member of the team missing of course. Gunn assures fans Zoe Saldana was part of this party, but she had to leave before the picture was taken.
There was a time when Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 3 was designed to be the first movie in Phase Four of the Marvel Cinematic Universe. Instead, it won’t even be part of Phase Four, as that phase of the MCU will end in November after the release of Black Panther: Wakanda Forever.
After James Gunn was initially let go from Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 3, it was unclear if we would ever see a third film in the series, and if we did, would it be the same movie? We learned later that Gunn’s time away from Marvel was fairly short lived, but he had agreed to make The Suicide Squad for WB in the interim, so the third Guardians movie took a backseat.
That's not to say we haven't had am embarrassment of Guardians of the Galaxy riches. We got a series of Groot focused shorts on Disney+, a Guardians of the Galaxy roller coaster at Walt Disney World, and we're going to get a Guardians Holiday Special at the end of the year.
Now, Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 3 is set to open next May, and we know it will make the end of Gunn’s time with these characters, and likely the end of the Guardians, or at least this iteration of the team. Considering the first two movies have been some of the most emotional in the entire MCU, we can expect Vol. 3 will be a powerful story.
