Can ‘Guardians’ go on without Gunn?
Since James Gunn’s firing, doubt hangs over the future of the superhero space romp
Pity the cast members of Guardians of the Galaxy
who defended its director James Gunn after he was sacked by Disney over offensive tweets posted a decade ago. Their attempt to stand tall alongside the filmmaker might have been more effective had all but Bradley Cooper’s Rocket Raccoon and Karen Gillan’s Nebula not been killed off or disintegrated by Thanos during the events of Avengers: Infinity War.
Every Marvel fan expects the full crew, with the possible exception of Zoe Saldana’s Gamora, to spin back into reality at some point. But in terms of bargaining positions, it is probably fair to say Theresa May’s hopes of securing a favourable post-Brexit settlement from the EU look more promising.
Now the mastermind behind this particular iteration of the Guardians has been fired, Marvel could go with a new team of cosmic crazies in the already announced Guardians of the Galaxy 3, should it fail to assuage the current team’s highly vocal chagrin.
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There is probably no director more intimately connected with his own corner of the Marvel Cinematic Universe (MCU) than Gunn, whose impressive stewardship of the first Guardians of the Galaxy film in 2014 paved the way for Marvel to begin exploring the vast comic book realms beyond Earth’s borders.
Without Guardians and its 2017 sequel, Thor might still be battling with irritating space elves, Hulk would never have got out of his solar system and Thanos might never have entered our consciousness.
Gunn also successfully introduced far-out alien races such as the godlike Celestials, warlike Krees and ohso-genetically-perfect Sovereigns, papering over any logic cracks with supercharged smarts and bombastic cosmic chicanery. Gunn’s departure has cast doubt over the future of the series.
In part, this is because Marvel has achieved mixed results after previous directorial switches. Shane Black did an excellent job on Iron Man 3 after taking the baton from Jon Favreau, adding emotional gravitas to the character of Tony Stark as well as intriguing sleight of hand and an amiable willingness to subvert Marvel’s comic-book roots with the introduction of Ben Kingsley’s Mandarin/Trevor Slattery.
But the studio’s decision to replace Edgar Wright with Peyton Reed, after the former had spent eight years developing 2015’s Ant-Man, resulted in the weakest MCU episode since Thor: The Dark World.
Who should Marvel turn to now? The fan favourite is Taika Waititi, who proved with last year’s Thor: Ragnarok
The fan favourite is Taika Waititi, who proved with last year’s Thor: Ragnarok that he has the comedy chops to take the superhero space romp to a whole new level.
that he has the comedy chops to take the superhero space romp to a whole new level. That film’s breakout character, the squeaky rock monster Korg (voiced by Waititi), would make a welcome addition to the ranks of the Guardians, whether or not the studio decides to plump for a new team after Thanos’s devastating finger-snap.
If the Marvel supremo Kevin Feige wants to retain the formula that made the first Guardians a hit, he could do worse than bring back the screenwriter Nicole Perlman, who worked on the film for several years before Gunn was hired. She clearly continues to be admired by the studio, or it would not have offered her the chance to write next year’s potential MCU game-changer, Captain Marvel.
If Waititi is unavailable to direct, Reed could be approached. Given time to develop the Ant-Man sequel, Ant-Man and the Wasp, the filmmaker produced a highly effective follow-up with more comic energy than one of Thor’s lightning strikes.
And all this from a pipsqueak property few thought would hold its own alongside Marvel’s real giants. The introduction of Michelle Pfeiffer’s Janet van Dyne into the MCU was so deftly handled that all talk of the character’s troubling comic book back story disintegrated into smoke — like one of Thanos’s victims.
Marvel will have to take a deep breath and get on with the job of deciding who takes Guardians of the Galaxy forward, and how.
Because unlike Star Lord, Groot and Gamora, who could be resurrected with a twist of the time stone in Infinity War’s asyet-untitled sequel, there will surely be no rematerialisation for Gunn in the MCU after the past few weeks’ revelations.