It was already in-the-wind that some version or another of “Guardians of The Galaxy” was going to be the Marvel/Disney 2014 movie that would hit after “Captain America 2” (now officially subtitled “The Winter Soldier”) and serve as a lead-in to “Avengers 2.” Now it’s been confirmed at SDCC, and we have official concept-art revealing the team lineup:
Who the hell are you looking at? Hit the jump…
It looks like they’re going with the more recent version, where the Guardians are an all-star (figuratively-speaking) team of cosmic/space-oriented Marvel characters. From left to right, the movie lineup seems to include:
DRAX THE DESTROYER – a Jim Starlin creation whose origin coincided with the first appearance of Thanos, who is the person Drax is supposed to be destroying.
GROOT – He’s a talking tree; originating as one of Jack Kirby’s many, many Earth-invading space-monsters from Marvel’s pre-superhero days, later ressurected as a Hulk foe and more recently as part of Marvel’s “cosmic” roster.
STAR-LORD – Human astronaut born under cosmically-influenced circumstances, eventually becomes a spacefaring paramilitary-type who has a Master Chief/Cortana kinda thing going on with his sentient, psychically-linked spaceship “Ship.”
ROCKET RACCOON – He’s exactly what he looks like. That’s right, while certain other studios are wringing their hands about whether things as “weird” as Wonder Woman or “silly” as Robin can work on film, Marvel/Disney is headling a multimillion dollar space-epic with a talking, gun-toting raccoon.
GAMORA – Thanos adopted daughter, later turned “good.” Usually wears significantly less clothing than pictured here.
It’s going to be interesting to see how this is recieved. It’ll be the first Marvel Studios film that’s decidedly not a superhero movie (they’ve been touting it as something more in the vein of Star Wars) and it’s easily the most obscure property they’ll have adapted to the screen to date. One assumes that, with two Thanos-related guys on the team and Thanos’ all-but-given stature as “Avengers 2’s” heavy, they’ll be counting on the “this sets up Avengers 2” factor to draw in the die-hards; but are mainstream audiences really going to line-up for what will look like “The Adventures of Tree-Person and Cartoon Animal?”
At some point, the Marvel Cinematic Universe is going to have to learn how to accomodate “niche” movies alongside four-quadrant blockbusters like they’ve been making so far. Edgar Wright’s “Ant-Man,” for example, is probably not destined to do “Thor’s” numbers, but if produced responsibly with realistic goals it doesn’t need to. “Guardians,” on the other hand, is going to cost quite a bit to make and will have to do sizable business to be worth it, financially.
I wouldn’t be surprised to see the individual members (or traces of them) turning up in the more familiar characters’ sequels to try and get people more invested in them as things go on.
MOVIEBOB CENTRAL 
I'm looking forward to this, and Ant-Man as well.
But I really want a Black Widow/Hawkeye movie, come on there is so much room for potential right there! A sort of spy movie set amongst a world that's a little bit stranger then our own.
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this totally has the potential to work, and I mean really work, I don't see it as the kind of teen fodder that is Iron Man or…god help you TASM or the adult kind of film that Captain America or Dark Knight is, if this is played as way more of a strait forward skin deep kids scifi fun flick I think that'll sell.
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I honestly hope that the post-credits reveal for Iron Man 3 has Rocket Raccoon showing up a la Nick Fury in the first one. That would be…amazing. If only to see what kind of look Downey Jr. will give to that situation. I'm going for mildly surprised or “At this point, who gives a fuck”.
Raccoon: “Stark. We have to talk.”
Stark: “Oh, yeah. Sure. Talk. Yeah, let's talk. There's a talking space-raccoon in my living room, and he wants to talk–you are a space-raccoon, right?”
Raccoon: “Yeah.”
Stark: “Thought so. Sure, why not? Let's talk. Maybe I can get you a drink, too. *under his breath* Talking space-raccoon. Remember when I built hot-rods and slept with calendar models? Yeah, me neither.”
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As a DC fanboy, every time Marvel/Disney does something like this, I feel two things. My heart leaps for joy at the awesome things they're doing, then immediately shatters when I think of how at the opposite end of the spectrum, even greater potential is being squandered at Warner/DC. I'd like nothing more than to see both companies crank out awesome adaptions of my favorite increasingly obscure characters year after year. And while I'm wishing, I'd like Marvel to take a note from DC and stop sucking at making cartoons.
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No Moondragon. I am disappointed.
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Rocket Raccoon. Um… I don't know how he is in the comics, but I cannot imagine how this character could ever work. I'm picturing every terrible CG-only comic relief character right now, he'll probably be voiced by John Leguizamo or something and be endlessly annoying. They could have at least made him anthropomorphic, like a denizen of the Star Fox universe. Instead, I'm thinking Alvin and the Chipmunks here.
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@Blue Highwind In the comics he'a acctually ultra voilent. like wolverine but with less fucks given.
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Awesome they're going to put in the talking gun waving Raccoon in it. Though I do hope more members of the Guardians show up in the film. I can understand if these five will be the core members who the film will focus on, but there are more members of the team who are interesting as well.
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My only exposure to this group was during an episode of The Avengers cartoon series (The Avengers, Earth's Mightiest Heroes).
As a side note, the show itself was pretty good. It's kinda of like Marvel universe 101 and touches on a lot of different aspects of the marvel world.
Anyway, while it was only one episode, they did seem like a fun bunch of characters. Especially the raccoon. At the very least, they have two years to built up hype.
@ James
;_; I'll miss her too.
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AMAZING! I never imagined this team would come to the big screen, but now that it is, I'm so freakin' excited I can barely contain myself.
While I will miss Moondragon, Phyla-Vell, Adam Warlock and Mantis, I can understand the need to downsize the roster and keep it manageable.
I'll be very interested to see how they handle vocals for Rocket and Groot: one of the things the Lord of the Rings really messed up was making Treebeard's equivalent to a 90-year old man with emphysema. It killed all the comedic value of his jokes.
Yeah, Groot only has one line of dialogue (“I am Groot!”), but we still need to be able to understand it.
On Rocket, I really hope they don't go high-pitched or squeaky. Throw off the audience's expectations and go deep!
Can't wait for this!
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*making Treebeard's voice*
I want to edit posts! Bah!
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Woot!
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If there's a movie that could break Marvel/Disney's winning streak, it would most likely be this one. Why? Simply put, unlike their previous films, it's a hard sell. Whereas most non-geeks had at least a passing familiarity with Iron Man, Thor, the Hulk, Captain America, etc., no one has ever heard of these guys. Many of them are VERY obscure characters. And while I was already familiar with Rocket Raccoon, having read his limited series in the '80s, I had never even heard of those other characters and *I* had to look them up on Wikipedia!
If I'm a geek and I have no idea who the majority of the Guardians are, how confused do you think John and Jane Q. Moviegoer are going to feel? And I don't think the previous tactic of just giving them a passing mention or a cameo appearance like in the pre-Avengers films is going to work here.
And again, while I'm a big fan of Rocket's, I also keep thinking of how well Howard the Duck went over, too.
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@Blue Highwind
Imagine “Rango” in the avengers 2.
Also, Learn what anthropomorphize means.
Just because something isn't a furry doesn't mean its not anthropomorphic
P.S. Fuck Furries
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Dude……… Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles count as furries… way to fail.
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NO. You are wrong. Turtles are exempt from the rule because I said so.
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I am really worried Marvel is going way too fast with these movies. While their movies so far have been very successful that still doesn't mean that giving us more of them is a good idea. While it's good they are producing new franchises, they might want to wait and let audiences actually start wanting more superhero movies. Ant-Man can work because he's a superhero. These guys…I don't know what the fuck they are. Talking tree? Cool, but why? I also hope they include the time Ant-Man gave Scarlet Witch and abortion. AVENGERS EARTHS MIGHTIEST AND MOST CONTROVERSIAL HEROES!
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For people curious how the non-comic fan audience will react to this movie, it really depends on how well the movie it marketed.
Marvel has built up a reputation for making very good superhero movies, and reputation goes a long way to putting a good impression in people's heads.
But how will they get people to understand who these characters are? Simple: MARKETING.
Every movie not based off another property has to sell its concept and characters to the potential audience through advertising, trailers, puff pieces in Entertainment Weekly, etc.
This one will be no different. Besides, I think this will get a lot of press simply because it's so different than anything Marvel's put out to this point.
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I am seriously hoping Marvel doesn't run out of steam after Avengers. Or rather, the movie going audience doesn't run out of steam now that The Avengers has hit. I seriously love everything they're doing with this universe, and as movies are more accessible than decades of comics it's a lot nice to try and keep up with.
What is most amazing is how the only character in their roster that was, in any way, familiar to non-comic fans before these films were Captain America and Hulk, and now they're basically building a cinematic universe of gangbuster sellers with a whole bunch of characters folks never knew about. And now they're getting even more obscure.
I love it. I absolutely love it.
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Rcoket Raccoon. Hell yes! It amazes that finally studios are goign with the more imaginative sides of the comic book genre films and not stripping them of everything that made them interesting like they did with the last Superman film and Green Lantern. You have millions of dollars at your disposal I want to see demons, monsters, kameahmeah waves, and sonic booms god dammit!
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This could be huge if marketed right. The success of Avatar and Abrams' Star Trek proves audiences are hungry for a “new Star Wars”, and it will be a nice break from the stream of cookie cutter sequels Marvel is currently dangling in front of us.
I agree that Rocket Raccoon will be a hard sell, but in a film full of (presumably) a ton of other CGI things he shouldn't stick out too much.
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@Lord Slithor:
Whereas most non-geeks had at least a passing familiarity with Iron Man, Thor, the Hulk, Captain America,
You must not know many non-geeks if you think more than a handful of them were familiar with any of those guys (with the exception of the Hulk) before their respective movie trailers came out.
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This could be an awesome movie, just love the super heroes stuff. The effects just blew me away in Avengers, looking forward to what comes next!
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I've been a Starlord fan since he first appeared in the 70s. Unfortunately I haven't kept up with comics and only recently realized that he was in GotG. I finally caught up on all the comics to date and was disappointed that in GotG he had lost his Ship, costume, gun and powers. All that was left was a space Punisher. Now, in the new Avengers Assemble comics, the Guardians fly around in his old Ship, he's got his old costume and gun back along with all his old powers. Presumably Avengers Assemble is related to the movies. If that's the case, I'm really looking forward to seeing the old familiar Starlord again!
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