Guardians of the Galaxy: Five Things We Want to See

In the coming year, there are quite a few comic book adaptations hitting theaters, but none quite as unpredictable as Marvel's Guardians of the Galaxy. Coming from a director who's never done anything close to this huge before and focusing on a group of characters that, five years ago, nobody would have believed could get a major motion picture, Guardians is widely regarded as the biggest risk Marvel has taken since they decided to start putting their cinematic universe together a decade ago. It's the kind of film that could very well become an instant classic--the cast is great, Gunn is well-suited for the material and what little content has made its way out into the world so far has impressed everybody. But with no recognizable superheroes in the film, they've got to rely on an aggressive PR campaign, word of mouth and good trailers--more or less like a movie that isn't an adaptation at all. And movies like that don't generally do Marvel money. So if being awesome is key to this film's prospects for success (since they need word of mouth), what would help sell the world on it?

Balance Marvel and Gunn

Marvel have a house style--a look and feel that most of their movies fit into. They've had a couple of filmmakers go a little outside of the norm, with mixed results. Thor: The Dark World felt more cohesively Marvel than did the first Thor movie, and perhaps as a result has resonated with most audiences more than did Branagh's film. The third Iron Man film, arguably the most cinematically interesting of the trilogy, seems to have a lot of edges that don't fit neatly into the jigsaw puzzle of the Marvel Cinematic Universe. James Gunn is an interesting director with a great voice that's all his own; he won't fit into the generic mold of the Marvel Cinematic Universe. They'll need to have given him some creative freedom to make this film work, and it seems from his remarks that they have. Hopefully, though, they'll have found a balance where the film doesn't seem so out of place as a result, especially since it doesn't inherently fit with the other movies the studio has made so far.

At least one big surprise During production on this film, there were lots of rumors floating around, ranging from Iron Man's involvement with the team to any number of surprise villains who could show up in-story. Let's let one or two come true, because that "hell yeah" moment for the hardcore fans is the kind of thing that will get people talking online and get the word-of-mouth really going. Granted, you can get those in other ways, and a good story will hopefully have those, too. But given the number of rumors surrounding this film, it's facing that thing where the fans have constructed expectations which, reasonable or not, are expectations.

Thanos James Gunn told reporters at San Diego Comic Con International that Thanos's presence would be very much felt in the film--and yet no actor has been cast to play the role and it's unclear whether he'll appear on camera. So leaving aside the fact that it would be nice to see the Mad Titan actually appear, what do we expect from this film? It's hard to say, but at a minimum it would be nice to see him skulking around in the background, like The Emperor in the Star Wars films. Giving him some clear motivation would be good, since as of now all we really know is that he attacked Earth to get the Cosmic Cube in The Avengers--an item that pretty much everybody wants. There's more of an expectation on Thanos here not just because the filmmakers have said he'll play a role but also because the Guardians, in the comics, are more closely associated with the character than just about anybody else--and connecting them to him on film will help to connect the dots for the average viewer who doesn't necessarily understand what all of this has to do with The Avengers.

Badass Space Sequences So far, Marvel's Cinematic Universe has taken place largely on Earth or Earth-like environs. There have been glimpses of something other or more in the Thor and Avengers films, but nothing has really stepped firmly into that science-fiction territory quite yet. Let's Jim Starlin-up this joint! The fact that they're talking about this as a kind of space western, like Star Wars or Serenity, is a nice start.  The next thing to do is to make sure that while you're operating within those strictures, you're not stealing too much from the vocabulary of those films and are crafting your own identity. And, yeah, some outer space chases or dogfights or even just battles with weird-looking aliens is more than half the fun of doing any movie set among the stars. From the leaked set photos that made their way out in 2013, it seems as though that's all coming, and we can't wait.

Everyone's a character In Avengers, we had numerous movies to lead up to the film, and almost all of the characters were fairly well-known. Not so with the Guardians, and most of them aren't even human. That's going to make them a bit harder to relate to, and so it's going to be the responsibility of the script, the cast and the filmmakers to make them as relatable, likable and human as they can. In the comics, we all kind of take for granted that Rocket Raccoon and Groot are awesome, for instance, but their appearance is difficult to overcome and the film will have to establish those characters quickly, before people start to make their own impressions based on looks.