Guardians of the Galaxy Scores Watchmen Composer Tyler Bates

Guardians of the Galaxy

director James Gunn announced today via his personal Facebook page that Tyler Bates, best known for scoring 300 and Watchmen for Warner Bros. and Legendary Entertainment, will make the jump to Marvel/Disney to work on Gunn's upcoming sci-fi superhero film. The director also said that they'll be pre-scoring elements of the film so that during filming they can use Bates's music to set the mood for the actors. This will allow the performances (at least in theory) to sync up with the way the audience is responding to the score while they watch the film. "Grateful to be working with my favorite composer, Tyler Bates, on Guardians of the Galaxy," Gunn wrote. "Unlike most films, Tyler writes huge chunks of the score first so that I can actually film to the music. During action scenes and huge dramatic moments we blare the score on set so that the cast, crew, and camera can move in harmony with the music. Music is often an afterthought in film, but never for us. And everything Tyler's done so far has been amazing!" Bates also scored Dawn of the Dead and Sucker Punch for Man of Steel director Zack Snyder, and has worked with Gunn previously on Super and Slither. Snyder's Dawn of the Dead remake was actually written by Gunn, meaning that the composer may have met and first collaborated with the two star directors (and his most frequent collaborators) on the same set. Guardians of the Galaxy is reportedly just over halfway through with filming and is set for a release on August 1, 2014.