Guardians of the Galaxy Director Unveils Big Plans for Peter Quill and Mantis

Though he's hard at work on The Suicide Squad, James Gunn is still gearing up to return to Marvel Studios and complete his Guardians of the Galaxy trilogy with Vol. 3 in the near future. Since Gunn left the characters at the end of the Vol. 2 in 2017 the characters have been through a lot across Avengers: Infinity War and Endgame including some of them being disintegrated because of and others outright dying at the hands of the mad titan Thanos, not to mention the time travel and existing alongside past selves. As a result, the characters will be in peculiar places at the start of their next solo film, but Gunn has plans for it all.

While answering questions on his Instagram, Gunn was asked which of the characters from the Guardians movies was his favorite to write, with the fan noting Nebula and Yondu were their favorites. Gunn revealed not only his two favorites, but had a tease for which characters will have something to look forward to in the next film.

"Those are two of them for sure," Gunn said. "I probably liked writing Nebula and Rocket's arcs most (still continuing into Vol 3). But I also think we have great things coming up for the others, like Quill and Mantis. All of their arcs take place over the three films as opposed to in only the individual movies."

Recent reports suggested the third Guardians outing could fall on the February 2023 release date Marvel Studios currently has reserved, meaning the film would have virtually all of 2021 and 2022 for principal photography, reshoots, and post-production. Given that Gunn has previously said that work on the film wouldn't start for at least a year or more. That's certainly more than enough time to create an epic space opera suitable for closing out a trilogy.

We still don't know much about the film itself, though Guardians of the Galaxy star Karen Gillan says fans should expect an "amazing" movie from Gunn his team.

"I can say that I've read it and it's amazing," Gillan recently told Yahoo! Entertainment. "We're all really excited that James is back to complete the trilogy because it wouldn't have felt right without him. It's a wonderful, wonderful script."

Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 3 has yet to set a release date.

Other upcoming Marvel Studios projects include Black Widow on May 1, 2020, The Falcon and The Winter Soldier in Fall 2020, The Eternals on November 6, 2020, Shang-Chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings on February 12, 2021, WandaVision in Spring 2021, Loki in Spring 2021, Spider-Man 3 on July 16, 2021, What If…? in Summer 2021, Hawkeye in Fall 2021, and Thor: Love and Thunder on November 5, 2021, and Black Panther 2 on May 6, 2022. Marvel Studios Disney+ series without release dates include Ms. Marvel, Moon Knight, and She-Hulk.