Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 3 is “the last time people will see this team of Guardians,” director James Gunn has said of the conclusion to the trilogy he started in 2014. “This is the end for us.” With the third and final chapter hitting theaters in May 2023, Marvel’s Comic-Con panel on Saturday marked the last time this Guardians cast would take the stage at Hall H. Gunn joined castmates Chris Pratt, Karen Gillan, Pom Klementieff, Sean Gunn, and newcomers Will Poulter and Maria Bakalova on stage to reveal the Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 3 trailer, which moved the Comic-Con crowd — and the cast — to tears.
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“I wasn’t emotionally prepared when I watched it. And it hit me, just, hard,” Pratt told Yahoo Entertainment. “So don’t do any emotional preparation. Just go see it. And you’re gonna see what we’re talking about. You’ll see why people [were] moved. It’s definitely an emotional moment.”
The Star-Lord actor continued, “It’s an emotional moment, certainly, for us, as the actors who are in the piece, watching it for the first time, being reminded of everything we did over the past year-plus making the movie. And then being out at Hall H in front of all these fans for the first time in several years, and understanding that this is the end of this trilogy. It’s all emotional.”
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Gunn again confirmed on stage that Vol. 3 is “the final arc that we began at the very beginning of Guardians of the Galaxy,” the 2014 film that first assembled the group of cosmic outlaws of Star-Lord (Pratt), Gamora (Zoe Saldana), Drax (Dave Bautista), Groot (Vin Diesel), and Rocket Raccoon (Bradley Cooper). The family has since grown to include Nebula (Karen Gillan) and Kraglin (Sean Gunn), who will both have key parts in the final installment of the trilogy.
“I haven’t seen the movie, but they just showed us the trailer for the first time. They were playing it for everybody in Hall H, and they played it backstage on the screen for us. And we had not seen it before, and we all just started fully crying,” Gillan said. “It’s such an emotional, beautiful trailer, and it’s such a beautiful story. And it’s also the end of an era for us. And so, it’s so emotional. And then they, like, threw us on stage.”
She added: “We were fully crying. And then everyone in the room is crying — it was a really emotional experience.”
The trailer — which was not released online for the general public — plays “Do You Realize” by The Flaming Lips and showed a new look for Ravager Gamora, a young adult Groot, and teased the origin of an innocent-looking Baby Rocket Raccoon.
“I’m not prepared for it. I gotta tell you, I wasn’t ready for that,” said Poulter, who joins the Marvel Cinematic Universe as the all-gold cosmic character Adam Warlock. “But I think this will be the most emotional Guardians, for sure.”
Starring Chris Pratt as Star-Lord, Zoe Saldana as Gamora, Dave Bautista as Drax, Karen Gillan as Nebula, Pom Klementieff as Mantis, Sean Gunn as Kraglin, Elizabeth Debicki as Ayesha, Maria Bakalova as Cosmo the Spacedog, Will Poulter as Adam Warlock, Chukwudi Iwuji as the High Evolutionary, Vin Diesel as Groot, and Bradley Cooper as Rocket Raccoon, Marvel’s Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 3 opens in theaters on May 5, 2023.
