With about a week and a half to go before Guardians of the Galaxy hits theaters, Marvel isn’t letting the hype train slow down a bit. The House of Ideas has released a new extended clip from Guardians , and six juicy tidbits caught our attention.
It’s no secret that we’re psyched for Guardians of the Galaxy , and we’re probably not alone. That’s because Guardians will expand the Marvel universe in a way that neither Thor nor The Avengers was able to do, introducing some non-core Marvel characters and opening up the potential for much wilder stories.
The new extended clip from Guardians gives us more of the witty repartee that’s been the signature of Marvel movies since Iron Man , but it looks like Guardians might even one-up the existing Marvel movies. It also gives us a better look at just how Groot, Star-Lord, Gamora, Rocket, and Draxx wind up coming together, and it doesn’t look like they meet under the best of circumstances.
How the Band Got Together
Using our keen powers of observation, we were able to piece together a backstory leading into the extended clip. It looks like the Guardians come together due to a number of interweaving plots. Star-Lord is trying to steal something, and Rocket and Groot are on his tail, trying to collect a bounty on him. Gamora shows up, though, throwing a wrench into Rocket and Groot’s plans. We can’t figure out just how the fifth Guardian, Draxx, winds up with the other four, but we do think we’ve got an idea of just what they’re after.
An Infinity Gem Will Loom Over the Guardians of the Galaxy
The extended Guardians clip has Star-Lord asking Gamora about an “orb.” Specifically, he says it’s got a “shiny blue suitcase, Ark of the Covenant, Maltese Falcon sort of vibe.” Witty, that, as that’s a list of pretty famous MacGuffins — largely unexplained plot devices that the hero of a story pursues.
We’re betting the Guardians decide that they’ve got to get the Orb back because something something Galaxy In Danger something something Hey Time to Fight Again. We’re also betting that that’s not any regular old “Orb of Immense Power.”
We’re betting it’s an Infinity Stone , an artifact that, when paired with its five other companions, will make its wielder nigh-omnipotent. Star-Lord, of course, will just have seen something shiny and decided to steal it, but Gamora will probably have an idea of its true power. That brings us to our next point.
Gamora’s Got an Ulterior Motive
“I had an agreement to sell [the Orb] to a third party,” Gamora says as the Guardians are being processed through the prison.
Early in the clip, a prison guard notes that Gamora and her sister Nebula were “loaned” from their adoptive father, the mad tyrant Thanos, to Ronan. Since she’s not getting it for Ronan, that leads us to believe she doesn’t intend to hand it over to Thanos either. So, whom could she be retrieving it for?
We think it’s The Collector. You may recall that name from our earlier piece on the Infinity Stones, or maybe you just remember Benicio Del Toro filling the role of the Collector in Thor: The Dark World . We’re betting Gamora’s “third party” is in fact The Collector. The Collector’s already got one Infinity Stone from the end of the last Thor movie, and he knows that another is in Asgard. Three out of six Infinity Stones would put him halfway to omnipotence – great album title, we know; you can have it — and he’ll probably try to maneuver the Guardians into getting that “Orb” for him.
Just How Does Star-Lord Understand All These Aliens?
Peter Quill was born on Earth and eventually went into space to become Star-Lord, but just how does an earthling understand all of the alien languages he encounters?
At about the 49-second mark in the new Guardians clip, we get our answer: Star-Lord’s got a translation implant in his neck. How do we know? We blew the video up to full-screen and squinted at all that information that’s ticking off as the characters are introduced.
That’s how we also found out that Quill’s got a “sex crime” on his record, but fear not; you don’t need a trigger warning. Guardians of the Galaxy director James Gunn told ComicBook.com earlier this year that Quill was seduced by a Gramosian Duchess, which is a crime, but not a sex offender crime in the way us earthlings would think.
There Will Be a Ton of Internal Strife Between the Guardians of the Galaxy
If you couldn’t tell from the clip, the Guardians are a group that really don’t like each other too much to start off. Gamora calls Star-Lord an “honorless thief,” Rocket calls Gamora the “lackey of a genocidal maniac,” and Rocket and Groot were totally about to turn Star-Lord in for a bounty. Add to that Draxx, who just seems very, very, very angry, and this group looks like a time bomb. Of course, seeing a bunch of aliens arguing endlessly wouldn’t make for a great movie, so we’re betting that the quest for the Infinity Stone… er… “Orb” brings them all together.
We Might See More Murderous, Anthropomorphic Animals Besides Rocket
Rocket Raccoon is one of the biggest reasons we’ll be first in line when Guardians of the Galaxy opens in a week and a half, but one bit of info on Rocket’s digital rap sheet made us take note.
Rocket says that he’s the only one of his kind, but the 34-second mark of the clip shows some information on a character named Lylla. A quick look at the Marvel Encyclopedia shows that Lylla is an anthropomorphic weasel, kind of like Rocket. She’s also shown brandishing a large gun and kicking the crap out of some other characters, so she may share Rocket’s love of murder and mayhem.
Lylla could just be an Easter Egg tossed in to satisfy fanboys with nothing better to do than comb through each frame of the extended clip… Ahem… but her inclusion does leave open the possibility that Rocket isn’t as alone in the universe as he thinks.
We’re sure there are a ton of other things hidden in the Guardians extended clip, so share them if you’ve found them. These six have got us pretty excited by themselves, though, and we can’t wait to see what else is in store for us when Guardians of the Galaxy opens on August 1.