Audiences at San Diego Comic-Con are always the lucky recipients of something special. In the case of Hall H it's usually a first look at a highly-anticipated trailer or some other footage. Sometimes studios release it online afterward and sometimes not, and in the case of Marvel's Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2, some fans at home were upset to learn they wouldn't see the SDCC footage. Director James Gunn explains why.
Gunn has a reputation for being pretty talkative and honest with fans through his social media channels. Sometimes he uses it to confirm things while also giving fans a small look into production, other times it's to vent.
But after the Marvel panel at SDCC Gunn took to Facebook to explain why they wouldn't be sharing the footage (which reportedly featured Baby Groot brutally killing a man).
“I've gotten a lot of questions about why am I, why is Marvel not releasing the footage we showed at Comic-Con. Of course I want to share with you guys everything. It's important to me to be able to do that. But here's the thing, the footage we released at Comic-Con will eventually be seen by the public but in a more finished form,” he explained. “It's very early days, we've only been stopped shooting for a month. We presented an entire, huge scene with Yondu, and Rocket, and Baby Groot. And then we also presented some special glimpse just for San Diego Comic-Con and a teaser trailer of sorts. And the visual effects are not finished, I am a perfectionist for people who have followed me know that everything needs to be exactly as I want it to be, to be seen in a film, so that it stands up to repeated viewings. And the truth is, this Comic-Con footage…it's not something I, nor Marvel, are comfortable with being out there and standing up to repeated viewings because the visual effects just aren't finished. And if I do something I want to do it 100% correctly.”
Gunn likened showing small bits of the film to the Hall H crowd to showing a friend a piece of footage at his house. He had some technical difficulties and wound up recording a second video as well.
“Being able to show people something was great. And you know it's been on my mind a lot because I've been trying to prep for this Comic-Con thing for a while,” he told fans. And when asked again in his Facebook stream about releasing the footage added, “I'm very sorry for that but that's just something…it's just the way it has to be right now.”
But there was lots of news from the panel besides the footage. Gunn revealed Kurt Russell would be playing Star-Lord's father (duh!), Ego the living planet (well!) and announced Russell's Tango & Cash co-star Sylvester Stallone would also have a role in Guardians 2. He also noted the Ravagers in attendance would have a big role.
Actor Elizabeth Debicki was revealed to be playing Ayesha (“the golden High Priestess of a genetically-perfect people called the Sovereign. She”s not a woman to be screwed with – she, and her entire world, are extraordinarily deadly”) and Gunn mentioned Pom Klementieff's Mantis will be green and have antennae.
In his videos Gunn referenced another bit of the Marvel panel that hasn't been made available to the masses yet: an Office-like documentary from Thor: Ragnarok director Taika Waititi. I'm hoping that winds up on the home release at least.
The entire Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2 portion of the Marvel Hall H panel (minus the footage) can be watched right here.