Once upon a time, James Gunn was one of Marvel Studios’ biggest assets. As the director of the super-successful Guardians of the Galaxy franchise, his influence also extended into other corners of the MCU. For instance, he’s responsible for some dialogue and character developments in Avengers: Infinity War. However, Gunn’s Marvel career came to an unceremonious end last summer when he was fired due to a controversy surrounding some resurfaced tweets.
It turns out that he also had some input on Captain Marvel though before he was given the boot. While speaking with the press during a set visit, producer Jonathan Schwartz explained that the filmmaker didn’t have a huge amount of sway with the production, but he did approve the script and chatted with the team.
“I think he’s read the script, we talked to him about it a little bit. It takes place before a lot of what he’s doing happens, so I’m sure the Skrulls will be a fun toy to play with at some point. But I think we’ve really been able to do our own thing. But we love when James gives input for sure.”
Of course, it only makes sense that Gunn would have some say on Captain Marvel, as the origins movie for Brie Larson’s Carol Danvers will make use of two characters he introduced into the MCU. Namely, Kree villains Ronan the Accuser (Lee Pace) and Korath the Pursuer (Djimon Hounsou). As Schwartz says, though, CM takes place a couple of decades prior to Guardians, so it’ll see the pair in very different places.
Korath, for instance, is part of Starforce, the heroic Kree super-squad that Carol’s a part of and is led by Jude Law’s Mar-Vell. Ronan’s role in the narrative has yet to be clarified, but it’s likely that he’ll be portrayed as less villainous as well. We might even see how he became the single-minded maniac who lost to Star-Lord in a dance-off. In fact, maybe that’s what Gunn spoke to Schwartz and the production team about?
We’ll find out when Captain Marvel blasts into theaters on March 8th.
