Drax stole our hearts the very first time we saw him in Guardians of the Galaxy. His ‘take everything completely literally’ schtick, combined with Dave Bautista’s beautiful comic timing, made for many of the film’s biggest laughs – something which continued in Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2.
Despite all the great one-liners (“Nothing goes over my head. My reflexes are too fast. I would catch it”) though, there’s always been a core of sadness to Drax given that his beloved family was slaughtered by Thanos and all he craves is revenge. Now, in the audio commentary track for Avengers: Infinity War, we’ve finally found out what happened to them.
The explanation comes when the filmmaking team are discussing the flashback to the Mad Titan invading Gamora’s planet and his subsequent adoption of her. One of the most shocking portions of this scene comes when Thanos literally divides the population in two and executes everyone on the unlucky side. Joe Russo explains that it’s precisely this that happened to Drax, saying:
“Here’s a call back to Drax’s history with Thanos. His planet was treated the same way as Gamora’s planet. Drax was put on one side, his family was put on the other.”
While it’s understandable that Drax might not want to bring this up too often, it makes the bonds between the Guardians of the Galaxy that much stronger. After all, both he and Gamora share the same trauma of watching Thanos do this to them. No wonder they’re burning with a desire for vengeance.
But, at least as things stand now, that vengeance is going to go unfulfilled. Gamora’s currently lying dead at the bottom of a cliff on a planet occupied only by the Red Skull and Drax crumbled away to dust like so many other heroes. That being said, Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 3 is still on the way (James Gunn or no James Gunn), so perhaps we’ll soon see Drax and Gamora discover how much they have in common (other than the fact that they both met their end in Avengers: Infinity War, of course).
