James Gunn talks writing process for Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 3 and release date

Guardians of the Galaxy was a pretty unknown Marvel property prior to the 2014 film that introduced audiences to not only new characters but a new tone and style for superhero movies. As the superhero fatigue began to set in, director James Gunn swooped in to fill the Marvel Cinematic Universe with color, great tunes, and irreverent jokes.

The sequel came earlier this year and while some think the first film is a bit better, it managed to deliver a stunning and intimate movie that evolves the characters instead of just focusing on huge set pieces. As the sequel released, Gunn said that he has already begun working on the third and possibly final Guardians film which is set to come after Avengers: Infinity War.

While there aren't tons of details as of right now, Gunn is deep into writing the script and he has a general idea of when they will begin shooting. Speaking with Collider, the acclaimed director talked about how the third film will serve the overall story for the trilogy and how difficult the process of writing the story is.

“It’s been pretty easy. The truth is, the first movie is the first act, the second movie is the second act, and the third movie is the third act so I’m tying a lot of stuff together in the third film. We get a lot of answers on a lot of different things, so doing that in an elegant way takes a little bit of grace and elegance. It’s more challenging in that respect writing the third movie than the second movie.”

He went on to talk about how he goes about crafting his stories which involves extensive outlines with great detail.

“I do an incredibly in-depth treatment for every movie. I think of writing a screenplay as creating the body of a human being and you’ve got to start with the skeleton, start with the bones, and you create the bones. You take a lot of time because that’s the actual base of the movie and if you screw that part up, later on down the line, you’re going to have a lot of mistakes. So by creating a really strong foundation for the story, that’s the most important thing. So I write a good treatment that’s probably about 70 pages long. It includes photographs and things like that. So that has been the way I’ve dealt with every movie and this one as well.”

Gunn also said that Guardians 3 will begin filming in a little over a year, probably meaning it'll start in 2019 and hit a 2020 release date. The only thing we really know about Guardians 3 is that it'll likely introduce Adam Warlock, a pivotal character in the Marvel universe who was teased at the very end of both Guardians films.

Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2 will release on Blu-ray on August 22nd but you can get it at digital retailers on August 8th. The Guardians themselves will appear in Avengers: Infinity War next May.