Disney and Marvel are in no hurry to replace James Gun on the third Guardians movie. After struggling to find Gunn’s replacement, production on Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 3 has been pushed to 2021.
A listing from Production Weekly confirmed that production on the sequel is slated for February 2021. This means it’s unlikely the film would be released before early 2022. While the director’s chair is still vacant, it seems Marvel still intends to use Gunn’s original script on the project.
The working title for the film has been revealed to be ‘Hot Christmas.’ Usually, these titles are inside jokes for the cast and crew but that hasn’t stopped fans from speculating wildly. The prevalent theory is that the title refers to Adam Warlock, a fan-favorite character seen as the Jesus character of this universe. Warlock was hinted to appear at the end of Guardians Vol. 2 so regardless of the title’s meaning, its likely Warlock will appear in the new installment.
It’s unknown what the Guardians line up will look like for this third installment. Following Gunn’s firing earlier this year, the cast voiced their displeasure but all seemed mostly interested in reprising their roles. Dave Bautista however, has signaled multiple times that he doesn’t intend to return without Gunn. It’s unclear if Marvel would let Bautista out of his contract should he actually decide to leave the franchise.
Marvel is staying pretty quiet about the film. No word yet on who the frontrunner to replace Gunn is, but if they don’t find a replacement soon production could be pushed back even further.
