In addition to Kevin Feige's recent thoughts about The Avengers: Age of Ultron, SFX Magazine also asked the Marvel Studios honcho whether he's the least bit nervous about Guardians of the Galaxy, given it's their biggest unknown quantity. “Not really, because we really believe in them,” he replies. “And not only in the way they've been portrayed in the comic books over the years, but also in the new ideas that we have to bring them to the screen. There's definitely a comparison to be made between Iron Man & Guardians of the Galaxy because it's easy to forget that Iron Man was not well known when that first film came out. Back then I had to spend a lot time explaining to people that Iron Man is not a robot and he's actually a person and a scientist, who builds this suit. He doesn't fly like Superman, he has to obey the laws of physics. Likewise with Guardians of the Galaxy; it's based on a comic that has a certain following but nobody should feel bad if they've never heard of it because we're expecting that most people haven't.” Adding to his comment that Marvel has been tiptoeing towards a full cosmic adventure with Thor, The Avengers and Thor: The Dark World, Feige says “Guardians is unique because while the hero Star-Lord is human and from Earth, hopefully the audience can relate to the adventures that he goes on as they see it through his eyes.”
Additionally, SFX Mag' also caught up with Jonathan Schwartz, who was a Marvel assistant before becoming a production executive, but he's now an associate producer on Guardians of the Galaxy. “When James Gunn came aboard he brought a completely unique visual sensibility to it, harkening back to pulpy '50s science fiction,” he recalls. “One of the things that he mentioned in his original pitch was that science fiction as we understand it has become greyer and sleeker and blacker and darker, this kind of Blade Runner world. We all love Blade Runner but that's not all that science fiction can be, so the world that you're going to see in Guardians of the Galaxy is colorful and bright and pulpy, but it's also lived-in and grounded. And finding the balance between those two things is what's driving a lot of this universe.” What do you think?
Marvel’s Guardians of the Galaxy expands the Marvel Cinematic Universe into the cosmos, where brash adventurer Peter Quill finds himself the object of an unrelenting bounty hunt after stealing a mysterious orb coveted by Ronan, a powerful villain with ambitions that threaten the entire universe. To evade the ever-persistent Ronan, Quill is forced into an uneasy truce with a quartet of disparate misfits–Rocket, a gun-toting raccoon, Groot, a tree-like humanoid, the deadly and enigmatic Gamora and the revenge-driven Drax the Destroyer. But when Peter discovers the true power of the orb and the menace it poses to the cosmos, he must do his best to rally his ragtag rivals for a last, desperate stand - with the galaxy’s fate in the balance. Marvel’s Guardians of the Galaxy is presented by Marvel Studios and stars Chris Pratt, Zoe Saldana, Dave Bautista, Bradley Cooper as the voice of Rocket, Vin Diesel as the voice of Groot, Lee Pace, Michael Rooker, Karen Gilian, Djimon Hounsou with John C. Reilly, Glenn Close as Commander Rael and Benicio del Toro as The Collector. Distributed by Walt Disney Studios Motion Pictures, the film opens August 1, 2014.