Sylvester Stallone Joining Guardians Of The Galaxy 3?
Could Sylvester Stallone be making the move from DC to Marvel? A new rumor has him eyeing a role in Guardians of the Galaxy 3
This article is more than 2 years old
A new rumor suggests that action movie legend Sylvester Stallone isn’t quite done with the Marvel Cinematic Universe, and that we’ll be seeing him reprise the role of Ravager big-wig Stakar Ogord in the upcoming Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 3.
As the Disinsider reports, the rumor has its origins on Reddit, where a user going by the name “thegaminggecko15” says they were part of a Zoom Q&A with Midnight in the Switchgrass director Randall Emmett, during which the director — who is a friend of Sylvester Stallone’s — made mention of Stallone working on the third Guardians of the Galaxy movie.
On one hand, as Disinsider points out, a Reddit post is hardly a chiseled-in-stone fact. Also, it’s worth noting that Sylvester Stallone’s character appears in Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2 mainly as a service to Yondu’s backstory. Considering Yondu’s fate in Guardians Vol. 2, it would seem unlikely Michael Rooker would be reprising the role of Star-Lord‘s blue-skinned adoptive father except perhaps in a flashback.
On the other hand, Sylvester Stallone’s character and the other Ravagers — mostly based on the original Marvel Comics Guardians of the Galaxy team that premiered in 1979’s Marvel Super-Heroes #18 — appear in one of the many mid and post-credits scenes of Guardians Vol. 2, with the intention of causing some trouble. Not to mention that with James Gunn returning to the director’s chair for the third Guardians film, it would make his third collaboration with Stallone, who voices King Shark in the upcoming The Suicide Squad.
Regardless of whether or not Sylvester Stallone makes his way back to the role of Stakar, Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 3 will have finished a long and difficult road once it finally hits theaters sometime in 2023. Amid controversy over decade-old tweets from Gunn, THR reported in July 2018 the writer/director was fired by Disney from the superhero film franchise he’d helmed to spectacular success. Less than a year later, after Gunn had already signed on to make The Suicide Squad, Deadline broke the news fans had been begging to hear for months — Disney reinstated Gunn as director for Guardians Vol. 3.
While Sylvester Stallone may not be among them, most of the Guardians are expected to appear at least a couple of times outside their own film franchise. As Vin Diesel confirmed to ComicBook.com in March 2020, the spacefaring team is expecting to appear in 2022’s Thor: Love & Thunder. Later that year, Disney announced Gunn would follow in the footsteps of Star Wars — hopefully just conceptually and not quality-wise — to direct the Guardians of the Galaxy Holiday Special for Disney+, to be released in December 2022.
When we finally see the heroes in Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 3, whether or not Sylvester Stallone is on board, it promises to be a much more emotional affair than fans of the franchise are used to. This July, Nebula actress Karen Gillan told Collider that she read the script with Mantis actress Pom Klementieff, and the experience wasn’t quite what you’d expect. “We read it together and we both cried and laughed, but there was full tears,” Gillan said. She also added it was Gunn’s “strongest work” with the franchise.
