Marvel's Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 3 drops its first trailer

The outer-space equivalent of the Brady Bunch faces the music in the rocking trailer for Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 3.

Director James Gunn's irreverence is firmly on display from the off, as Dave Bautista's Drax launches a ball at an anthropomorphic alien creature's face (a child, no less). There's a sentence we never thought we'd type, but such is the singular, twisted wit of this particular Marvel strand.

Guardians 3 comes after Phase Four of the Marvel Cinematic Universe (MCU) has concluded with Black Panther: Wakanda Forever . The latest Guardians movie is due for release after Ant-Man and The Wasp: Quantumania (released in February 2023) and gives the characters their first solo movie since 2017.

Evidently, an awful lot has happened in the franchise since then, something that's acknowledged by Chris Pratt's wry Peter Quill/Star-Lord in the voiceover. Expect candy-coloured celestial vistas, a thumpingly retro soundtrack and plenty of puzzle pieces that allude to the future of the MCU.

We get the briefest of glimpses at Will Poulter's super-engineered Adam Warlock who was teased at the end of Guardians Vol. 2. Meanwhile, Chukwudi Iwuji's glowering villain The High Evolutionary is largely kept in the shadows. We're more intrigued by the allusion to the origin of the individual Guardians, including a possible origin story for Rocket Racoon (voiced by Bradley Cooper) that will no doubt be laced with tragedy.

It also remains to be seen how Zoe Saldana's Gamora will fit in. After all, she experienced a life-changing tragic/heroic arc during the events of Avengers: Infinity War and Avengers: Endgame, and at the outset of the Guardians Vol. 3 trailer, she seems absent from the main team.

There's evidently a lot to catch up with, and not before time. This is set to be Gunn's final Marvel film as he prepares to become the head of creative at rival studio DC, along with Peter Safran. It's just as well we can soak up his perverse yet oddly sweet-natured wit within the MCU one last time.

Check out the Guardians Vol. 3 trailer below. The movie is released at Cineworld cinemas on May 5, 2023.

Don't forget to check out our coverage on Phase Five and Phase Six of the MCU to discover what's coming down the pipe.