‘Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2’ has deep Missouri roots

Missouri loves company

You would think that “Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2” is so full of Missouri mentions because writer/director/mastermind James Gunn grew up in the St. Louis suburb of Manchester. (Or as The New York Times called it in a recent profile, “small-town Manchester, Mo.” Whatever.)

But actually, in the Marvel comics, Peter Quill/Star-Lord was born in nearby St. Charles, Mo. So it’s authentic to have the movie’s 1980 flashback scene of Peter’s Earth mother and Celestial father traipsing through the Missouri woods. (OK, it was filmed in Georgia.) And when snooty High Priestess Ayesha asks Peter where his father is from, he tells her, “Not from Missouri. That’s all I know.”

Back in the first “Guardians,” sharp-eyed viewers may have noticed barely a hint of Missouri: a little state flag on a hospital nurse’s desk. Thank you, James Gunn, for giving the Show-Me State a bigger role this time.

Familiar face

Speaking of the “Guardians” movie, did you have any idea that underneath all the makeup and mohawk on the villainous Taserface is actor Chris Sullivan, who plays the sweetest guy in the world on NBC’s “This Is Us,” boyfriend Toby? “The makeup process started off at about 3  1/2 hours and we whittled it down to about 2  1/2 , as the makeup team got more and more practiced at it,” Sullivan told Entertainment Weekly. “It was quite involved.”

Stranger mutants

And speaking of actors on beloved TV shows, Charlie Heaton, who plays big brother Jonathan on Netflix’s “Stranger Things,” is in talks to join the “X-Men” spinoff “The New Mutants,” says Variety. He would play Sam Guthrie, aka Cannonball, who is invulnerable when he’s airborne. Like his “Stranger Things” character, these mutants are misunderstood teenage outsiders. He would join Anya Taylor-Joy, Maisie Williams, Rosario Dawson and “The Fault in Our Stars” director Josh Boone. The movie is due out next April.

This story was originally published June 1, 2017 at 3:43 PM with the headline "‘Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2’ has deep Missouri roots."