As one of the most loved and most different installments of the Marvel Cinematic Universe, Guardians of the Galaxy showed audiences just how much heart and humor a single comic book movie could contain. Despite its lack of easily recognizable characters, Marvel’s first foray into the cosmic realm easily became the highest grossing domestic release of 2014. Despite facing a much tougher lineup in 2017, Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2 still holds a spot as number 2 of Screen Rant’s Most Anticipated Movies of 2017 - coming in as the top comic book movie. It would be hard pressed to beat the box office juggernaut that is Star Wars, but it’s guaranteed to make a dent, and second to Star Wars is nothing to frown at.
The first Guardians was a fun romp that had to establish the world and develop primary characters, but without that same burden, director James Gunn has the luxury to mix it up and play around with things like adding more relationship dynamics and including more diversity in the soundtrack in the sequel. There were also more complex relationships present in Guardians of the Galaxy, especially when it came the Thanos and his daughters - Nebula and Gamorra - but with so many other elements to focus on, Nebula and her relationship to her family didn’t get as much time in spotlight for a closer examination.
With Karen Gillan set to reprise the role in Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2, the actress explained the evolution of the Nebula character during a recent interview with The Wrap:
“What I love about the second movie for Nebula in particular is that we get — We know that she’s a pretty angry woman with some daddy issues. [But] in the second movie, we’re going to start to see how much pain her father actually caused her, and we’re going to delve right into the relationship with her sister Gamora.”
It’s not clear exactly how much screen time Nebula will get compared to the first Guardians movie, but any opportunity to learn more about her character (and possibly Thanos) is definitely an enticing proposition. In exploring her character more, Gillan thinks audiences will be sympathetic to her circumstances:
“I think we might even feel a tinge of sympathy towards Nebula this time, because we really start to see the emotional crack in her character...I was just allowed to completely explore that and take it to a completely different dimension with her. I was really happy about that.”
It’s no secret that Gunn has high hopes for the character. In fact, he even expressed a desire to see Karen Gillan lead her own Nebula spin-off film, meaning there’s obviously a lot in the script to work with. With such a full slate of films, Marvel might not be in a rush to add another spin-off, but that doesn’t mean Nebula will be neglected. We can likely expect to see her featured more as marketing ramps up, especially with James Gunn promising more Nebula toys.
That being said, with so many characters to draw from, especially for unprecedented team up films like Avengers: Infinity War, you never know who’s going to make an appearance in future films. Gamora was just recently confirmed for her own part in Infinity War, so there may yet be room in there for her sister, too.
Source: The Wrap
