[WARNING – This article contains SPOILERS for Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2]
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Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2 not only reunites everyone's favorite band of intergalactic misfits but James Gunn's colorful follow up to his 2014 smash hit continues to take fans of the Marvel Cinematic Universe to far-flung places we've never seen before. The original Guardians of the Galaxy introduced Xandar, the homeworld of the Nova Corps; Knowhere, the hollowed-out head of a long-dead Celestial that houses a sprawling city of scum and villainy; and the dangerous blue-skinned race known as the Kree.
With a whole multi-verse to continue to explore, Vol. 2 doesn't rest on its laurels or spend a lot of time revisiting old haunts. Instead, the sequel rockets the Guardians to brand new worlds to meet an array of new aliens and gods, most of whom want the Guardians dead for various reasons. Vol. 2 is a hell of a ride once again. Pack up your gear and your Baby Groot and strap on your seat belt on the Milano, as we hit the stars and visit the many new planets and locations in Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2:
Earth - Missouri
One of Rocket's least favorite planets, the backwater world called Earth, is a technologically inferior mudball which nonetheless is the home of a growing assemblage of superpowered humans who are soon to cause a significant impact on the fate of the universe. The most prominent human from Earth thus far is Peter Quill (Chris Pratt), Star-Lord, leader of the Guardians of the Galaxy, who is half-human and half-Celestial.
Like the original film, Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2 begins with a flashback. In 1980 Missouri, Meredith Quill, the future mother of Peter Quill, is crazy in love with Ego (Kurt Russell), an ancient, god-like being called a Celestial who adopted a human form. She's even aware that Ego is from outer space. Ego brings Meredith to the woods and shows her the seed he planted; part of his essence he's planted on countless other worlds, which would eventually allow him to absorb Earth and the universe into becoming part of himself. In the present, when Ego commences his master plan, the seed morphs into a gigantic blob of energy that begins absorbing the surrounding area, until Peter successfully defeats his father and the Guardians destroy Ego in his planetary form.
The Sovereign
The Sovereign are an arrogant and xenophobic race of golden beings genetically engineered for perfection. The Sovereign consider themselves superior to every other race in the galaxy; However, the Sovereign World regularly finds itself under attack by a multi-dimensional monster called the Abilisk, which devours the planet's power source, the Anulax Batteries, making them dependent on outside assistance as they don't want to get their own hands dirty.
As a result of the Guardians' victory over Ronan in the Battle of Xandar, they are hired by the Sovereign to protect the Anulax Batteries from the Abilisk in exchange for The Sovereign releasing Gamora's sister Nebula (Karen Gillen) into the Guardians' custody. Their golden high priestess Ayesha (Elizabeth Debicki) declares war on the Guardians after Rocket (Bradley Cooper) steals some of the Anulax Batteries, but the Sovereign find themselves continually foiled in their attempts to destroy the Guardians. At the conclusion of Vol. 2, Ayesha begins engineering a new breed of Sovereign to destroy the Guardians, which she named 'Adam'.
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Berhert
When they escaped from the Sovereign fleet, the Guardians of the Galaxy crash landed their starship the Milano on the planet Berhert. On this forest world, the Guardians meet Ego and Mantis (Pom Klementieff), his empathic helper. Soon, the Guardians split up: Star-Lord, Gamora (Zoe Saldana), and Drax (Dave Bautista) accompany Ego and Mantis back to Ego's planet while Rocket remains on Berhert to repair the Nebula with Baby Groot (Vin Diesel) and Nebula. Soon, the Ravagers arrive on Berhert and capture Rocket and Groot, thanks to an escaped Nebula, who bartered with the Ravagers in exchange for a ship so she can hunt down and kill her sister.
Contraxia
The ice world of Contraxia would seem to be an unusual vacation destination, but nonetheless, Contraxia is a favorite stop for the many factions of the Ravagers. When staying in Contraxia, the Ravagers frequent the Iron Lotus, the planet's most colorful den of sin, drink, gambling, and ill-repute. Howard the Duck, after escaping confinement in the Collector's destroyed museum on Knowhere, was sighted schmoozing at the Iron Lotus. Yondu (Michael Rooker) is a frequent client of the Iron Lotus' robot bordello. It's highly unusual for a race such as the Sovereign to be caught dead on Contraxia, yet Ayesha personally visited the planet with the Sovereign to hire Yondu to kill the Guardians for her.
Ego
One of the most powerful yet unusual beings in the universe, Ego is a Celestial born countless millions of years ago. Alone in the beginning, Ego, in the form of a giant brain, began expanding itself and gathering knowledge, eventually taking the form of a lush garden planet roughly the size of Earth's moon (but with a human-looking face). Eventually, Ego began creating avatars of himself, taking on the forms of the races that inhabit the planets he visited to spread his seed. This includes taking on a human form and siring Peter Quill with Meredith Quill on Earth.
Ego hired Yondu and the Ravagers to retrieve each of his children born across the alien races, but Peter was the only one of Ego's offspring able to tap into the light, Ego's Celestial powers, which would allow Ego to absorb all of the planets he seeded into himself. Ego murdered the rest of his failed offspring; their bones gathered in the caverns beneath the surface of Ego's planetary form. Finally, the Guardians of the Galaxy destroyed Ego, though in order to do so, Peter Quill sacrificed his inherited Celestial powers.
The Multiverse
When Yondu, Rocket and Groot escaped the Ravagers on board a splinter ship called the Quadrant, their destination was Ego's world to rescue the rest of the Guardians. However, Rocket miscalculated the number of necessary space jumps it would require to reach Ego, and the Quadrant ended up performing 750 space jumps.
We saw several unidentified planets and aliens in the course of the Quadrant careening across the multi-verse, but the most significant aliens sighted were the Watchers. The Watchers are an ancient race whose mandate is to observe all events in the universe - but they must never interfere. This particular gathering of Watchers were being regaled by tales of the misadventures of one of their own informants, who had taken the form of an older human male (Stan Lee). Uatu, the Watcher assigned to observe Earth, resides on the Blue Area of Earth's moon. It's possible this was the location briefly glimpsed when the Quadrant jumped in the vicinity of the Watchers.
As the MCU continues to truly depict the universe, the new worlds revealed in Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2 are but a taste of the planets, aliens, and even otherworldly dimensions still to come in Thor: Ragnarok and in next year's Avengers: Infinity War.
