Guardians of the Galaxy 2 director teases Sylvester Stallone and Michael Rosenbaum's "very important" new characters

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We’re less than two months away from seeing Guardians of the Galaxy 2, but there’s still a lot we don’t know about it: including the secret roles of two “very important” Marvel Cinematic Universe characters played by Sylvester Stallone and Smallville’s former Lex Luthor, Michael Rosenbaum.

Writer/director James Gunn was a guest on The Adam Corolla Show recently, and he teased a little bit about those two new characters. “We do have a couple of characters who are very important to the Marvel Universe who are going to make their debut in Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2 which people don't know about," he said. "Sylvester Stallone plays one of these characters...my friend Michael Rosenbaum also has a pretty decent role in the movie as well and it sort of works in tandem with Sly's character."

There’s long been speculation that Stallone might be playing a member of the Nova Corps, but as far as I can tell, that speculation originated with an observation that those characters’ comic book costumes look similar to Stallone’s costume in 1995’s Judge Dredd.

As for Rosenbaum (a longtime friend of Gunn’s), I’ve seen some people hope that he’ll be playing Richard Rider, a Nova Corps member who was born on Earth in the comics. However, I’d love to see him play a cosmic hero named Adam Warlock, while Stallone could play the High Evolutionary - a space researcher and explorer who transformed into a godlike being and encountered both Warlock and Thor in the comics. Hey, if Kurt Russell is playing a living planet, why can’t his Tango and Cash co-star play a godlike space explorer?

Directed by James Gunn and starring Chris Pratt, Zoe Saldana, Dave Bautista, Kurt Russell, and more, Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2 will hit UK cinemas on April 28, 2017 and open in US theatres on May 5, 2017.

Images: Marvel/Buena Vista Pictures

Ben Pearson
Ben Pearson
Ben is an entertainment journalist who has written about movies online for nearly a decade. He loves the Fast & Furious franchise, prefers Indiana Jones to Star Wars, and will defend the ending of Lost until his dying day. He shook Bill Murray's hand once (so he's got that going for him, which is nice). Ben lives in Los Angeles with his wife.