James Gunn Confirms Star Wars To Join The MCU – April Fools’ Day Joke

Star Wars may be set a long time ago in a galaxy far, far away… but according to Guardians of the Galaxy director James Gunn, it’s about to become a part of the MCU (Marvel Cinematic Universe).

“The Marvel Cinematic Universe is a huge place,” Gunn stated in an interview to promote his sequel to the hit 2014 film. “It’s populated with eternal beings and cosmic travellers. When you’re dealing on a scale that huge, the big picture can be hard to grasp. But it’s time to blow people’s minds. People aren’t just ready to know, they want to know. People are always saying how great it would be if, you know, universes collided and characters could cross over. And you know what? We are.”

After posting an amusing Star Wars/Guardians crossover picture on his Facebook account just hours before, it seemed like a joke. Yet when pressed on the matter, he finally admitted with a grin, “We’ve got Star Wars! It really is a shared universe now!”

This move may strike fear into the hearts of some fans of both franchises, who would prefer the two universes to be distinctly separate. However, for others like Gunn it’s like a dream come true, and with both properties owned by parent company Disney it seemed inevitable for the two to co-exist.

“We’re not going to be screwing up timelines or having all the characters meet up,” he warns. “After all, the Star Wars films are solidly set way back in the past. However, when you look at some of the things like the Infinity Stones, for instance, their history is incredibly old. So are the Khyber Crystals and the Jedi Holocrons. In Rebels, there’s a huge ancient creature called Bendu, the first truly cosmic giant they’ve shown. In Guardians, there’s the place called Knowhere, a giant severed head of a long-dead cosmic being, and nobody knows what this creature was. It’s going to be a lot of fun tying everything together.”

Does this mean that we’ll soon be seeing Star-Lord flying the Millennium Falcon anytime soon? Gunn laughed at the question, before pausing to answer.

“That would be pretty cool, right?” he said, nodding. “Personally I doubt it, but never say never. What I can tell you though is that there are a few things we’ve already managed to put into the new film, old scrap Battle Droids, a lightsabre, things like that. I’d say they’re Easter eggs, but that’s kind of unfair. They’re front-and-centre. It isn’t like we’re going to hide it. But they [Star Wars] have their own thing going on, and so do we. Nobody wants to step on anybody else’s toes. You’ll be seeing more and more of it in all the films now though.”

Star Wars has had a long history with Marvel Comics, with the original films being adapted into comics, as well as an ongoing series, before moving over to another company Dark Horse. However, when Disney acquired Lucasfilm in 2012 in a deal which reportedly cost over $4 billion, it wasn’t long before Star Wars comic books returned to sister company Marvel’s stable. This latest move of merging the two cinematic universes seems to be the next logical step. It’s one which Gunn is obviously excited about.

“I’ve been wanting this to happen all my life,” Gunn said enthusiastically. “Now we’ve all been given the go-ahead, and it’s fair game as long as we don’t go overboard. A part of me wants to throw in everything, but I know I can’t. It wouldn’t be fair to anyone, as fun as the thought of it may be. For now, it’s about just dropping little references, but that’s still enough. I’m just happy to confirm that the Marvel Cinematic Universe and the Star Wars Universe are now one and the same.”

With Thor: Ragnarok and Star Wars: The Last Jedi both being released later this year, expect to see more crossover references. Or don’t, since this is an April Fool’s Day article.