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James and Sean Gunn on Bringing Rocket Raccoon to Life

With just weeks until the premiere of Avengers: Infinity War, fans are finding out a little bit about what goes on behind the scenes. Not in a ‘giving away big secrets’ way, but in a ‘this makes us appreciate the entire thing a little more’ way.

Most recently, James and Sean Gunn spoke about what goes into creating the character of Rocket Raccoon on set. Hint: it involves Sean in a green suit, portraying Rocket to make the interactions more authentic.

Guardians of the Galaxy franchise director James Gunn said he was used to working with Matthew Lillard in Scooby Doo and he knew he wanted a similar set up for these films. Sean was happy to comply.

‘When we rehearsed the first scene, I just jumped in there. I got on my hands and knees, essentially, so that when Chris Pratt and Zoe Saldana and Dave Bautista were speaking to Rocket, they were looking at a person’s eyes.’

He’s more limber than the average person. In fact, what he does is something that would be uncomfortable for anyone else. Especially because of the length of time they spend on set.

‘I can crouch down and even walk from that position without too much trouble. I don’t think many other actors would be able to do the physical part of it.’

He went on to say that it is ‘strange’ to spend so much of his time as this character and for it to not be his voice or face on screen. Bradley Cooper actually voices Rocket Raccoon. However, it’s not recognition or attention he wanted, it’s a solid film.

‘It is strange to spend so many hours as a character and then see it and have it be neither my voice nor my face. I never did the job because I thought it would get me a lot of attention. I did the job because I wanted the movie to be as good as it could possibly be.’

We’ve always had a soft spot for Rocket, but we’ll treasure his interactions now more than ever before.

Avengers: Infinity War hits theaters on April 27th.