MCU: 10 Things You Might Not Know About GUARDIANS OF THE GALAXY

There's one other name you might know me by... Geek Dave.

1. Director James Gunn auditioned a huge list of actors to find his Peter Quill/Star Lord. Amongst them were (deep breath) Joel Edgerton, Eddie Redmayne, Jensen Ackles, Lee Pace, Wes Bentley, Jack Huston, Cam Gigandet, Sullivan Stapleton, Logan Marshall-Green, Garrett Hedlund, Chris Lowell, James Marsden, Jim Sturgess, Joseph Gordon-Levitt, Aaron Paul, Michael Rosenbaum, Glenn Howerton and John Krasinski (phew!).

2. One person Gunn was quite sure he didn't want to see read for the part of Peter Quill/Star Lord was Chris Pratt. However, a production assistant had seen the selfie that Pratt had posted of himself showing his ripped body, taken during the filming of Zero Dark Thirty...

...and the strength of that picture convinced Gunn to let Pratt audition.

However, when he came to audition, Pratt was now 50 pounds heavier as he'd been asked to gain weight for the film Delivery Man.

James Gunn later said that after Chris Pratt had read for 30 seconds he knew he was perfect for the role. Pratt's audition was so good that Gunn was prepared to offer him the part even if he didn't lose weight and get in shape in time, joking that he was willing to CGI a six pack on Pratt's body if needed. With 6 months to lose 50 pounds and get in superhero shape, Pratt took up the challenge willingly, and ended up losing 60!

3. Olivia Wilde, Rosario Dawson, Gina Carano, Rachel Nichols, Thandie Newton and Adrianne Palicki auditioned before the role of Gamora, with Wilde actually being offered the part first and subsequently turning it down, leaving the door open for Zoe Saldana.

4. Isaiah Mustafa, Brian Patrick Wade and Jason Momoa were all considered for the role of Drax the Destroyer, as was Djimon Hounsou who originally auditioned for this part before being offered the role of Korath.

5. Before Bradley Cooper signed on to voice Rocket, Adam Sandler, David Tennant, Sharlto Copley, Jim Carrey and H. Jon Benjamin were all considered to voice the Raccoon.

6. According to Vin Diesel, to perfect Groot's voice he recorded the line, "I am Groot" over 1,000 times! He then went on to record all of his "I am Groot" lines in several different languages, including Russian, Mandarin, Spanish, Portuguese, German and French, so unlike the other cast members whose lines were dubbed by foreign voice actors, his real voice could be used in the film all around the world.

7. James Gunn revealed that Star-Lord's line, "If I had a blacklight, this place would look like a Jackson Pollock painting," was totally ad-libbed by Chris Pratt, as was his obscene gesture.

8. Peter Quill's ship in Guardians of the Galaxy is called The Milano. James Gunn revealed that it is named after Alyssa Milano, Peter Quill's childhood crush.

9. You no doubt spotted Stan Lee making his cameo appearance as an alien Casanova-type character, but originally he was supposed to be part of the Collector's museum, like this...

A photo posted by James Gunn (@jamesgunn) on Sep 3, 2014 at 9:01am PDT

...James Gunn had already shot the scene with a Stan Lee body-double, intending to digitally impose Lee in later, but the idea was nixed by Marvel, as Gunn explained...

"A couple of the guys at Marvel thought Stan Lee in a case was too broad of a joke in general, and that it took the audience out of the movie. I argued about it for a bit, but we ended up not keeping it in the film."