Topics: Guardians Of The Galaxy, Film and TV, Marvel, Marvel Cinematic Universe, James Gunn
People who've seen Guardians of the Galaxy Volume 3 are worried that it might be a bit traumatizing for children who go in expecting a fun superhero movie.
The third and possibly final entry in James Gunn's Guardians of the Galaxy movies has been released and people are packing out cinemas to see it.
Watch the trailer below and beware of spoilers from this point onwards:
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Saying goodbye to much loved characters is already a pretty sad deal, and ahead of the third Guardians film releasing some major stars made it clear their time in the Marvel Cinematic Universe was at an end.
We've known about this for a while as Zoe Saldaña has said she's probably not going to be back playing Gamora again, while Dave Bautista has said his time as Drax the Destroyer is pretty much over, now he's wrapped on the third Guardians movie.
The movie has a PG-13 rating in the US, meaning kids can see it but there's a content warning, and a 12A in the UK meaning children under 12 need to have an adult with them to watch it - and viewers are saying the movie really pushes the boundaries of what you can get away with for those ratings.
Okie dokie, let's get properly cracking with the spoilers in Guardians of the Galaxy Volume 3, so if you don't want to know any concrete details about what happens in the film, maybe you'd be better off reading how Karen Gillan once showed up to couple's therapy in costume as Nebula instead.
Right then, people who've seen the latest Guardians of the Galaxy movie have been saying that what's up there on the big screen might actually be quite traumatising for children watching it.
The movie really does not pull any emotional punches, depicting our heroes getting seriously wounded, and in some cases even hanging on the precipice of death, for extended periods of time.
This sort of thing would likely be pretty distressing for children, so it's understandable why plenty of viewers are leaving the cinema thinking what they saw might upset younger audiences.
Then there's a whole sequence where we get to see Rocket Raccoon's (Bradley Cooper) backstory and get introduced to several adorable animal friends.
There's Lylla the Otter (Linda Cardinelli), Teefs the Walrus (Asim Chaudhry) and Floor the Rabbit (Mikaela Hoover), who Rocket befriends during his early days being a test subject of the villainous High Evolutionary (Chukwudi Iwuji).
There are several adorable sequences where we see them befriend a young Rocket after he was experimented on, and then they all die horribly as the Raccoon makes an escape attempt when he discovers they're all going to be incinerated the next morning.
It all goes a bit Watership Down for some viewers, getting us to like these animal friends and then just offing them on screen to cause Rocket - and possibly any children watching - significant trauma.
Then there's the other stunts the High Evolutionary pulls, destroying an entire planet the Guardians had spent some time on just because he thinks he can make a better one.
Speaking of things the High Evolutionary pulls, he also rips off his own face later on in the movie and the camera shows pretty much all of the gruesome gore you'd expect from such a moment.
On top of all that, there's a sequence near the end where Star Lord (Chris Pratt), seemingly dies in space, only to be saved at the last moment by Adam Warlock (Will Poulter).
While Star Lord is all right in the end, and indeed at the end of the credits the movie promises he'll return, it's still pretty disturbing for audiences to see the film's main character come so close to death right at the end.
