'Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 3' director James Gunn says he worried about threequel curse: 'There's just not too many good third ones'

• James Gunn was worried about working on "Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 3."
• The director said there are "not too many" good third films.

It's been an interesting few months for James Gunn, as he's taken the reins over at DC Studios to become co-CEO alongside Peter Safran, and he's still working on "Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 3" for Marvel Studios.

The director is finally getting to finish telling the story that he started way back in 2014, and "Vol. 3" finds the cosmic band of misfits in a vastly different place. But Gunn was worried that the threequel wouldn't hold up to the previous two movies.

Gunn recently spoke to Entertainment Weekly about his final outing with Star-Lord (Chris Pratt) and the gang when he explained his concerns stem from the fact that other trilogies typically haven't ended on a good third film.

He said: "The amount of good third episodes in a trilogy, I can count them on one hand. Basically, there's the 'Before Sunrise' series. 'Lord of the Rings.' Maybe 'Spider-Man.' But there's just not too many good third ones."

The director went on to call the upcoming movie "the big one," before explaining that he came back to explore Rocket (Bradley Cooper) and his story at the end of the trilogy.

Gunn said: "One of the reasons why I came back to this movie was because I felt like I needed to tell Rocket's story. I would've been very sad not to complete the trilogy for many reasons, but I just feel very connected to Rocket. I feel like nobody would be able to tell his full story if it wasn't me."

The director called the anthropomorphic, gun-toting raccoon the "secret protagonist" of the franchise, and he embodies traits from the whole team in his feisty personality.

Gun explained: "To me, Rocket has always been the secret protagonist of the 'Guardians' movies. From the beginning, it has been rooted in who he is as a character. I think he exemplifies a lot of the traits of all the Guardians. They've had all these traumas, and it brings them together. I just think that his is more extreme than others."