Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2 took comic fanatics by surprise when it introduced members of the original Guardians team, but one hero was noteably missing. However, if you were hoping Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 3 would introduce Vance Astro to the MCU, then you are about to be sorely disappointed.

Thanks to MCU Exchange, fans have learned James Gunn has no plans to bring out Vance Astro in Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 3. The director revealed the fact to fans who attended his panel at HasCon this weekend. When Gunn was asked about the chances of Vance’s debut, he said, “Not great. I’m done with [the script’s] treatment.”

For fans, the absence of Vance Astro is a bitter one. The character is the original team’s most recognizable member as he led the group. If you are not familiar with Vance Astro, you should know the character hails from Earth. Born Vance Astrovik, the hero volunteered to man a government-sponsored trip into space in 1988. However, the mission would require him to go through experimental procedures to endure his centuries-long journey.

After being given state-of-the-art alterations, Astro was sent into space. The man began to develop psionic powers during his time in suspended animation. He eventually arrived on the planet Centauri IV to discover what he had missed over the years, and Astro wound up forming the first Guardians teams with himself as its leader.

Oh, and he wields a future version of Captain America’s iconic shield. There’s that too.

If you’re curious as to why Gunn included the original Guardians he did, then you are in luck. The director took to Facebook back in May to detail his selection process for fans.

“I woke up one morning and I was thinking, oh my god, I would love to see those guys together at the end of the movie, sort of forming an even more messed up, screwy version of the Guardians, who are even less heroic than the Guardians are. And they’re also even weirder,” Gunn wrote.

“Charlie-27 is obvious, Martinex is obvious, they’re two of the original Guardians of the Galaxy. Aleta, I thought, was an interesting character. Mainframe is male. I thought she could be very interesting as this big, tough robot head that could [go on into] a lot of other things, but it talks like Miley Cyrus. And then Krugarr I just thought was even weirder than Rocket and Groot and could be a really cool character. So that was my decision process, it really was just me lying in bed and thinking about who those characters could be.”

Guardians of the Galaxy Vol.2 is available on Blu-ray and DVD now. What did you think of the latest volume of the Awesome Mix? Let us know with your rating in the Movie Database below!