Revealing a hidden detail from Avengers: Infinity War led to Guardians of the Galaxy writer/director James Gunn apologizing to fans for making them cry. While his intentions were meant to be informative, the reveal more or less backfired.

Avengers: Infinity War is a critical success breaking box office records, but its traumatic final act has left audiences reeling. Similar to the way The Empire Strikes Back ends on an all-around sour note for the protagonists, Infinity War pits the Avengers against Thanos, only to have the heroes fail in their mission to defeat the Mad Titan. Thanos succeeds in acquiring all six Infinity Stones, snaps his fingers while wearing the Infinity Gauntlet, and in seconds, half of all humanity in the entire universe is wiped out. One by one, various heroes fade to dust, and though their return in Avengers 4 is just short of being definite, their ends are no less devastating. However, given that audiences are incapable of translating Groot’s language, the impact of his death wasn’t fully satisfied until James Gunn officially revealed that his dying word was “Dad,” referring back to the original Groot character from Guardians of the Galaxy. As a result of this revelation, fan outcry was more intense than he anticipated, leading to Gunn’s formal apology.

After his response gained momentum, Gunn reached out to fans on Twitter to personally beg forgiveness for the heartbreaking revelation. Even though he was well aware the revelation would strike some emotional chords, he explained that he never anticipated the response to be so intense. That said, in his apology he leveled with his fans, expressing how much it means to him that audiences share his enthusiasm and affection for the characters. See his tweet below.

While the screenplay for Infinity War was written by Christopher Markus and Stephen McFeely, Gunn was brought on board to write some dialogue for scenes involving the Guardians. Having already tackled volumes 1 and 2, his involvement made sense, given that the overall tone of Guardians is so disparate from other entries in the MCU. That said, it hasn’t been specified how much of the dialogue was Gunn’s, and he didn’t specify whether Groot’s final line came from him or the other writers.

His death aside, this budding version of Groot has been the focus of confusion for some fans. While some believed that Baby Groot was simply a resurrected version of Groot from the first Guardians movie, Gunn confirmed that he is actually Groot’s son - which would explain the elevated tragedy in his final line.

More: James Gunn Shares Some of His Original Guardians of the Galaxy Pitch

Source: James Gunn/Twitter

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