Warning: Spoilers for Avengers: Infinity War and Endgame ahead

Avengers: Infinity War saw the death of Gamora (Zoe Saldaña) as we knew her, but Endgame then saw a pre-Guardians of the Galaxy, alternate reality version of the character return. She assists in the final battle and then goes off on her own (not before kicking Chris Pratt in the nether regions, however). But that almost looked a whole different, at least according to director James Gunn.

Speaking with ComicBook.com about Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 3, Gunn revealed that he initially planned to kill off Gamora and not Yondu (Michael Rooker) in Vol. 2. “So things always change and you never know. But Gamora almost died in Vol. 2,” said Gunn.

He added, “I knew from the beginning Zoe only wanted to play the character for so many years, and she's been very honest saying that she's done [after this]. And so I was going to have her die. I thought she was the one that was going to sacrifice herself, and Quill was going to learn about himself as opposed to in the second movie, and I thought different of it. I was kind of talked out of it by Kevin [Feige] and Lou [D'Esposito], and then it just didn't work that well. It didn't feel right, it felt much more right to go where we go in that movie. That seemed what was correct for the story. I think at the time I was afraid of killing Michael Rooker because he's my friend.” Gunn finished by saying he “felt bad” about killing Michael Rooker's character and that he “didn't want to do that.” However, he felt it was where the story of Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2 naturally progressed.

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While it's easy to say that comic book movies don't generally have stakes, Gunn may be right about the case of Rooker. In fact, it's hard not to imagine a film where Yondu dies given the significance of Peter Quill (Pratt) listening to “Father and Son” at the end of the film. In turn, that allowed Gamora to have more of an emotional role in Infinity War given her ties to Thanos (Josh Brolin).

Gamora returns in Vol. 3 as the same version we saw at the end of Endgame, not familiar with the whole Guardians of the Galaxy team and taking a while to warm up. Whether or not this is Saldaña's curtain call for the character still remains to be seen, though.

Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 3 will be released on May 5.