Star-Lord is on the hunt for the real Peter Quill in Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 3

In the first "Guardians of the Galaxy", Quill is a boy who never grew up. He was abducted by alien Ravagers after the death of his mother Meredith (Laura Haddock). As a child, Quill couldn't hold his dying mother's hand as she reached out for him. So her new life gave her the chance to escape her grief by being someone else.

The movie emphasized that "Star-Lord" was a name Quill chose for himself: many 80s kids pretended to be Han Solo, but Quill took his fantasy one step further. By the end of the movie, he's still playing the Star-Lord fantasy, only now he's a Guardian of the Galaxy instead of an outlaw. It's easy to let your job overwhelm your identity, especially when it's a job as fun as a galactic adventurer.

In "Vol. 2", Quill finally meets his father, the (literally) planet-sized celestial ego (Kurt Russell). As noted by Pratt, Peter begins to reorient his identity around his father. When he learns that Ego actually has plans to destroy the universe, Quill rejects him: he chooses humanity over divinity and even accepts the late Ravager Yondu (Michael Rooker) as his real > father.

Then Peter and Gamora (Zoe Saldana) reunite, but she dies in 'Avengers: Infinity War'. Worse still, she's been replaced by a duplicate from the alternate timeline who doesn't know Peter, only reminding him of what he's lost. So where is Star-Lord now? "He realizes that all these different people he found are Quill," Pratt said, "None of them are the real Quill." Who is the real Quill? We'll just have to find out alongside Peter himself in "Vol. 3".

"Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 3" hits theaters May 5, 2023.