James Gunn Reveals He Came Up With the MCU's Infinity Stones Lore in 3 Minutes — GeekTyrant

Geek Tyrant

11-07-2025

So much of the Marvel Cinematic Universe hinges on the Infinity Stones. They drove the plot for over a decade, shaped character arcs, and culminated in Avengers: Infinity War and Endgame . But according to Guardians of the Galaxy director James Gunn, the entire mythology behind these cosmic MacGuffins came together in… about three minutes.
While chatting with GQ and reflecting on his Marvel run, Gunn casually dropped that he was the one who gave the Infinity Stones their cinematic lore, and he did it without much of a game plan from Marvel.
'I knew there were Infinity Stones when they said, 'You know, we have been thinking, and we think maybe some of these things have been Infinity Stones in different ways. And so, could you write up what the Infinity Stones mean?''
Gunn said there were no formal outlines, no grand Kevin Feige whiteboard moment. Just a need for some connective tissue between 'the red thing and the blue thing.'
'It was literally me sitting down for three minutes and writing that. And that's then what became the rest of the Infinity Stones.'
That scene with Benicio del Toro's Collector explaining the stones? That was Gunn's three-minute brain dump. And somehow, that little lore drop became the backbone of the entire Infinity Saga.
He also clarified that Marvel wasn't locked into any color scheme early on:
'The Power Stone in Guardians of the Galaxy was originally red. And then they decided the red thing in Thor: The Dark World was going to be the Reality Stone. So then [the Power Stone] became purple in post.'
It's a reminder of how fluid the MCU's worldbuilding really was in those early days. The Infinity Stones were once just placeholders that Gunn helped unify with a quick write-up. No massive committee, no big lore bible. Just a guy with a keyboard, comic book knowledge, and three free minutes.