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Back in London for Guardians shooting, Cassius felt the vibe shift right away.
After the short separation, the cast greeted each other like old friends reuniting. The makeup room and holding areas buzzed with noise every morning before call time.
Dave was always the loudest.
He stomped around in his heavy Drax muscle suit, voice booming as he chased people with his script. "Cass! This line—'I'll rip his spine out through his mouth.' Should I add a snarl, or is deadpan scarier?"
Cassius let the makeup artist touch up his face while he answered. "Deadpan, Dave. Drax says shit like that the way normal people say the weather's nice. The calmer you are, the creepier it lands."
"Solid!" Dave grinned and lumbered off to bother Zoe, who was half-buried under green silicone.
Zoe barely moved her eyes. "Shut up, Dave. I'm turning green over here."
Dave just laughed and went hunting for Bradley to workshop Rocket's next savage insult.
Bradley wasn't even in the movie full-time—he only did voice work—but he hung around set anyway, feeding lines and rhythm to the puppeteers and actors. He and the leads clicked fast.
His sharp, filthy Rocket comebacks had the whole stage cracking up.
Gunn was the chaos engine and the biggest kid on set.
He ran around in a hoodie and sneakers, hair wild, walkie in one hand and a can of Play-Doh in the other. That was his thing—his weird little reward system.
If a take was fire or someone dropped a killer improv, Gunn would pull a fresh can out of nowhere like a magician. "That was insane! Here—cosmic energy clay. Go make an alien monster."
Cassius already had three cans: neon green, galaxy purple, and a blinding orange-red.
Zoe got silver-gray. Dave got deep red—"Drax's rage color," Gunn declared. Even Bradley earned a dirt-yellow one for a killer ad-lib and called it "Rocket's fur."
The childish, warm gesture cut through the grind and turned the set into something that felt more like play than work.
Cassius used his neon-green can to sculpt a lumpy, tentacled potato thing and left it on his monitor. Gunn spotted it and laughed for five straight minutes.
Today's scene was Star-Lord trying to sell Rocket and Groot on their makeshift prison-break plan.
They were in the common area of the Kyln.
The tricky part was playing to two non-human characters at once—one was pure post-production CGI (Groot), the other was a half-puppet raccoon that relied on Cassius's imagination and Bradley's off-camera voice work.
"Action!"
Cassius crouched on a rusty pipe, eyes flicking between Groot's mark and the slightly twitching Rocket puppet. "Listen, I know you two aren't exactly fans, but right now we've got the same problem—we need to get the hell out of here."
He kept the cocky street-kid swagger in his voice and body while switching focus between the empty air and the puppet.
Bradley's Rocket voice cut in sharp and fast from off-camera. "Idiot! Why the hell would I trust you? You can't even hang on to your own Walkman!"
Cassius let the jab land—face twisting with that quick flash of annoyance—then covered it with an even bigger shrug. "Strategic relocation! Point is, we need each other. I draw the heat, you handle the locks and anything that goes beep-bloop!"
The real skill was selling the audience on the fact that a pissed-off raccoon and a silent tree were actually standing there, reacting in real time. It took rock-solid belief and perfect timing.
Gunn nodded hard behind the monitors. "Cut! Perfect!"
He tossed Cassius a fresh can of glittery deep-blue Play-Doh as a reward.
Between takes the cast kept the energy stupid and fun. Dave dragged over some giant rusty gear and tried to challenge Cassius to a strength contest in their bulky suits, nearly face-planting and sending everyone into hysterics.
Zoe finally escaped the endless makeup touch-ups and sat sipping water. Cassius handed her an energy bar.
"Thanks," she said. "Your rhythm with Rocket was tight today. Bradley's lines landed clean."
Cassius shrugged. "Bradley made it easy. Hard to get pissed at empty air without those insults."
The corner of Zoe's mouth twitched. "He's good at that."
Afternoon green-screen work felt less like torture because of the chaos. For the asteroid field chase, Cassius had to react to explosions and impacts that only existed in sound effects and the cast yelling random bullshit off-camera.
"Hard left—boulder bigger than your head!"
"Oh shit—gravity well! Hold on!"
"Haha, got one! Their engine's throwing fireworks!"
The mess helped him nail the panicked, half-assed flying energy Gunn wanted for Star-Lord.
By wrap Cassius was wrecked, but happy in a way he hadn't felt on other sets. Hunger Games and Fast had been professional. This felt like a weird, creative family workshop. Gunn's style, sure—but Cassius loved it.
Back at his place that night he looked at the row of Play-Doh cans and laughed. He could feel Peter Quill getting more alive with every stupid little moment on set.
The Guardians were a bunch of misfits, and the people playing them were slowly turning into one too.
The panel confirmed it: Trendsetter progress ticked up another three percent.
The next day Cassius finished an action take, face still streaked with dirt, when Rob burst onto set looking like hell.
Cassius had just grabbed water from an assistant and froze mid-twist of the cap. Rob should've been in L.A. pushing the Oscar campaign, not standing in a London soundstage looking like he'd slept in his suit.
Something was wrong.
Rob's shirt was wrinkled, tie crooked, hair flattened by London weather. He spotted Cassius and kept his voice low. "Bro. Need a minute. Private."
Cassius stayed calm on the outside. "Tell the AD I'm taking fifteen."
He led Rob to a quiet corner behind unused set walls and prop crates.
"What happened? Oscar numbers shifting?"
Rob pulled a silver flask from his jacket, took a long pull of what smelled like straight espresso, and wiped his mouth. "Oscar just got a lot more complicated. Warner made their move."
"Made their move?"
"Against you," Rob said, voice tight with anger. "They're not running normal PR. They're using every connection they've got to make sure you don't win Best Supporting Actor. They want you stuck at the nomination and nothing more."
Cassius leaned against a metal crate, expression neutral while his brain spun.
Rob kept going. "Source inside Warner is solid. High-level execs gave the order—protect Interstellar's image and make sure the guy they dumped doesn't turn around and grab an Oscar. That would make every decision they made look like pure stupidity. Bad for stock price, bad for the project."
"How are they doing it?"
"Lobbying. Pressure. Quiet deals." Rob ticked them off on his fingers. "They've got their PR teams and old-school fixers talking to the older academy members—the ones who still think awards should go to 'real acting.' The talking points are all the same: this year's field is stacked, Waltz and Hoffman are textbook, we should honor the highest art, not the biggest box office. Especially not some young Asian guy from a teen franchise."
Cassius stayed quiet.
"Plus they're trading favors," Rob added. "Warner's got projects, money, distribution. They're hinting that supporting the 'right' candidate now could mean help later. The opposite if you don't play ball. They're hitting the producers branch and some tech-adjacent voters hardest. Actors branch is tougher, but they've got reach."
Cassius tapped his fingers on the crate. Classic Hollywood. Quiet, polite, brutal.
He just hadn't expected Warner to spend this much political capital on him.
"Do they really care that much if I win?"
Rob gave a short, bitter laugh. "Bro, you're underestimating what an Oscar does for someone like you. Nomination? You're the commercial kid who got lucky. Win? You're Oscar winner Cassius Cass. That title changes everything—negotiating power, future projects, respect from the old guard, and the signal it sends to Asia and global audiences. You stop being a flash in the pan and become certified top-tier. Warner can't stomach that. Not after they kicked you off Interstellar."
Cassius exhaled slowly.
He got it. This wasn't just about one statue. It was about control and narrative. They were terrified of the guy they'd written off turning into something bigger than they could manage.
"What do we do?"
Rob looked stressed. "We're outgunned on connections and money. Can't go head-to-head without proof, and that'd just make us look desperate. Academy rules—"
"We don't fight them on their terms," Cassius cut in, calm. "We change the game."
Rob blinked.
"From now on, every member screening and interview isn't about my performance. It's about why Peeta connected with millions of kids across cultures. Why a non-traditional hero matters. What Hollywood's future looks like when it stops being so damn narrow. We tie me to bigger ideas—diversity, globalization, the next generation. Make me a symbol instead of just another competitor."
Rob's eyes sharpened as he processed it. "Smart. Takes you out of the mud fight and puts you on higher ground. Harder for Warner to smear without looking like they're attacking the future of the industry."
Cassius nodded. "And feed a couple friendly outlets the story that this year's Oscar race has a quiet culture war underneath it. Let people see the old guard trying to lock the gates. Makes Warner's backroom deals look uglier in the open."
Rob was already pulling out his phone, color coming back to his face. "We can do that. We'll reframe the whole conversation."
Cassius glanced across the stage where Gunn was still laughing with Dave and Zoe. The Guardians set felt like another planet compared to the cold political machine Rob had just described.
But the machine was real, and it was coming for him.
Fine.
If Warner wanted to play dirty, Cassius would just make sure the whole world was watching.