Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2 director James Gunn is pretty active on social media, and often uses it as a way to tease and interact with his fans. In addition to sharing pictures of the cast and crew of GotG2, he also periodically shares teases and other tidbits that he thanks the fans will enjoy.

Not all of the images he shares are from GotG2, however. Recently, Gunn showed off a still from an unfinished scene that was cut from the original Guardians of the Galaxy… though it wasn’t cut for the reason that many fans think.

Posting to Facebook, Gunn shared an image from a scene he referred to as “Groot’s Last Supper.” The image depicts a number of aliens (including Drax and Rocket) in an approximation of “The Last Supper,” with Groot in the center position. The single image was recently finished and delivered to Gunn as a gift, and he wanted to share it with the fan community that made the film so popular.

Groot’s Last Supper. This was a shot from Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 1 that got cut from the movie and was never…Posted by James Gunn on Thursday, March 31, 2016

Given the obvious reference to Leonardo Da Vinci’s painting depicting Jesus and the disciples, some fans believed that the scene was cut from the film for fear of offending Christians or other religious groups. Gunn denies this, however, saying that it was simply cut because it didn’t work well with the pacing of the film. Responding to a fan who believed that both the scene and the song “Spirit in the Sky” (which was in a trailer and on the soundtrack but didn’t appear in the film) were cut to appease both religious and secular groups, he stated:

Even without context, it’s still an interesting image and it’s good to see that at least part of the scene was finished for Gunn. Now we’ve just got to see if Groot’s back in fighting shape come Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2, since he ended the first movie looking a little on the skimpy side.

“Haha, well, no, Spirit in the Sky was never in the movie - just in the trailer. And this scene wasn’t cut because anyone thought it was blasphemous, it was just a slow moment in the wrong place in the film.”

Next: Guardians of the Galaxy 2: James Gunn Says Marvel Offers Creative Freedom

Captain America: Civil War will release on May 6, 2016, followed by Doctor Strange – November 4, 2016; Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2 – May 5, 2017; Spider-Man – July 7, 2017; Thor: Ragnarok – November 3, 2017; Black Panther – February 16, 2018; The Avengers: Infinity War Part 1 – May 4, 2018; Ant-Man and the Wasp – July 6, 2018; Captain Marvel – March 8, 2019; The Avengers: Infinity War Part 2 – May 3, 2019;Inhumans – July 12, 2019; and as-yet untitled Marvel movies on May 1, July 10 and November 6, 2020.

Source: James Gunn