While Guardians of the Galaxy director James Gunn has had nothing but praise about how great Marvel Studios and Disney were with things that he wanted to incorporate into the film, there’s apparently one particular scene that Disney did veto.
During Dragon Con, James Gunn relayed a story about the original idea he had for Stan Lee’s cameo. Gunn originally planned for Lee to be one of the Collector’s exhibits, just like Howard the Duck. In the scene Gunn had planned, Groot would have looked at Lee in the exhibit and been taken aghast. Then, Lee would have flipped Groot the bird.
Evidently, Disney was not ok with Lee flipping the bird, even though it had previously been shown earlier in the film.
Instead of being part of the Collector’s exhibit, Stan Lee wound up being one of the people on the planet Xandar, who Rocket spots in passing.
While Disney has gotten a bit more progressive with what they let into a Marvel movie these days, they’re naturally going to draw the line somewhere. I wouldn’t worry too much Guardians Of The Galaxy 2 will probably find ways to push Disney to it’s edge in even more fun and raunchy ways than Guardians Of The Galaxy.
The image below showcase Stan Lee’s body double prepping for the original shot.