Dave Bautista Says Leaving Marvel is a "Relief," Says Playing "Silly" Drax "Wasn’t All Pleasant"
Dave Bautista’s acting career got a huge boost by playing Drax in Marvel Studios’ The Guardians of the Galaxy franchise. But, while he’s grateful for the opportunity of playing Drax, he’s also relieved that his time as the character is over. During a recent interview with GQ magazine, he says he doesn’t want this silly performance to be his legacy. He explained:
“I’m so grateful for Drax. I love him. But there’s a relief [that it’s over]. It wasn’t all pleasant. It was hard playing that role. The makeup process was beating me down. And I just don’t know if I want Drax to be my legacy — it’s a silly performance, and I want to do more dramatic stuff.”
Bautista is exiting the Marvel Cinematic Universe, as Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 3 marks his final film as Drax the Destroyer, a role that he’s been attached to for nearly 10 years over the course of seven different MCU projects.
The actor has expressed his frustration over the role in the past that how Marvel “dropped the ball” in terms of doing Drax justice on the big screen. He always wanted to see more from the character:
“I really wished they would have invested more in Drax, personally. Because I think Drax has more of a story to tell. I think Drax has a really interesting backstory, which they dropped the ball on. That’s no dig on Marvel. They had their slate, I know what they’re focused on, that’s what they have [it] slated out. But man, I think they really missed the ball on Drax. He has such a great backstory.
“Selfishly, as a performer, that would have given me the opportunity to show different sides of Drax, emotionally. And physically as well. Because, if you notice, Drax, although he looks like a badass, you look at him and he looks terrifying, but Drax gets his ass kicked more than any other Marvel character...The whole “Destroyer” thing they just threw that out the window...people just fell so in love with the comedic side of Drax they tapped into that, then they tapped into it more, then they really dug a hole into it. But we missed a huge boat on that character and I don’t think it’ll ever come back around. But I’m really just looking forward to finishing out this whole journey."
I agree, Drax has an incredibly interesting backstory, and it’s something they never really touched on and explored.
The actor has definitely had the opportunity to take on a good amount of dramatic roles since playing Drax in projects like Dune and the upcoming M. Night Shyamalan movie Knock at the Cabin. He also recently starred in Rian Johnson’s Glass Onion, which he was great in.
Bautista is now in a position to shape his career any way he wants, and it’ll be cool to see what kind of roles he ends up taking on in the future.