Like Captain America: The First Avenger before it, Guardians of the Galaxy Vol 2 breaks the mold of films taking place within the general timeframe that they were released. This is part 15 of a 20 part video series discussing when each film in the MCU takes place. So when does Guardians of the Galaxy Vol 2 Take Place?

“He may have been ya’ father boy, but he wasn’t yo’ daddy.”Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2 is unique in that it’s a sequel released 3 years after the first film, but takes place only a few months after the first film. And considering there are no concrete modern dates in its duration, we can only guess when exactly it occurs. But the film does begin in 1980, in Missouri. Ego and Peter’s mother, Meredith, are introduced to us, setting the stage and planting the seeds for what’s to come later in the film.

We can assume that only about 2 to 3 months have elapsed since the first film, primarily due to the quick growth cycle that Groots appear to have. After all, as we see in Infinity War, Groot is already a rebellious teenager, and we can date that film to almost exactly four years later, but we’ll discuss that in more depth in parts 19 and 20. This places Guardians of the Galaxy roughly mid to late fall, 2014.

One mistake in continuity is pretty apparent in this cameo with Stan Lee, as he mentions an event that occurs almost 2 years later. “At that time, I was a Federal Express man.” Director James Gunn has gone on record as stating this is a mistake.

The mid and end credits scenes are unique in this film, not only because there are five of them, but because they take place over a large swath of time. The first, second, and fifth likely occur in 2014, shortly after the film’s main timeframe. The third scene, with Ayesha and her new birthing pod for Adam Warlock, likely occurs in 2015, as some time must have elapsed for her to create a new type of birthing pod. The fourth scene is the most interesting, as it appears to occur in 2018, shortly before the events of Infinity War, based solely on the fact that Groot looks and acts identical to his age in that film.

So 1.7% of the runtime occurs in 1980, 97.3% in 2014, .6% in 2015, and another .4% in 2018.