By now, it’s no secret that Marvel Studios wants to put out two movies per year. Already on the schedule are ‘Iron Man 3’ and ‘Thor 2’ in 2013 and ‘Captain America 2’ in 2014. Rumors have been flying around concerning which hero would fill the unannounced spot in 2014. Previously, we had word that Black Panther would occupy that spot, but now it seems like Latino Review is reporting that the Guardians of the Galaxy will instead fill the void and set up for ‘The Avengers 2’ in 2015.

Earlier this week, Marvel was caught purchasing domain names and things like that related to the Guardians, which may have something to do with the team entering the Marvel Cinematic Universe sooner rather than later. According to the report, the film will be set in the future where the team battles an evil alien race called the Badoom, but that isn’t the only evil alien they’ll have to worry about. Apparently, Thanos, who appeared in the post credits scene of ‘The Avengers’, will be a part of the movie as well, so that suggests that, in order to tie in the Guardians with The Avengers, we’ll be seeing a bit of the Thanos Imperative storyline.

Consisting of Star-Lord, Drax the Destroyer, Gamora, Groot, and Rocket Raccoon, the Guardians of the Galaxy were formed after the Phanlanx invasion of the Kree in the ‘Annihilation: Conquest’ storyline. Star-Lord forms the team of interstellar heroes to be “proactive in protecting the galaxy, rather than reacting to crises as they happen”. Latino Review also points out that we’ll likely see Nova join the ranks of the Guardians in the film version considering that he’s the most recognizable Marvel space character. After all, he’s already being gradually introduced to casual Marvel fans in things like ‘Ultimate Spider-Man’ and ‘Avengers Vs. X-Men’.

Despite being one of the more obscure titles in the Marvel catalogue, the Guardians of the Galaxy has grown quite a following among fans. Since the company is looking to explore more areas of their universe on screen, it was bound to happen that they’d eventually fit in the intergalactic heroes into the MCU eventually.

Nothing is official yet though, so treat this as a rumor for now, but as I’ve pointed out before, Latino Review has a pretty good record when it comes to sharing Marvel information. Hopefully we’ll get some clarification from the House of Ideas once San Diego Comic-Con rolls around next month.