Fans were devastated when Guardians of the Galaxy director James Gunn revealed that Groot actually died in the first film. It answered one of the big questions about the franchise as viewers didn't know whether the baby Groot they saw in the sequel was the original character or one of his offspring.
Well, to bring a bit of reality to this science fiction, a botanist has provided a nice little insight into how baby Groot came to be.
James Wong wrote on the social networking site: "Baby Groot is created from a cutting of Groot, an ambulant alien plant who dies at the end of the first Guardians of the Galaxy movie.
"Baby Groot is the result of a form of asexual reproduction known as vegetative propagation. Plants, unlike most animals, retain their stem cells through their lives. So cloning them is super easy.
"Baby Groot is therefore a perfect genetic clone of Big Groot.
"Son's tend to only share half their DNA with their parents, so this analogy is tricky. Genetically they are one and the same, more like identical twins. (Unless, of course, Baby Groot was actually grown from the pollen/spores/seeds emitted by Groot in the crash landing scene?)
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"If it was indeed pollen in that scene, it would suggest there is a mysterious 'Lady Groot' character we have so far not seen.
"However, as many (most?) plants are simultaneously male and female, it is highly likely that we all have our pronouns wrong here!
"And finally, as we now know even Earth plants can process complex information about the world around them and retain it without the need for a centralised storage organ like animals need (ie. a brain).
"If Baby groot is a cutting, it is likely it retains Big Groot's memories!"
It would be a very interesting twist if there was a female Groot that appears in the third Guardian of the Galaxy film, which is slated for release sometime in 2020. The plant was going through the moody teenage phase in the sequel, so a girlfriend could be a nice surprise.
But it's worth pointing out that applying Earth's biology to an alien plant that can move and speak is a bit pointless. It's a bit like trying to work out the physics involved in a game of Quidditch from Harry Potter when we actually have no idea how a broomstick operates.
Featured Image Credit: Marvel/DisneyTopics: Entertainment, TV and Film, Interesting, Guardians of the Galaxy, Marvel Cinematic Universe, Marvel