How Powerful Is Cosmo the Spacedog? Powers & Abilities Explained

The latest MCU movie, Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 3, is sure to be something that will be talked about a lot in the coming weeks. Some fans have already watched the movie, and some will watch it this weekend. The movie dealt with much more than expected, with many old and new characters. We are writing this article to discuss Cosmo. So, let’s talk about the character’s powers and abilities to see how powerful Cosmo Superdog really is.

Even though Cosmo looks like an ordinary Labrador-breed dog in a spacesuit, the character has so-called psionic abilities, including high-level telepathy and telekinesis, and enhanced sense of hearing and smell, which dogs generally possess. These abilities make Cosmo a very powerful character because, despite maybe looking like an ordinary dog, the powers of telepathy and telekineses can make Cosmo an equal match to some very powerful characters, such as Adam Warlock. Still, we aren’t sure that MCU movies showed Cosmo’s true potential just yet.

Cosmo the Spacedog was created by the artist Dan Abnett and the writer Andy Lanning. The character debuted in comic books in Nova, Volume 4 #8, in January 2008. The character didn’t take long to appear on the big screen. A female version of Cosmo debuted in a minor role in the original Guardians of the Galaxy movie in 2014, only six years after the character’s debut. In last year’s The Guardians of the Galaxy Holiday Special, Bulgarian actress Maria Bakalova debuted in the voice role of Cosmo. She also reprised the role in Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 3.

Cosmo’s story in the comics and movies

In the source material, before he became a space dog, Cosmo was an ordinary dog that lived in the Soviet Union during the 1960s. He was picked to be launched into Earth’s orbit by the Soviet space program but eventually got lost in space. Cosmo’s space journey eventually led him to Knowhere, and cosmic rays also mutated him. The comic books also depict Cosmo as the security chief of Knowhere and a Guardians of the Galaxy member.

Cosmo debuted in Nova’s comic book. Nova still hasn’t joined the Marvel Cinematic Universe, although there are rumors that he could come shortly. Regardless of that, Cosmo’s origin story wasn’t really changed in the movie apart from the fact that the movie’s Cosmo is a female. We’ve first seen her in the original Guardians of the Galaxy movie, where she was depicted as part of Taneleer Tivan’s collection in his own museum in Knowhere.

When Guardians came to Tivan, also known as the Collector, to show him the Orb in their possession, they discovered that the Orb contained an Infinity Stone. When the Collector’s slave Carina tries to take the Stone to escape from him, an explosion occurs in the museum, which gives Cosmo a chance to escape. Although Cosmo escaped from Tivan, she didn’t leave the museum, and she returned later to Tivan to lick his face in the movie’s post-credit scene.

It’s unknown where Cosmo was during Infinity War, considering that Thanos attacked the Collector in Knowhere to obtain the Reality Stone. The next we see Cosmo is in 2022’s The Guardians of the Galaxy Holiday Special, where the team members are celebrating Holidays, and Cosmo was also there, eventually becoming a team member.

Although Cosmo didn’t talk in the first Guardians of the Galaxy movie, Maria Bakalova joined the cast in the Holiday Special, and that’s when we learned that Cosmo could use her abilities to communicate with humans and other creatures. Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 3, which was recently released, also featured Cosmo.

Although she didn’t have a large role in the movie, she was crucial in the third act when she used her abilities to connect Knowhere with the High Evolutionary’s ship to evacuate everyone before the ship exploded. That shows how powerful Cosmo is with her telepathic and telekinetic abilities.

Will Cosmo return in the future of the Marvel Cinematic Universe?

James Gunn has already announced that Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 3 is his last Marvel movie and the ending for this team incarnation. However, the movie’s ending and the mid-credit scene have already set up a new team, which we’ll likely watch again in future MCU projects, and Cosmo is also a member of this new team.

We don’t know if Marvel Studios is planning a fourth installment with some new writer/director, but the ending of Volume 3 has set up a future for this team, and we’re excited to see them again in the Marvel Cinematic Universe eventually.

Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 3, written and directed by James Gunn, is now playing in theaters.