In rather shocking and surprising news today, James Gunn, director of Marvel’s “Guardians Of The Galaxy” franchise, was fired from the series by Disney when old tweets of poor taste, provocative jokes about pedophilia and rape were discovered online.
Before any decision was made, and when the controversy was rapidly metastasizing, Gunn apologized on Twitter but has now released a post-dismissal statement.
“My words of nearly a decade ago were, at the time, totally failed and unfortunate efforts to be provocative,” Gunn said in a statement. “I have regretted them for many years since — not just because they were stupid, not at all funny, wildly insensitive, and certainly not provocative like I had hoped, but also because they don’t reflect the person I am today or have been for some time.”
“Regardless of how much time has passed, I understand and accept the business decisions taken today. Even these many years later, I take full responsibility for the way I conducted myself then,” he continued. “All I can do now, beyond offering my sincere and heartfelt regret, is to be the best human being I can be: accepting, understanding, committed to equality, and far more thoughtful about my public statements and my obligations to our public discourse. To everyone inside my industry and beyond, I again offer my deepest apologies. Love to all.”
Leading the charge to fan the flames of outrage and having Gunn fired was conservative provocateur Mike Cernovich, who has, in the past, insisted date rape didn’t t exist and wrote blog posts with headlines like “When In Doubt, Whip It Out,” in regardless to dates and sexual encounters. Gunn is an outspoken Trump adversary on social media. Ironically, this mess all started when Gunn defended indie filmmaker Mark Duplass, for suggesting Ben Shapiro, conservative pundit, troll, and the Editor-In-Chief of DailyWire was an across-the-aisle voice worth considering. A liberal backlash to Gunn amplified his comments which Cernovich and his followers seized upon.
“The offensive attitudes and statements discovered on James’ Twitter feed are indefensible and inconsistent with our studio’s values, and we have severed our business relationship with him,” said Alan Horn, chairman of Walt Disney Studios, in a statement.
As many have pointed out, there seems to be much inconsistency going over at Disney. Roseanne Barr tweeted actively hateful, racist and Anti-semitic tweets for years and even when pointed out, ABC, owned by Disney did nothing and kept her employed by several months. It’s been reported that ABC was aware for months she was a powder keg liability but hoped it wouldn’t bite them the ass. And then, of course, it did when her racist, islamophobic and Anti-Semitic comments got her fired from ABC’s “Roseanne.”
Even the aforementioned Shapiro said that that firing Gunn was a dangerous precedent on Twitter this afternoon. “I think @JamesGunn is an a–hole, as my exchange with him earlier this week made clear,” the Daily Wire editor-in-chief tweeted on Friday. “I also think that firing him for vile old joke tweets is bad precedent and a mistake. There is no limiting principle to the outrage mob.”
Gunn also apologized for these offensive, poor taste jokes six years ago as well when he first started the “Guardians Of The Galaxy” franchise. “We’re all in the same camp, and I want to do my best to make this world a better place for all of us,” Gunn wrote in a statement at the time provided to GLAAD. “I’m learning all the time.”
Perhaps Disney didn’t pay attention. Even as recent as 2017 in a Buzzfeed profile, the director owned up to his mistakes and called them out himself. “Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 3” is supposed to shoot in January of 2019, but given Disney now has to hire a new director, not to say what they do about his script, that date could be pushed, though “Ant-Man” recovered fast in 2015 when its original director. Gunn was being groomed to be the de facto Godfather of the “Cosmic” side of the Marvel Cinematic Universe and even if he didn’t go on to direct additional films post ‘Guardians 3,’ it seemed like he would take on some consigliere role to guide this slice of the cosmos.
Here are a few tweets that I personally feel capture the situation well, including, yes, accountability for Gunn’s old, idiotic jokes.
https://twitter.com/DanaSchwartzzz/status/1020419810390228992
https://twitter.com/adambvary/status/1020420193753825281
https://twitter.com/Josh_Wilding/status/1020425227967303680
https://twitter.com/JoshRaby/status/1020425237098369024
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Um. I believe Gunn has been allowed to tweet all sorts of hateful stuff at Trump and his staff without reprocussions for ears now. But I guess when you talk about child rape, even liberal Disney draws a line. Me personally, I want everyone to be able to say what they want, but don’t say Roseanne deserved her termination but Gunn didn’t. Shoe is simply on the other foot now. But don’t worry, it will keep going back and forth.
‘Without repercussions’. Yes, it called the 1st Amendment: Also Barr is a total false equivalency: he made his comments years ago as comedic provocations and has apologized for them (long before this recent scandal came to light), while Barr’s comments are consistent with her political beliefs and every ‘apology’ she makes is followed by doubling down.
Yes. Without repercussions…like the one that just fell upon him…as in his firing! How did the 1st Amendment help him out here huh?
You totally missed Yarnguy’s point
“That did not seem to be the case for Roseanne, and it sure as hell doesn’t seem to be the case for POTUS.”
This is the left getting a dose of its own medicine. I also think James Gunn is an asshole, but I enjoy his films and I think firing him is ridiculous.
‘This is the left getting a dose of its own medicine’. Hmm, Al Franken faces dubious and obviously politically motivated allegations and he resigns. Meanwhile the right allows a pedophile to run for governor and elects as president a misogynist pig with at least 19 sexual harassment or assault allegations.
What I would like to know is if it is true that Gunn is a member of NAMBLA. If it is then i would say much of his so called jokes are probably not jokes! In any case he is getting no different than Roseanne got! As for trumps comments about grabbing …. At this time nothing has come to light that indicates that he is obsessed with it the way Gunn was obsessed (10000 Tweets!!) was! I think he got exactly what he deserved. By the way this does not get Disney off the hook in my world. Disney aka ABC is complicite in the decline of our society and I will make every effort not to give any money to that evil organization.
“What I would like to know is if it is true that Gunn is a member of NAMBLA.”
You are clearly not an intelligent person, are you?
Clearly i am ignorant on the issue of whether Gunn is a member of NAMBLA that is why i posed the question!
You seem to be ignorant of many things.
There’s no problem if people are genuinely upset by his comments. I just don’t think that’s the reason why many people here don’t like him and it’s genuinely painful to listen to barely coherent morons struggle to contain their glee that a cultural enemy has been vanquished. if you think the statement “Clearly i am ignorant on the issue of whether Gunn is a member of NAMBLA that is why i posed the question!” qualifies as English let alone a clever take on this issue then you are clearly too ignorant and stupid to be helped.
Well then i guess that indicates you have no interest in discussing this further. Thats fine. Enjoy your day!
I will still leave my question out there. Is Gunn a member of NAMBLA? This is not a rhetorical question. I would really be interested in knowing this.
No. Do you know what sarcasm is?
The sad thing here is that someone like Gunn can be forthright about his past (“I did inhale”) several times to get ahead of whatever story may be out there, go on to make successful films, then got pilloried because some right-wing shit-kicker decided to go after him because Gunn hates Trump. There has to be some kind of parole board-style indication of growth, maturation, and regret to absolve someone of past indiscretions. We are who we are, but we also change and evolve. That did not seem to be the case for Roseanne, and it sure as hell doesn’t seem to be the case for POTUS.
Meanwhile the alt-right asshat who instigated the witchhunt against Gunn has some interesting, definitely non-ironic tweets of his own: https://www.facebook.com/vsjeff/posts/10209522798666820
“What I would like to know is if it is true that Gunn is a member of NAMBLA” – Sure
THIS right here explains Trump / Facebook / Twitter & everything else wrong with the western world.
People by the thousands – totally unable to discern Bullshit from Reality