James Gunn opens up about Marvel firing: “It was unbelievable”
By Dan Selcke
A couple years back, Guardians of the Galaxy director James Gunn was famously fired by Marvel after conservative personalities dug up some old, off-color tweets he made back in the day, none of which jived with Disney’s family-friendly atmosphere. “I called [Marvel Studios president Kevin Feige] the morning it was going on, and I said, ‘Is this a big deal?’ And he goes, ‘I don’t know,’” Gunn told The New York Times in a new interview about the incident. “That was a moment. I was like, ‘You don’t know?’ I was surprised,. Later he called me — he himself was in shock — and told me what the powers that be had decided.”
"It was unbelievable. And for a day, it seemed like everything was gone. Everything was gone. I was going to have to sell my house. I was never going to be able to work again. That’s what it felt like."
Of course, that’s not how it ended. To start, fans and celebrities — including members of the Guardians cast — rallied behind Gunn, which was something he needed at that moment. “I felt really fulfilled and loved in a way that I had never felt in my entire life,” he said. And then, later, Marvel rehired Gunn, who’s currently working on Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 3.
So was James Gunn a victim of “cancel culture”? That’s one of those terms that’s become so politically loaded that it’s hard to have a productive discussion about it, but Gunn treats it with a refreshing amount of nuance:
"It’s such a bigger issue than that. Because cancel culture also is people like Harvey Weinstein, who should be canceled. People who have gotten canceled and then remain canceled — most of those people deserved that. The paparazzi are not just the people on the streets — they’re the people combing Twitter for any past sins. All of that sucks. It’s painful. But some of it is accountability. And that part of it is good. It’s just about finding that balance.”"
I like the idea of Twitter trolls being digital paparazzi. And I like his take on cancel culture, too. Is is an example of moral absolutists running amok or ordinary people holding the rich and powerful to account for their misdeeds? Well, it can be either depending on the situation. It’s not my fault life is complicated, yeesh.
Marvel Studios is more hands-on than DC Films
As upsetting as Gunn’s exile from Marvel was, it did give him the chance to go work for rival Warner Bros., the studio behind the DC Comics movies — Gunn’s movie The Suicide Squad comes out on August 6.
This puts Gunn in the unique position of having worked on both Marvel and DC movies, which means he’s better able than most to delineate the similarities and differences. “There’s no doubt Kevin Feige is way more involved with editing than people are at Warner Bros,” Gunn said.
He gives more notes. You don’t have to take them and I don’t always take them.”
That kind of micro-management keeps the Marvel movies feeling coherent. Things are a little more individualized over at DC, which has its advantages; for instance, Warner Bros. is more willing to make R-rated movies. Gunn says that “the folks over at Warner Bros. are really interested in building out a world and creating something that’s unique to the filmmakers.”
"That is one of the ways in which DC can distinguish itself from Marvel. What I do is very different from what [Ant-Man director] Peyton Reed does, it’s very different from what [Iron Man director Jon] Favreau did, it’s different from Taika [Waititi, the director of Thor: Ragnarok]. But not as different as Shazam! and Suicide Squad, however."
And then you have DC movies that aren’t connected to the main movie continuity at all, whereas everything Marvel makes has to tie back into the Marvel Cinematic Universe. “The fact that they did Joker, which is a totally different type of movie, that to me is cool,” Gunn said. “I’m very excited about Matt [Reeves]’s movie [The Batman]. They’re getting some really good filmmakers involved. They’re always going to be hit or miss — I just don’t want them to get boring.”
At Marvel, Gunn has Guardians 3. At DC, he’s producing a show about Peacekeeper, a character featured in The Suicide Squad. Beyond that, who knows? “I have no clue what I’m going to do,” Gunn said. “For me, Guardians 3 is probably the last one. I don’t know about doing it again. I do find, because of the ability to do different stuff in the DC multiverse, it’s fun.”
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