James Gunn is Back!

[Random490]

That makes sense. I am sure you are correct that the real reason for his reinstatement is that it makes business sense - because it does. However, the original reason for his firing was stated by Disney that his behaviour was inconsistent with Disney's values. That's a moral stand ( again, or is dressed up as one). What Disney is showing us is it's degree of hypocrisy, that morals come second to good business sense - because Gunn still did what he did, and his apology and the outcry from the cast are old news.
if those tweets were inconsistent with Disney corporate values then, they're inconsistent now, unless those values have changed or are just a sham.

Now I can completely accept that Disney puts revenue first, but my original question is what has changed ? ( other than Disney realising that it was the best financial decision) is there something else that's happened to change their mind.

Reports for what changed is that the Disney exec decided to sit down and talk with Gunn based on his handling of his firing and through that conversation he changed his mind. I highly doubt this was that financially motivate. Gunn is a great director and is perfect for Guardians, but that franchise has grown beyond a single director, and really the worse case scenario given it's Marvel Studios is that without him the film would have just not have been as good as the first two. No one would predict a huge enough loss for a high level executive to care. As for what prompted that conversation, I wouldn't be surprise if some like Feige said "just sit down and talk to him and if you don't change your mind then that's fine"

I'm also sure the delay in announcing this, while partially examining the PR of a change of direction, it's mostly from signing a new contract and nailing down a schedule.

Anyway, is anyone else surprised how this didn't leak at all? I'm sure if they did everyone would roll their eyes assuming it was fake.

 

[writer0327]

I think the timing of the announcement was to add more hype to the MCU. CM had a great first weekend, the Avengers trailer drops, then they announce Gunn is back. That's a nice trifecta of positivity in one week.

 

[SirStrangefolk]

However, the original reason for his firing was stated by Disney that his behaviour was inconsistent with Disney's values. That's a moral stand ( again, or is dressed up as one).

Nah, Disney knew about his history when they hired him. He was most well known for his Troma stuff and movies like Super and his tweets were out there from the start. The reason they fired him must have been that it came into the spotlight and it could've hurt Disney as a brand if they were linked to someone who made jokes like that or could in the future say or do more potentially harmful stuff. So what changed is that they saw 1. the public opinion shifted towards defending Gunn and 2. Gunn himself and the people at Marvel convinced them in their talks that they did not have to worry about future incidents that could hurt Disney.

 

[Darkprime]

The weird part for me is it said he was reinstated a few months ago the news only just got out now.

 

[Batmannerism]

Nah, Disney knew about his history when they hired him. He was most well known for his Troma stuff and movies like Super and his tweets were out there from the start. The reason they fired him must have been that it came into the spotlight and it could've hurt Disney as a brand if they were linked to someone who made jokes like that or could in the future say or do more potentially harmful stuff. So what changed is that they saw 1. the public opinion shifted towards defending Gunn and 2. Gunn himself and the people at Marvel convinced them in their talks that they did not have to worry about future incidents that could hurt Disney.

That may all be true, but it makes Disney out to be bigger hypocrites than I originally thought. I'm not surprised that they have done this but I was wondering if there was some other intervening event ( a drop in share price, new acquisiton/merger or new taxes or regulations coming through, a new set of orders from their alien overlords etc).
That's all a bit conspiracy theory and I'm probably making something out of nothing, but I find it a bit odd.

I would have thought that if they've sat on the news for a while, why not sit on it until after Endgame's box office run to start generating hype for phase V ?

 

[BigThor]

The weird part for me is it said he was reinstated a few months ago the news only just got out now.

Wow, I didn't know that great news for us fans either way though.

 

[Flash525]

One word - Good! Disney were too quick to remove him in my opinion, and all for some questionably tasteless tweets. All he's quilty of is having a slightly dark, and maybe slightly twisted sense of humour, but a lot of people can relate to that, I'm sure (though I'm equally sure a lot of people wouldn't post such humour on a public media feed).

Needless to say, he's not actually done anything wrong. There's too many ... for lack of a better word, crybabies in the world today that get too upset over trivial things and attempt to ruin lives because of it. I'm glad Gunn is back, and I can't wait for Guardians 3 (though I'm hoping it's better than Guardians 2).

 

[ChuChu2u]

Well this only proves one thing. Disney's bank account outweighs their morals.

Not saying that to hate on James Gunn but it seems Disney morals stop at the bank.

 

[Zarex]

What if proves is that its never to late to do the right thing. Kowtowing to the garbage human who dug up a handful of offensive tweets made years ago and posted them out of context was cowardly. I am thrilled the Mouse finally saw the light, even if they waited until the Fox deal all but closed.

 

[Prettyricky]

Its a bad look for disney after the grandstanding alan horn did last year with his comments on gunn to only now bring him back when they clearly couldnt find a replacement. This isnt like with xmen 3 where you bring in a yes man brett ratner to finish bryan singers vision.

 

[R_Hythlodeus]

Great news and good for Horn to come to his senses. Gunn was a Troma guy before he was a Disney guy and everyone who knows Troma knows they have an image to uphold just like Disney does. Gunn was guilty of living up to his then company's image. If anything, it should've encouraged Horn from the start that Gunn will live up to Disney's image either (especially since he has done so since he joined MS)

 

[Raiders]

Disney is really looking bad here. They made a big deal by firing Gunn, just to rehire him a few months later.

 

[Limonade]

Disney is really looking bad here. They made a big deal by firing Gunn, just to rehire him a few months later.

Well. Gunn has kept himself busy and shown he's more than able to move on from Disney. However brief that period had been.

You gotta admit. Not many people are able to do such a thing successfully. But how much of that is due to the "ex's revenge" syndrome.

 

[TheVileOne]

What if proves is that its never to late to do the right thing. Kowtowing to the garbage human who dug up a handful of offensive tweets made years ago and posted them out of context was cowardly. I am thrilled the Mouse finally saw the light, even if they waited until the Fox deal all but closed.

And yet none of the people defending Gunn came to the defense of Kevin Hart when literally the same thing happened to him and cost him his Oscar gig.

 

[Zarex]

And yet none of the people defending Gunn came to the defense of Kevin Hart when literally the same thing happened to him and cost him his Oscar gig.

This isn't true. I posted on multiple occasions that Mr. Hart had also been unfairly targeted by the Social Justice Purity Police.

 

[Zarex]

I am very happy that Ellen stood up against internet trolls. I wish she stepped in when James Gunn was screwed over.

Clearly Mr. Hart said some stupid stuff. As has every comedian ever (including every Oscar host). But he says he's sorry and doesn't hold homophobic views. I think he should host.

As with the James Gunn removal disgrace, this is PC theater that helps absolutely no one. Hart is a perfectly reasonable hosting candidate who (LIKE EVERY OTHER COMEDIAN EVER!) has said some stupid stuff for which he has subsequently apologized.

What's the goal here? To teach the kiddos tolerance through the vilification of an extremely popular black comedian and actor? One who would have been a strong ally if this situation had been handled appropriately? This is an extremely empty "win" for supporters of LGBTQ rights.

So yeah, a big win for equal rights! Maybe the Academy can replace Hart with a black comedian that's never made a joke or other comment that is negative to the gay community. I hear Dr. Cosby's available.

Hart should have apologized the day the tweets were revealed. I don't know why he didnt. Maybe he was concerned about losing his street cred? Anyhoo, he did apologize and the Academy should have brought him back on. Moving onto the next comedian - and their offensive tweets, jokes and comments - doesn't fix a damn thing.

What about a PWC CPA for the hosting role? They're already on the payroll.

So we're saying the baseline qualifications for an Oscar host is that they be an outspoken supporter of LGBTQ rights? That doesn't seem reasonable.

I would agree that Mr. Hart doesn't care about the gay community. He appears to care about his career, money, fame and sleeping with women who aren't his wife. Social justice doesn't make the list. But that shouldn't disqualify him from being an Oscar host. And I am not a fan of Kevin Hart. I find him to be completely unfunny and grating. I will probably watch more of the awards ceremony now that he is confirmed to not be involved.

But I will never be okay with rummaging through someone's old tweets or social media postings and firing them because of a joke or offhand comment made many years prior.
Don't hire them in the first place? Fine.
Fire them for tweets that occurred after they were hired? That seems reasonable.
Fire them if the current response is to double down on the offensive comments? Sure, go with someone else.

But demanding a history of social justice purity from comedians and other entertainers whose job is to tiptoe next to the line of impropriety is an extremely bad idea, and results (as we saw with James Gunn) in folks aiding and abetting garbage humans who use this purity test to punish their enemies. Folks who support social justice need to be smarter than that.

My comment on being an ally was based on the content of his Ellen interview. Apparently it didn't stick. But Hart DID apologize. Not in as timely a fashion as you apparently would have preferred, but it did happen.

I have a real problem labeling someone as a homophobe based remarks made years earlier that were subsequently disavowed, just as I had a problem labeling Gunn a pedophile. Is there anything else there? If Hart has exhibited bigoted behavior in his off line life, than feel free to toss the label around. If not I think its wrong.

 

[Xeno]

And yet none of the people defending Gunn came to the defense of Kevin Hart when literally the same thing happened to him and cost him his Oscar gig.

A lot of us don't go to the "social" section of this site so we wouldn't have weighed in on the Hart situation here. I certainly never gave my views on this site because I'm not here to talk about anything other than comic book movies.

For the record, I strongly supported Hart because he had apologized for his jokes before and has never behaved in a homophobic manner. My view is that if Hollywood is going to penalize Hart for his jokes, then the same standard has to be applied to comics like Amy Schumer and Sarah Silverman, both of whom said things that were as bad as or worse than Hart did. The fact that there wasn't the same response to Schumer and Silverman using homophobic slurs served to prove that there is a double standard and hypocrisy was at play in Hart's situation.

 

[metaphysician]

Well this only proves one thing. Disney's bank account outweighs their morals.

Not saying that to hate on James Gunn but it seems Disney morals stop at the bank.

So, serious question time.

If a person, or a company, makes a decision that they decide was a mistake, what *are* they supposed to do? Just continue following through with it, come hell or high water, just for the sake of. . . I don't know, not admitting a mistake?

 

[TheVileOne]

That may all be true, but it makes Disney out to be bigger hypocrites than I originally thought. I'm not surprised that they have done this but I was wondering if there was some other intervening event ( a drop in share price, new acquisiton/merger or new taxes or regulations coming through, a new set of orders from their alien overlords etc).
That's all a bit conspiracy theory and I'm probably making something out of nothing, but I find it a bit odd.

I would have thought that if they've sat on the news for a while, why not sit on it until after Endgame's box office run to start generating hype for phase V ?

Everyone in the entertainment industry is a hypocrite. So what else is new?

 

[Batmannerism]

Everyone in the entertainment industry is a hypocrite. So what else is new?

True. I guess I'm just surprised by the degree of hypocrisy in this case.

 

[metaphysician]

In what way it is it hypocrisy to admit that one has made a mistake?

 

[TheVileOne]

In what way it is it hypocrisy to admit that one has made a mistake?

From September 2018:

"I would say there is a blend of my helping to make the decision to my supporting the decisions that have been made. Roseanne was completely unanimous. We discussed how it would be communicated and when because there were a number of entities that had to be properly filled in, but the decision was completely unanimous. The James Gunn decision was brought to me as a unanimous decision of a variety of executives at the studio and I supported it... I haven't second-guessed their decision."

 

[ludovica]

From September 2018:

How do we know that's the truth and not PR?
Horn screwed up with Gunn and he will not admit it publicly, at least things were corrected.
That isn't even hypocrisy on the corporate part, just Horn's, but what did anyone expect?

Besides, Disney and the Academy are different entities, so no reason IMO to use one kerfuffle to criticize another.

 

[TheVileOne]

How do we know that's the truth and not PR?
Horn screwed up with Gunn and he will not admit it publicly, at least things were corrected.
That isn't even hypocrisy on the corporate part, just Horn's, but what did anyone expect?

Besides, Disney and the Academy are different entities, so no reason IMO to use one kerfuffle to criticize another.

That's straight from the mouth of Bob Iger less than a year ago.

 

[ludovica]

That's straight from the mouth of Bob Iger less than a year ago.

Yep, when he shielded Horn.
Again, most probably PR.