Disney Fired the Guardians of the Galaxy Director After Conservatives Unearthed His Controversial Tweets

Photo credit: Shutterstock
Photo credit: Shutterstock

From Esquire

Disney said on Friday that it is cutting ties with James Gunn after conservative critics resurfaced the Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 3 director's old controversial tweets. The company made the announcement at Comic-Con in San Diego, where Gunn was scheduled to appear.

"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 Walt Disney Studios chairman Alan Horn in a statement.

Gunn, an outspoken critic of Donald Trump, was known for getting into heated Twitter feuds with conservatives. Amid the most recent spat, his conservative opponents unearthed tweets that joked about topics such as pedophilia and rape.

Gunn has since deleted his account. Prior to that, he tweeted: "Many people who have followed my career know when I started, I viewed myself as a provocateur, making movies and telling jokes that were outrageous and taboo. As I have discussed publicly many times, as I’ve developed as a person, so has my work and my humor."

Gunn wrote and directed the first two Guardians movies, which hauled in more than $1.5 billion for Marvel and Disney. Shooting for Guardians 3, which Gunn was in the process of writing, was expected to begin in the fall. Disney has not yet named his replacement.

('You Might Also Like',)