James Gunn’s career is totally fine after Disney fired him last year

One of the biggest industry stories last year was Marvel/Disney firing James Gunn, the writer/director of the Guardians of the Galaxy franchise. GOTG was/is a wildly popular and lucrative franchise, and it wasn’t like James Gunn screwed up the franchise at all. No, Gunn was fired after MRA dirtbags dug up dozens/hundreds of Gunn’s old tweets from 2008-2012 in which he made a lot of really gross and inappropriate jokes about rape and pedophilia. I covered it thoroughly at the time, and I came down on the side of “James Gunn deserved to be fired, even if his firing was a direct result of MAGA Deplorables waging a campaign against him.” Two wrongs, etc.

That happened about seven months ago, and a lot of people involved with the Marvel films totally caped for Gunn and argued that it was all in the past and he shouldn’t be punished for it, etc. Disney held their ground, although I remember that there was some talk about how Marvel executives were mad about how high-handed Disney was being. It’s clear though – Disney wants no part of James Gunn’s future career. And so he went to Warner Bros. He’s directing the second Suicide Squad film?

James Gunn is returning to the director’s chair. Gunn, who was fired from helming the third installment in his Guardians of the Galaxy franchise, is in negotiations to direct the second Suicide Squad film, the follow-up to the Warner Bros. 2016 hit that featured DC Comics anti-heroes as the leads. The move is not entirely unexpected as Gunn was already writing the script for the sequel, which Warner Bros. just slotted for a August 2021 release.

The dealmaking does, however, solidify that the new Suicide Squad film will be his next directorial effort. Disney fired Gunn from his Marvel franchise in July after old tweets from 2008 and 2009 resurfaced in which he made insensitive and controversial jokes.

The pic has the title of The Suicide Squad and is not being labeled a direct sequel but as a relaunch. The 2016 original movie featured the characters Deadshot, Harley Quinn, the Joker, Captain Boomerang and Killer Croc, who are forced into the service of the government in exchange for lighter prison sentences. Sources say that Gunn’s focus is to take the franchise in a new direction with a mostly all-new cast of characters and actors. Sources also say that the project is also very much rooted in Gunn’s vibe, as seen in the Guardians movies.

[From The Hollywood Reporter]

I eventually saw the first Suicide Squad movie and it was such a chopped-up trainwreck. You could really tell that they did a bunch of reshoots and they edited out so much of Jared Leto’s Joker, all in favor of giving Margot Robbie’s Harley Quinn a bigger role. What I’m saying is that I couldn’t care less about the sequel, but I’m not the audience for it anyway. I’m also saying that for all the breast-beating about how James Gunn’s LIFE WAS DESTROYED by… facing consequences for being a disgusting pervert on social media, he still ended up with another big job. Remember, James Gunn is a white man. He only had to spend a few months with a “destroyed career/reputation” and then he was back.

Photos courtesy of WENN.

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