James Gunn will not be returning to direct Guardians of the Galaxy Vol.3, as Disney remains firm on their decision to fire the director.
There may have been a strong push to get James Gunn rehired as the director of Guardians of the Galaxy Vol 3., but Disney isn’t having it. Instead, in the Me Too era, the studio has decided to stand behind their decision to fire the director after inappropriate tweets from a decade ago resurfaced recently.
According to a report from Variety, even with the support from fans and cast members, a meeting with Disney and James Gunn did not result in the director’s reinstatement. While even Gunn and his union rep pushed for him to get a second chance, a meeting with studio chairman Alan Horn did not go the way they might have hoped.
The meeting may have been a professional courtesy, but it is clear that Gunn’s decision to joke about pedophilia and rape on Twitter years ago simply did not align with the family-friendly image of Disney.
Words and actions have consequences and clearly, Gunn is finding this out the hard way. Even if his comments were made years ago, the fact that they were still posted to his Twitter account simply did not help his case. In the age of screenshots, even a deleted tweet is forever.
Kevin Feige, the president of Marvel, was out of town and did not take part in the meeting. However, it has been said that he stands behind the studio’s decision not to reinstate the director for Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 3.
With Feige not being in town, this means that the search for a new director has slowed, and once he returns the search will continue. While there is a complete script written by James Gunn that will apparently still be used, when a new director is found, they will most likely want to put their own flair on the project.
While the news might be sad for fans of Guardians of the Galaxy and the cast who fought to bring Gunn back, it seems that Disney is sticking with their decision to move forward without the director. Now we will have to wait to see what happens with the third movie and who the new director might be.