Unsurprising: From Variety, Disney Unlikely to Rehire ‘Guardians of the Galaxy’ Director James Gunn (EXCLUSIVE).
Despite a cast letter asking for James Gunn to be reinstated as the director of “Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 3,” Walt Disney Studios is currently not planning on rehiring the filmmaker who it recently fired after a series of offensive tweets surfaced, according to multiple people familiar with the studio’s current thinking. The feeling within both Disney and Marvel is that the dozens of so-called jokes that Gunn made about pedophilia and rape are unacceptable in the #MeToo era and are not in line with Disney’s family-friendly image.
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At this point, the letter does not seem likely to save his job. Gunn’s firing was approved by Disney Studios chief Alan Horn, with his boss, company CEO Bob Iger weighing in on the final decision. The involvement of the highest levels of Disney signals that the cast pressure to rethink the Gunn ouster will struggle to gain internal support. “I don’t see Disney re-hiring him,” says one person close to the matter. “Those tweets were so horrible and Disney has a different standard than other studios.”
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As for replacing Gunn, Disney feels no pressure to immediately find a new director, according to sources, and is willing to wait until the right A-list filmmaker comes along. For one, the studio never gave the film an official release date, even though it was widely expected to hit theaters within the next two years. Depending on how long it takes to land the right director, Disney may in fact wind up pushing back the film’s original February 2019 start date.
So far, the studio has yet to meet with any Gunn replacements. There have been rumors that Marvel regulars like Jon Favreau (“Iron Man”), Taika Waititi (“Thor: Ragnarok”), or the Russo brothers (“Avengers: Infinity War”) might be enlisted, but sources say that many of the usual suspects are busy with prior obligations. That means that there is a higher likelihood that Disney will reach outside the Marvel family to find a director with the kind of offbeat sensibility to handle the comic-book franchise.
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At this point, the letter does not seem likely to save his job. Gunn’s firing was approved by Disney Studios chief Alan Horn, with his boss, company CEO Bob Iger weighing in on the final decision. The involvement of the highest levels of Disney signals that the cast pressure to rethink the Gunn ouster will struggle to gain internal support. “I don’t see Disney re-hiring him,” says one person close to the matter. “Those tweets were so horrible and Disney has a different standard than other studios.”
.
.
.
As for replacing Gunn, Disney feels no pressure to immediately find a new director, according to sources, and is willing to wait until the right A-list filmmaker comes along. For one, the studio never gave the film an official release date, even though it was widely expected to hit theaters within the next two years. Depending on how long it takes to land the right director, Disney may in fact wind up pushing back the film’s original February 2019 start date.
So far, the studio has yet to meet with any Gunn replacements. There have been rumors that Marvel regulars like Jon Favreau (“Iron Man”), Taika Waititi (“Thor: Ragnarok”), or the Russo brothers (“Avengers: Infinity War”) might be enlisted, but sources say that many of the usual suspects are busy with prior obligations. That means that there is a higher likelihood that Disney will reach outside the Marvel family to find a director with the kind of offbeat sensibility to handle the comic-book franchise.
