Disney fires James Gunn from "Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 3"
- Thread starter Lawrence B
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Honestly, if they have offered it I wouldn't blame him for telling them where to go stick it.
That's how dark humor works. Finding ways to make things funny that everyone knows isn't funny in real life. It's all about seperating art from real life and also expecting the audience to be mature enough to know right and wrong on these issue's. That or trying to get people see uncomfortable truths in yourself. Granted it also takes skill to make it work. Even though Gunn has been able to bring humor into his movies he is not a comedian and from what I understand he was doing this to prove he could still be edgy to push himself because he didn't want to loose his edge. Which makes me think that most of these jokes weren't thought out at all but were him experimenting to try and push himself.
Jason
To push himself to what end? What’s the point of these sorts of jokes? It isn’t satire. It isn’t pointing out hypocrisy. It doesn’t speak truth to power.
As he himself said it was to gain notoriety. Guess it worked out exactly as he planned.
A fantastic video, if there ever was one.
This is in part the problem. It's people like Meryl who are very selective as to who gets her ire. With Gunn it has become just as much an issue of political alliance. NOT everyone, but there are enough. It shouldn't be some Alt-Right victory or some mainstream Left Hollywood defense. I felt the same with Julian Assange and why he was defended for not answering to charges laid against him in another country. Instead of focusing on that, it became all about whether you supported his cause, or WikiLeaks or politics.
Meryl can be amazingly empowering for women and yet she can also switch it around and turn a blind eye if her sense of art or political leaning takes priority.
The tweets weren't explicitly apologized for in the way that the superheroes blog thing was with a big announcement, but he has repeatedly said in interviews that he regrets the way he presented himself and the things he said online back then. Rocket Raccoon has basically become his avatar for excising that toxic part of his past self.
Why does any artist try and push themselves. To try and challenge themselves either to prove they are capable of doing something they have never done before or keep intact the edge they might be afraid of loosing because they are making money or doing less than challenging stuff. I'm sure he wanted to know the Troma edge was still in him as he started to move up and started making more mainstream art where you got to compromise more. Not sure why he went with the pedophile angle other than he knows just how hard it is to do that kind of stuff thus making it more of a challenge. He failed because he went for shock value had, no social commentary or anything worthwhile in them and he simply wrote bad jokes. He found out he wasn't good at something. George Carlin might can make that work but he can't. They guy seems to have learned from his mistakes. First he can't write those jokes at all very well and two Twitter is not the best place to be trying something like that. When you listen to stand up comics they talk about how they often go up on stage knowing half of their jokes are going to bomb. That is where they work out their act. Perhaps he should have found a different kind of stage to try that stuff out because their are simply to many people on the internet. No way you don't piss off or offend many people in a place like Twitter. Things have only become more restrictive since then because everyone is angry today because nobody likes where the world seems to be headed.
Jason
Or Trump for that matter. The bible-belt is for Trump even though he doesn't walk the talk any better than a disgraced televangelist. The enemy of my enemy is my friend and the ends justify the means.
I would agree that being a good artist means you're going to offend someone.
I am thinking of some of the nastiness in the Monty Python movies like the Every Sperm is Sacred bit that went after Catholic attitudes about birth-control. The reason why Monty Python got away with that is that the satire had a point behind it. Recklessly popping out kids like the Duggars is not good at the household (or planetary) level.
There is no redeeming "statement" to Gunn's tweets that I can pick up. It is just an attempt to shock for the purpose of raw attention for its own sake. That's the kind of thing children do, which is why Gunn didn't get a pass for it because he was already in his 40s when he tweeted them.
Remember Joaquin Phoenix's I'm Still Here stunt that backfired? It backfired for a similar purpose, because it came across like a bad publicity stunt. Same deal with some of Miley Cyrus' all-too-public antics. Are they crimes? No. But they can very well be career suicide in their own way.
I've always felt age was overrated in judging maturity especially when it comes to making or enjoying art. I mean most of us are adults but we like movies about Superhero's flying around in capes and all sorts of silly stuff that lets face it was created for children. Grown adults write and direct this stuff as well. Edgy humor is the same way. If your good at it like George Carlin you can enjoy it at any age or make it at any age because he was still his old self just about up until the end. Then Gunn comes along and he failed. Which proably wasn't the first time but that failure must have benefited him because he has made tons of fun stuff as well like "Guardian."
Seems to me maturity is about how you treat others. Instead of being a asshole to others you simply try and be nice and come to understandings when you don't agree with something. Also taking responsbility for mistakes which I thought he had done when he apoligized and stopped making those jokes on Twitter.
Jason
Seems to me maturity is about how you treat others. Instead of being a asshole to others you simply try and be nice and come to understandings when you don't agree with something. Also taking responsbility for mistakes which I thought he had done when he apoligized and stopped making those jokes on Twitter.
Jason
Trust me, you don’t have to tell me why an artist tries to push and challenge themselves. But I’m talking about these jokes specifically. What’s the end goal of perfecting a rape joke? These certainly weren’t about commenting on rape culture, they weren’t about our culture’s uncomfortablity with sexuality. They end game of these jokes were to shock. But what’s on the other side of shock? If the point of shocking is the end itself, it’s pretty hollow. It’s pretty pointless.
In the end, he said he did this to gain attention. That was the goal. In other words, shock to shock. There’s no art in that. There’s no challenge in that.
He would’ve been better off in challenging his art by writing material than trying these jokes.
I don’t know why you have spent so much time defending his material. I get defending him as a person. But the material? Why?
I'm not defending the material. To be honest I don't think we know why he went with the specific jokes or why he though they would be funny beyond the basic idea of shocking people is enough to be funny. Only he can answer that. Maybe they sounded funnier in his head than when he typed them. Who really knows. Only thing I feel is certain is his intent was not to offend people in that he was somehow making light of real life abuse or he somehow didn't think those things are bad things. I mean who really thinks these things are good in real life except the very worst of people and even they proably make excuses to themselves in ways they can not feel bad about it. I do agree he should have tried writing material that had more substance. He messed up and didn't think things through very well. I think everyone agree's he made a mistake but what else is their to say other than people sometimes do stupid things. If people always had common sense working 100% nobody would ever make these bonehead things in the first place. Sometimes mistakes lead to much worst things such as drinking and driving or saying something hurtful to someone in a fight that crosses a line or who knows what. This doesn't seem so bad in comparison and would have been forgotten about until two assholes wanted to make something politcal that didn't need to be.
Jason
Your certainty is wrong. As I have said over and over, Gunn said in his apology why he made the jokes: to get attention. Not anything else. He simply was trying to be provocative to get attention. That’s it.
What kind of attention? Was he just trying to piss people off or make people laugh? Attention covers a pretty big range of expectations. Doesn't everyone want attention whenever they say anything? They want to be heard and they want some kind of emotional reaction inside them. The thing with the apology is even that is proably not full accurate to what he was going for. You know they proably have lawyers and publist that help shape those things in a way they want them to. A apology can be sincere but also lacking in 100% honesty. Nobody tells the whole truth all the time about themselves. Of course we should have learned this lesson by just looking at ourselves from time to time or at the very least the Jim Carrey movie :"Liar Liar."
Jason
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