A lot of opinions have flown around since James Gunn was fired from directing Guardians of the Galaxy 3 over offensive tweets that were posted between 2008 and 2011. The cast of GOTG showed their unwavering support when they added their signatures to an open letter in support of James Gunn but no one from the cast has been more vocal than Dave Bautista, who plays Drax in the franchise. From day one, Bautista has made his opinion known and he’s expanding on that opinion on his Twitter page.
Bautista wrote on Twitter yesterday saying he will be in Guardian of the Galaxy 3 because he’s “legally obligated” but a franchise without James Gunn is “not what I signed up for.” He went on to say “Guardians of the Galaxy without James Gunn just isn’t Guardians of the Galaxy. “It’s also pretty nauseating to work for someone who’d empower a smear campaign by fascists #cybernazis.” This is in reference to right-wing commentator Mike Cernovich, who unearthed Gunn’s 10-year-old tweets. Many viewed Disney’s firing of Gunn as a capitulation to Cernovich and his followers.
There was a lot of speculation last week that Disney would reverse their decision and bring Gunn back but other media outlets have said they have yet to make a decision and that they’re unlikely to bring him back. The cast is contractually obligated to return for a third film but I suspect tension will be considerably high with someone new at the helm. The issue won’t be so much with a new director but harsh feelings about Disney and how this situation was handled.
Replacing Gunn won’t be an easy task, especially since he’s also the writer behind the project and any prep he ha done for the third film is likely to be scrapped as Disney looks for a replacement. I guess only time will tell how this one plays out.
