Dave Bautista threatens to quit Guardians of the Galaxy if James Gunn isn’t reinstated

Of all the members of the Guardians of the Galaxy cast to have protested against the firing of director James Gunn, Dave Bautista seems to be the most angry. The actor, who plays Drax in the Marvel Cinematic Universe, has said that he is open to breaching his contract and bailing on Guardians of the Galaxy Vol 3 if Disney were to scrap Gunn’s script for the film.

Gunn was fired by Disney last month following the unearthing of decade-old offensive tweets. A few days later, the main cast of the Guardians films - Chris Pratt, Zoe Saldana, Bautista, Vin Diesel, Pom Klementieff, Bradley Cooper, Karen Gillan - signed a letter in support for Gunn.

“Where I’m at right now is that if [Marvel] don’t use that script, then I’m going to ask them to release me from my contract, cut me out or recast me. I’d be doing James a disservice if I didn’t,” Bautista told ShortList. “Nobody’s defending his tweets, but this was a smear campaign on a good man. I spoke to Chris Pratt the day after it happened and he’s a bit religious so he wanted time to pray and figure it out, but I was more like: f**k this. This is bullshit. James is one of the kindest, most decent people I’ve met.”

On Sunday, Bautista wrote on Twitter that he finds it ‘nauseating’ to work for Disney following the firing. “I will do what Im legally obligated to do but @Guardians without @JamesGunn is not what I signed up for. GOTG w/o @JamesGunn just isn’t GOTG. Its also pretty nauseating to work for someone who’d empower a smear campaign by fascists #cybernazis . That’s just how I feel,” he wrote.

“We were all shocked by (Gunn’s) abrupt firing last week and have intentionally waited these ten days to respond in order to think, pray, listen, and discuss,” the letter, signed Guardians of the Galaxy, reads. “In that time, we have been encouraged by the outpouring of support from fans and members of the media who wish to see James reinstated as director of Volume 3 as well as discouraged by those so easily duped into believing the many outlandish conspiracy theories surrounding him.”

Gunn is considered to having been instrumental to the series’ success. The Guardians films have made a combined $1.6 billion worldwide, and were initially considered a box office gamble. A Variety report speculates that the film will be pushed back from its tentative 2020 release date as the studio waits for a replacement A-list director to become available.

A month before his firing Gunn tweeted that he had completed his draft of the Guardians of the Galaxy Vol 3 script. He captioned his tweet, “Every bit of my heart.”

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