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Why The Recent Firing of A Marvel Exec May Be Good For The Gays
Weird thing to brag about, but okay.
Former Marvel Entertainment Chairman Ike Perlmutter was ousted amidst the recent shake-ups at Disney, and now he’s pointing the finger at what he says is the company’s refusal to pay attention to their bottom line above all else.
“I have no doubt that my termination was based on fundamental differences in business between my thinking and Disney leadership, because I care about return on investment,” he told the Wall Street Journalin a recent interview.
Continuing to paint himself as a victim, the 80-year-old billionaire also claimed he was ousted for challenging “the company’s way of doing business,” and took pride in advising Disney to stay out of Florida governor Ron DeSantis’s way during last year’s “Don’t Say Gay” chaos.
“Don’t get involved in politics,” he recalled telling executives. “You’re going to get hurt. It’s a no-win situation.”
Perlmutter also claimed to have called DeSantis to personally inform him that he was right about Disney having no business weighing in on something that would impact so many of their employees.
Though DeSantis has very clearly taken retaliatory action against Disney in the wake of their belated stance against the discriminatory law, it should also be pointed out that Disney first drummed up controversy by declining to get involved in politics in the first place — which was seen as business as usual for the giant corporation.
There’s also the matter of what counts as “getting political” being so difficult to define these days, with conservatives frequently bemoaning the mere existence of LGBTQ+ characters in films or TV shows as part of a “woke leftist agenda,” and critics of DeSantis’s anti-LGBTQ+ crusade insisting that it shouldn’t be “political” to ensure all people have rights and dignity and the ability to exist openly in public.
Being so slow to embrace the LGBTQ+ community may have served Marvel and Disney in the past, but it can’t last forever. And despite Perlmutter’s tantrum over being let go, fans already seem thrilled that someone holding onto archaic ideals is out the door, hoping it will pave the way for progress in the MCU on multiple fronts.
\u201ciCYMI, Ike Perlmutter did not see value in an all black cast movies and almost prevented Black Panther from even being made.\n\nIke Perlmutter is a piece of a shit.\u201d— SHAWNMANIA (@SHAWNMANIA) 1680105858
\u201c@benschwartz_ Under reported is that Disney also announced it would host the largest LGBTQ conference in Orlando. Iger didn\u2019t come back to play.\u201d— ben schwartz (@ben schwartz) 1680134317
\u201cOh good Lord, *cheapskate*, not spendthrift! Spendthrift means the opposite of what I meant! Whatever, you get it\u201d— Sean T. Collins (@Sean T. Collins) 1680105475
\u201cJust saw the news that Ike Perlmutter has finally been fired from Marvel.\n\nTo mark the occasion, here's that photo of him with Trump, looking like they're attending a secret Hydra meeting.\u201d— John Cullen (@John Cullen) 1680111779
\u201c@the_moviebob It really is funny how in over a decade Ike's gone from controlling all of Marvel to redundant employee being laid off.\u201d— Like Kurosawa, I Make Mad (@Like Kurosawa, I Make Mad) 1680112627
But if nothing else, at least Perlmutter went out reminding people exactly who he is and why he has no place shaping culture in a modern world. Thanks, Ike!
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Rachel Kiley is presumably a writer and definitely not a terminator. She can usually be found crying over queerbaiting in the Pitch Perfect franchise or on Twitter, if not both.
Rachel Kiley is presumably a writer and definitely not a terminator. She can usually be found crying over queerbaiting in the Pitch Perfect franchise or on Twitter, if not both.
