Joss Whedon has received support from Marvel colleague James Gunn after the director quit Twitter over criticism on the social media network of his film Avengers: Age of Ultron.
Gunn, who directed last year’s Guardians of the Galaxy, wrote a lengthy post on Facebook attacking the rabid fanbase who have pulled apart Whedon’s box office-topping superhero blockbuster. “The angry contingent of fandom is getting more aggressive all the time, and it’s difficult to block out as a person in the public eye,” he wrote.
Gunn added: “Imagine being a guy, like Joss Whedon, who has committed his life to fandom and to creating the best characters he possibly can, characters he loves, and has spent two years of his life working on a movie, and then has to wake up to this shit on Twitter.”
He included a link to some of the tweets that caused Whedon to leave the social media platform. Many fans were angry over the depiction of female characters such as Scarlett Johansson’s Black Widow, and have accused the director of misogyny and sexism.
Gunn went on to ask people to curb their negative thoughts on and offline. “My plea to all of you … is that we all try to be a little kinder, on the internet and elsewhere. And, honestly, that includes being kind to the people who are tweeting this nonsense.”
Whedon has yet to confirm exactly why he deleted his Twitter account, but his last message read: “Thank you to all the people who’ve been so kind and funny and inspiring up in here.”
Avengers: Age of Ultron has already made more than $660m (£435m) worldwide after scoring the second-biggest opening weekend in the US.
