James Gunn Defends Chris Pratt After His Homophobia Accusations In Thor 4 Trailer
Chris Pratt certainly stands among the biggest names in MCU, thanks to his brilliant portrayal of Peter Quill aka Star-Lord in his four Marvel outings to date. These days, the veteran Hollywood actor is quite busy, prepping for his return in the upcoming Thor: Love and Thunder, however, the actor has also been the subject of a controversy off-camera.
Over the past few years, Pratt has found himself under constant fire for allegedly being a member of a church, promoting anti-LGBTQ+ views. Earlier, Pratt has also been called out, thanks to his political stances as he was not a part of Democratic gatherings, leading to various fans willing to see him canceled and getting replaced as Star-Lord in the Marvel Cinematic Universe.
Many MCU personalities have assembled to his defense post these remarks, which includes Iron Man star Robert Downey Jr. and some major players like Josh Brolin (who played Thanos). As these callouts against Chris Pratt have begun resurfacing online, Pratt’s first Marvel director has also stepped up to provide his support for the actor.
James Gunn Supports Behind Chris Pratt
James Gunn tweeted to support the Guardians of the Galaxy star Chris Pratt after many fans wanted Pratt to be recast in the MCU.
On Saturday, a fan went on to tweet for Marvel Studios to replace Pratt with Patrick Wilson (Aquaman), after various rumors around Pratt’s alleged affiliation with a church that promotes conversion therapy and homophobic views began resurfacing online. This post went viral on Twitter and amassed over 12 thousand retweets and more than 180 thousand likes.
“Marvel. Hear me out. Just… replace him.”
On Monday, Gunn termed those beliefs as “made-up” and “utterly false” while also mentioning that Chris Pratt would “never be replaced as Star-Lord” in the Marvel Cinematic Universe:
“For what? Because of your made-up, utterly-false beliefs about him? For something that someone else told you about him that’s not true? Chris Pratt would never be replaced as Star-Lord but, if he ever was, we would all be going with him.”
When a fan asked Gunn if he was cool with Pratt sharing these homophobic views, the GOTG director replied by saying that he knows what church Pratt attends. The director then went on to accuse the same fan of hearsay, making it very clear that this piece of information is simply false, only meant to put Chris Pratt in an absolutely bad light:
“He isn’t. I know the church he currently goes to. Do you? (The answer is you don’t, but you heard from someone who heard from someone who heard from someone where he goes to church, so decided, ‘yeah, okay, I’ll believe this terrible thing I heard online about this celebrity!’)”
James Gunn Calls Out False Claims About Chris Pratt
Chris Pratt and James Gunn have earlier worked together for almost a decade now as they teamed up on the two Guardians of the Galaxy films and later collaborated with each other on Infinity War and Endgame. Both have also built a really close working relationship since 2013, which means that Gunn knows Pratt really well, even off the screen.
Notably, Pratt is not the only Hollywood celebrity who is attached to the church in question (it also includes Justin Bieber and Selena Gomez), the GOTG star has had to face a bit more scrutiny than others, thanks to his centrist positions on various political topics. However, recent reports have completely denied him being a part of the controversial Hillsong Church, which is what James Gunn is trying to reference to his fans.
