James Gunn apologizes for “offensive” old tweets joking about rape, pedophilia

James Gunn, the writer-director of Marvel’s “Guardians of the Galaxy” franchise, apologized late Thursday after a series of old (now deleted) tweets resurfaced in which the filmmaker made what he admitted were “offensive” jokes about taboo topics like rape and pedophilia.

“Many people who have followed my career know when I started, I viewed myself as a provocateur, making movies and telling jokes that were outrageous and taboo,” Gunn wrote in a series of tweets. “As I have discussed publicly many times, as I’ve developed as a person, so has my work and my humor.”