Lucy Lawless says a Mandalorian fan petition might have cost her a Star Wars gig
Lawless has suggested that a petition calling for her to replace Gina Carano on The Mandalorian might have made it harder for Disney to hire her
Aux News Lucy Lawless
The fan petition has become a potent—or at least a very loud—tool of audience expression in recent years, as it’s become easier and easier for vocal advocates for this or that pop culture stance to make those feelings known with little more effort than signing their name to an online form. (Or someone else’s name. Or Big Bird’s.) The actual efficacy of these campaigns is much more murky, though; for every petition that can be linked to a series getting a surprise revival from a network impressed by a groundswell of fan devotion, there are hundreds more that are promptly ignored.
Or maybe, even, actively harmful to the cause. Take the case of Lucy Lawless, who gave an interview to Metro this week in which she briefly touched upon a petition that circulated earlier this year, asking Disney to replace Gina Carano—who tweeted herself right out of a job back in February—on Disney+ Star Wars series The Mandalorian with the beloved New Zealand actress.
Now, there’s probably no chance in hell that that exact scenario was actually going to happen—among other things, Carano’s character Cara Dune isn’t so vital to the series that they couldn’t just pair up Mando with a different space badass if they wanted to get Lawless into the fold. But Lawless speculates that it might have had a different effect: Screwing her out of a separate Star Wars job.
“Well to be honest with you, I was already in discussions about something on – it wasn’t The Mandalorian – something Star Wars-affiliated,” Lawless said in the interview. And while she makes it clear that she has no actual information that the petition impacted anything, she notes that, “It might have hurt me in some way, because then they couldn’t hire me because it would seem to be pandering” to fan demands. “I became political,” she noted, regardless of anything she or Disney had chosen to do.
Now, Lawless also makes it very clear that she’s grateful to her fans, remarking that she knows “they meant it out of love, and I thank the fans for their fealty to me.” (Excellent use of “fealty” there from the Xena star.) But the psychology of giving in to, defying, or just ignoring online fan demands is clearly only going to get more complicated as the years go on.
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Ron Swanson’s a lucky man.
So is Nick Offerman
So is Lentulus Batiatus
Will you stop going on about Lentulus Batiatus? You’re never going to meet him!
until he wasn’t…also so was Crixus
It’s Rob Tapert who’s the lucky one, really.
I think the Snyder Cut is likely the reason why studios don’t want to go anywhere near fan demands. But if Disney was already talking to Lawless about a Star Wars project, they should use fan interest to their benefit, not yank the whole project.
Yeah, the Snyder fans getting what they want and then immediately harassing people in the company for more really poisoned the well.
Petitions aren’t fan interest. They’re whiny demands by entitled twats.The very last thing Disney wants is to even APPEAR to have been influenced by a group of bitter incels.
This is all dumb. I have no doubt Jon Favreau and Dave Filoni could nerd the fuck out together in one afternoon and bang out a concept for Rangers of the New Republic that didn’t include Carano, and it would be great and the only folks who would complain are probably a bunch of damn Nazis anyway. Put Lawless in it, put Sun Hyung-Lee in it, put Weathers in it, and make it about about growing old and staying relevant and adapting to a changing universe and all that shit that anyone who was old enough to actually see A New Hope in the theater can relate to. Think pieces out the ass and angry Nazis = win/win.
I really want to meet someone who cared so much about Cara Dune as a character that they’d foresake a Rangers of the New Republic series if it didn’t have her in it. And I don’t mean a Nazi who likes the character because of their reactionary political fealty to Gina Carano. I mean someone who legitimately believes the character of Cara Dune is just so interesting and unique that any Rangers series would fail without her. Because I don’t think that person exists.
I actually really liked Cara Dune as a character. It was cool to see a woman with a different body type who could get physical and wreck some fools. But to your point – yea I’m not gonna not watch a Star Wars cause she’s not in it, and I sure as hell am not going to watch any Star Wars with a proud and out bigot in it.
In theory I agree with this and want to see more of it. In reality, even politics aside, Carano is such a talentless, charismaless screen presence that it made me cringe at every line of dialogue. I criticize the acting on that show a lot, but she was by far the worst.
sometimes i remember how Soderbergh had to ADR her entire performance in Haywire because her line readings were so bad and it makes me giggle
sometimes i remember how Soderbergh had to ADR her entire performance in Haywire He did the best he could with her – that one scene where she confronts Michael Douglas was exposition-heavy(ish) and Soderbergh had her pace up and down in front of him like a panther while she delivered her lines. It worked – wouldn’t have been necessary for a professional actress but Soderbergh knew what to do.As for her in Mandelorian – she was okay but they could very easily replace her with a different character, or not. There’s a lot going on in that show.
Wait, that was the good version of her performance?
Cara Dune is a great character. But even before all of Carano’s tweets I assumed “Rangers” was going to include the character, not be based around her, because Carano is not a good actor. I don’t know why a “Rangers” show couldn’t still work.
Up until she decided to put her whole ass on display, I thought the would have made for a great action movie star. I think I’m one of the few people who legitimately enjoyed Haywire.
I enjoyed the character and liked getting some body diversity up in the place, but even if Carano had stepped away of her own volition and for the tamest of reasons from the whole Star Wars shebang, I would have, at best, been mildly disappointed. Was she supposed to be the lead in the new series? Because she does not possess the talent or charisma for that. Pascal and his body double had more charisma in full body armor. She was fine in a supporting role that catered to her physical talents. Lawless, on the other hand, would be incredible in the Star Wars Universe.
Most people that yelled about Carano are just band-wagon protesters. Couldn’t really GAF, but were compelled to add on to the popular lynching.
Hell, “Cara Dune got space-plastic-surgery because so that way the Imperial Remnant don’t recognize her”
I’d have gone for “yeah we recast her, so fucking what, they’re actors”.
Thank you! Everyone these days seems like recasting roles is anathema to them. Or that there needs to be some sort of “explanation” like surgery for why they look different. And there really doesn’t. You’re not children, you can process this.
See also: Mark Ruffalo taking over the part of Bruce Banner/Hulk.
“Darth Vader was played by one guy and voiced by another in the OT, three other actors played Anakin Skywalker with his mask off, at least two guys have played Boba Fett, two guys have played Obi-Wan, and let’s not even get into all the CGI-face stuff we’ve done with Cushing, Fisher, and Hamill, plus all that was live-action and not to mention all the various voice actors who stepped in for various animated incarnations, and probably everybody forgets that we recast everybody except for Mark and Anthony Daniels back when we did the NPR versions, but now you’re getting uptight over recasting one character (a peripheral character on the show she debuted on) for a TV streaming show like a bunch of jackasses who’ve never seen two James Bond movies. Sure. Unsubscribe or whatever. Buh-bye.”
The CGI face stuff and Fake Shemp job they did on Leia kinda comes under being uptight over recasting.
Yeah – would anyone have complained if they’d had Charles Dance play Tarkin in Rogue One? Fuck no.
This is what should happen, but people have apparently regressed to the point where an actor/character are the same person and separating fiction from reality is impossible to do— and will cause them to riot violently in anger, I guess, based on producers seeming unwillingness to do it nowadays.It is utterly bizarre, but maybe watching Bond movies in a random order whenever they were on TV when I was younger inured my brain to this jarring and shocking concept.
Or introduce Cara’s sister Sera Dune. Similar appearance and life experience because… sisters! Maybe Cara got blown up and Sera wants revenge.
I still think the real problem with a Rangers of the New Republic series has little to do with Gina Carino, and everything to do with our prior knowledge that the entire series is a narrative dead end. The New Republic only ever exists for about 30 years before the First Order blows everything up in TFA, which means the Rangers accomplish nothing in the long run.
I guess the same could be argued of the entire original trilogy, which is one of the things that makes the sequel trilogy so loathsome.
I can see that. For me, I’d still tune in assuming the characters were interesting enough, or they were telling truly personal stories.
Two words: Cassian Andor.
The only “problem” that exists based upon whether or not the audience knows the outcome is that it puts all the pressure on the writers and the actors. If it’s well-written and well-acted, you could make a successful series out of the droid that got repaired when it blew up while Luke was whining about going to Toshi Station. You get around the “narrative dead end” element by making us actually care about the Rangers, their relationships with one another, and their lives/the lives they impact, so that the “dead” at their end is actually impactful…
And baby, we got a stew goin’!
Win/win for fans, but not for Disney. If they do Rangers now, they guarantee themselves more time talking about Gina Carano, which they don’t want to do. That’s kind of the point of the article—they’re so unenthusiastic to continue that conversation that they’d rather not hire Lawless if doing so is going to lead them back to talking about Carano.The only good side is that if the James Gunn situation is indicative, they may well come back to Rangers once the dust has settled.
Nazi’s? Really? This name is getting old. She isn’t a bigot… What did she say that was bigoted? And why is it anyone who thinks differently then someone else is labeled a Nazi? This seems to be an issue with the party that’s supposedly all about love and tolerance and being open-minded 🙄 (waiting to now be called a Nazi or a Nazis sympathizer bc I said something they don’t agree with)
I feel like the hole in what amounts to Lawless’s idle speculation here is that it presumes Disney doesn’t want to be seen to be giving fans what they want. The only “political” angle to this is the one they already explicitly backed when they fired Carano.
Well dang, I guess I should take down my “Put Lucy Lawless in everything ever” petition, I wouldn’t want to hurt her chances.
Yeah, you’re the victim here.
Ahigh, poor baby. Did it hurt, you being the clear victim of this story???
I always figured the people demanding Amber Heard be fired from Aquaman should realise that even if there was a chance she could have been (which I doubt), these actions would make it even less likely.
I really like Lawless as an actor, and she even seems like a cool person, but I absolutely agree that Disney should not pander to fan casting choices when it comes to Star Wars. No good creative project ever came from, “I wonder what would please billions of people who have nothing in common besides liking science-fiction/fantasy?”
Space Opera
Fans are the reason James Gunn got his job back after tweeting jokes about pedophilia and rape JUST because the left liked him talking smack about 45.
If she was up for ANOTHER gig in the SW universe, it wasn’t due to fans that she didn’t get it. It may have been considered pandering if she was cast as Cara Dune but then, we have James Gunn to debunk that.
I must say though, Lawless is underexposed.
No. James Gunn lost his job because conservatives were butthurt over Roseanne losing her job and caused a stink. Even though there’s a massive difference between comparing a Black woman to a character from Planet of the Apes when you’re the star of a Disney owned sitcom and making sick jokes a decade before you were hired by Disney, when you were affiliated with a film studio known for sick, gross-out jokes and your biggest film was about sex worms from outerspace.
Then Warner Bros. swooped Gunn up to direct Suicide Squad to absolutely no controversy, Disney started realizing they made a massive mistake.There’s also the blatant hypocrisy that Gunn was fired when several other actors involved with Disney franchises including Gilbert Gottfried, Sara Silverman, and Carrie – Princess Leia herself – Fisher told similar jokes in The Aristocrats – a documentary devoted to a beloved joke where the entire premise is to make the audience as uncomfortable as possible that almost always involves pedophilia.
And Roseanne was basically told from the start of the revival that she was on probation and needed to be careful about what she posted on social media – supposedly Gina Carano was in a similar situation where she was taken aside by the producers and asked to tone her social media posts down because it was leading to negative publicity. Gunn was never told, “Oh, if we find out you posted offensive jokes when you worked with that studio that makes the movies about the garbage monster that has sex with a blind woman, we’ll fire you.”
Disney wanted Gunn because he brought edgy comedy to genre films, then they claimed ignorance when it turned out he had a history of posting edgy jokes online.
LOL, if he was a conservative that you didn’t like, YOU’D have tried to get him fired. The left have been triggered over this same stuff.
The fact is that you move the goalposts when convenient.
Gunn didn’t lose his job JUST because neocons were butthurt. He lost it over the pedophile and rape jokes. Neocons didn’t make up Gunns jokes. They dug it up just like the left does years later.
It’s hilarious to see you write that off but will go full activist if the target is conservative.
lolwhat
I think you will find that the combined $1.3 Trillion dollars that the two Guardians of the Galaxy movies grossed for Disney might have also had something to do with it.Seriously, trillion with a T. The miracle is that they even bothered to pretend for half a second that they cared about that particular tempest in a teacup.
I am just wondering in what currency this Trillion with a T is in? 😉
…ha’pennies?Seriously I have no idea why or how my brain did that. Yes, of course, the total GotG grosses were roughly 1.5 billion.
Of course money talks. I said that Colin Kaepernick would still be playing if he was elite (which brings in the wins). However, lets not act like they couldn’t have hired someone else to do a good job like Taika.
Other Disney films have done fantastic as well without Gunn at the helm.
Disney’s face-saving excuse to the press was that Alan Horn jumped the gun and unilaterally fired Gunn as damage control, without consulting Kevin Feige or Bob Iger.
I love Lucy Lawless and I fully support giving her every role in the universe, but I think she’s speculating here.
No fucking shit, really? Is that because she SAID she was, Sherlock?
Do you think she is speculating because she specifically said she was speculating or did you have something to actually add?
Rosario Dawson was fancast as Ahsoka for years…and it ended up happening. So not sure why Lawless would think facasting would hurt her.
Because there’s a huge difference between being fancast as a character who hadn’t been played in a life action medium, and replacing an actress who was fired for her online behavior during a particularly politically charged time.
it’s pretty clearly laid out and explained, by her.
You must have missed this…. “Well to be honest with you, I was already in discussions about something on – it wasn’t The Mandalorian – something Star Wars-affiliated,” Lawless said in the interview. And while she makes it clear that she has no actual information that the petition impacted anything, she notes that, “It might have hurt me in some way, because then they couldn’t hire me because it would seem to be pandering” to fan demands. “I became political,” she noted, regardless of anything she or Disney had chosen to do.She isn’t saying fancasting stopped her from replacing Carano, she’s suggesting it stopped her from getting a different role in a different series because her name was linked to the Carano situation.Some fans also tried to undo Rosario Dawson by trying to get Asoka recast as Ashley Eckstien, but that didn’t really work. Disney has a habit of distancing it self from “problems” and anyone that happens to get splashed by that same controversy.
It’s because fancasting is not a the same as a politically-charged petition.
So not sure why Lawless would think facasting would hurt her.
Because you clearly can’t be bothered to read before commenting.
Yes, I agree Lucy. We don’t need another Baby Yoda.Oh, we were talking about her career. Yes, that too.
I always thought Xena’s blonde sidekick was the hotter one
I knew plenty of people more into Gabriel than Xena. And I found myself on the borderline… but Lucy Lawless just kept getting hotter over the years and I would say Lucy Lawless in Spartacus was exponentially hotter than Xena or Gabrielle.
She was so great on Spartacus.
She’ll always be Paula in Flight of the Conchords to me.
Lawless is a terrible actress. There, I said it. But it’s the truth. Maybe she’s fine for unintentionally awful stuff, such as Xena, but she’s pretty much poison when it comes to anything that has a shot at quality.
She’s excellent in that Treehouse of Horror.
Per Cara Dune, Gina Carano should be re-hired for the role. It’s fucking stupid that her personal opinions are canceling her from the gig. No one but a very vocal minority of over-zealous ideological purists give a shit about her “controversial” nonsense.
Who the hell would petition for Lucy Lawless to be in Star Wars just to play Cara Dune?!? That woman should be the leader of a crime syndicate or a Nightsister or something.
The important bit:
“she makes it clear that she has no actual information that the petition impacted anything”Don’t get me wrong, love Lucy, but she’s talking out her ass.
Well, you liked it when Jim Carrey did it
Did we, though?
I doubt she actually lost out on a Star Wars job due to fans clamoring for her to get a Star Wars job. This sounds like she’s making excuses.
Fuck yourself, you know shit about shit.
It’s a good thing you can read AND comprehend what you’ve read.
The lesson. Fans ruin everything. Fuck fans.
The 15 year old Xena fan in me is just here for the header pic.
But the psychology of giving in to, defying, or just ignoring online fan demands is clearly only going to get more complicated as the years go on.It’s not complicated at all! “Just Ignoring” is the way to go, and basically always has been. You don’t need a “Fandom” to be successful. Fandoms are what happen AFTER something is already successful, and they’re completely elective choices to join by folks who feel like they need SOMETHING at the center of their lives that isn’t THEIR LIVES. You can ignore a fandom completely for no other reason than any given fandom makes up – at most – like 5-10% of the general audience you’re aiming for. At BEST. And that fandom – because they’ve made the decision to center their life on being IN a fandom – is going to pay you anyway. Fandoms only real utility to studios is in the free marketing they provide as a volunteer street team/walking billboard. That’s 100% it. Everything else is either varying degrees of hindrance, or safely, completely ignorable. Because everything else in a Fandom has nothing to do with the movie you’re making, or the show you’re broadcasting. Everything else in a Fandom past that point is about the Fandom telling itself it’s more important to everyone than it actually is. The sooner more studios learn to ignore the fandom (and stop pretending/pandering that their input is worthy or worthwhile) the better their product will be.
Neither here nor there, but I would just like to point out that Lucy Lawless is fifty three in the picture above. Respect.
Oh good, ageism!
“They might not have put me into the Star Wars world because they had been presented with evidence that lots of people wanted to see me in the Star Wars world.” Perfect logic. I have no objections.
Do you know what quotation marks mean?
I love when retards like you don’t get that NOBODY appreciates your stupid petitions and campaigns.You think Disney browses change.org looking for what the fans REALLY want?Go back to your basement and your incest porn and leave the filmmaking to the filmmakers.
Centrist cowards
I can’t imagine Disney continues to be that short sighted with Star Wars. It seems like SW and DCEU consistently announce projects then those projects never happen. I’m sure whatever Lawless was discussing was one of those projects.
Fine then. Just replace Gina Carano with Bruce Campbell.
Fan culture and the internet suck ass