Entertainment Analyst Criticizes South Park For Not Targeting Kevin Feige And Marvel Studios After It Lampooned Kathleen Kennedy And Lucasfilm
John F. Trent
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Entertainment analyst Andre Einherjar, the founder of the Midnight’s Edge YouTube channel, criticized South Park and its creator Trey Parker and Matt Stone for not targeting Kevin Feige and Marvel Studios after it lampooned Kathleen Kennedy and Lucasfilm in their special South Park: Joining the Panderverse.
Kathleen Kennedy attends the UK Premiere of Lucasfilm’ “Indiana Jones and the Dial of Destiny” in Leicester Square on June 26, 2023 in London, UK. (Photo by StillMoving.Net for Disney)
In a recent video upload, Einherjar asserted, “Going after Kennedy right now is good and well, but in a way it’s too late. The damage has been done. They needed to have gone after her years ago when it still might have made a difference. By now can the brand ever recover? At this point it’s not looking good. So I would rather the South Park guys have focused their efforts on the parts of Disney where something constructive might still happen i.e. they should target Bob Iger and Kevin Feige.”
“Everything Kennedy did, she did under Bob Iger’s watch and oversight. He could have stopped her. And he did step in and prevent more movies, but he did not stop her from doubling down on Disney+. At best that makes him equally responsible,” he elaborated.
“But it gets worse,” he asserted. “It was Marvel that succeeded Star Wars as the biggest entertainment franchise in history. But in recent years that too has gone to the dogs and the person the most responsible for that is Kevin Feige, who knowingly and wittingly repeated what Kennedy was doing to tank Lucasfilm over at Marvel.”
“And surprise, surprise, it tanked Marvel too,” Einherjar declared. “I don’t know. It’s almost as if this is a universal recipe for failure or something.”
Kevin Feige attends the Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 3 Premiere at the Dolby Theatre in Hollywood CA on Thursday, April 27, 2023. (Photo: Alex J. Berliner/ABImages)
In fact, Kevin Feige made it abundantly clear that he had embraced the ideology while promoting the Eternals back in April 2021.
He informed Variety, “Well, the notion of switching up the genders, sexualities and ethnicities of the characters from the comics, was baked in initially — that was part of what Nate Moore was really advocating for in moving Eternals to the top of the list for us to start working on.”
Feige elaborated, “When it came to casting, that also did affect it. There were some characters that we change from male to female, there were some characters that we knew how we were altering them from the books. But then also it came down to casting.”
HOLLYWOOD, CALIFORNIA – OCTOBER 18: Producer and President of Marvel Studios and CCO of Marvel Kevin Feige arrives at the Premiere of Marvel Studios’ Eternals on October 18, 2021 in Hollywood, California. (Photo by Jesse Grant/Getty Images for Disney)
In October 2021, he also declared that making Phastos gay in the film was only just the start for gay characters in the Marvel Cinematic Universe, “There have been gay heroes before in the comics. It is more than past time in the movies. It’s just the start.”
“There have been gay heroes before in the comics. It is more than past time in the movies,” Kevin Feige says of the Marvel film’s first gay superhero. “It’s just the start.” https://t.co/F6rov2HB1g pic.twitter.com/XZXMs5G4zo
— Variety (@Variety) October 19, 2021
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As for Bob Iger, under his leadership the company introduced a new Inclusion Key with Disney Parks, Experiences, and Products Chairman Josh D’Amaro explaining, “We want our guests to see their own backgrounds and traditions reflected in the stories, experiences and products they encounter in their interactions with Disney. And we want our cast members – and future cast members – to feel a sense of belonging at work.”
D’Amaro added, “Like The Four Keys before them, The 5 Keys – with Inclusion at the heart – will continue to guide us as we interact with guests, collaborate together, create the next generation of Disney products and experiences, and make critical decisions about the future of our business.”
“Inclusion is essential to our culture and leads us forward as we continue to realize our rich legacy of engaging storytelling, exceptional service, and Disney magic,” he declared.
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Iger doubled down on this ideology when he returned to the company as CEO during a company townhall in November 2022.
He declared, “This company has been telling stories for a hundred years, and those stories have had a meaningful, positive impact on the world. And one of the reasons that they’ve had a meaningful, positive impact is one of our core values is inclusion, acceptance, and tolerance. And we can’t lose that. We just can’t lose that.”
In response to the so-called “Don’t Say Gay” legislation, Iger said Disney would still promote “inclusion,” but suggested that the company must strike a “delicate balance” and “listen to [its] audience” and “have respect for the people that [it’s] serving.” This is a retreat. pic.twitter.com/bZBnQdm616
— Christopher F. Rufo ⚔️ (@realchrisrufo) November 29, 2022
While Einherjar criticized Parker and Stone for not going after Feige and Iger, he did offer praise for the episode for its takedown of Kennedy, “This weekend will be a rough one for Disney in general and for Kathleen Kennedy in particular because South Park went after them and they went hard, mocking the very ideology and social messaging that Disney has been so proud to infuse into Star Wars, Marvel, and everything else.”
“Maybe they thought they were changing the world. Maybe they thought they were on the right side of history, but South Park just exposed the only thing they changed was shareholder value and they changed that for the worse,” he stated.
Bob Iger via 2023 Annual Meeting of Shareholders Webcast
South Park: Joining the Panderverse has received high praise from audiences. The special currently has an 8.0 out of 10 rating on IMDb. The unweighted mean is an 8.5 with nearly 40% of reviewers giving the special a perfect 10 out of 10.
South Park: Joining the Panderverse IMDb score
South Park: Joining the Panderverse is currently available to watch on Paramount+, which you can get for a 30-day free trial with the code: SOUTHPARK.
The official description for the episode states, “Cartman’s deeply disturbing dreams portend the end of the life he knows and loves. The adults in South Park are also wrestling with their own life decisions as the advent of AI is turning their world upside down.”
South Park: Joining the Panderverse is now streaming on Paramount+ in US & CA. Start your free 30-day trial with code: SOUTHPARK. pic.twitter.com/8NQObHRLt8
— South Park (@SouthPark) October 30, 2023
What do you make of Einherjar’s criticism of Trey Parker and Matt Stone for not targeting Kevin Feige?
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