Clark Gregg, who plays Agent Phil Coulson in the Marvel Cinematic Universe, attacked Marvel fans who have been criticizing Captain Marvel and actress Brie Larson.
Gregg sat down with Nerdist, where he described Marvel fans who criticize Larson as “dinosaur[s] wandering towards the tar pits.”
Gregg would begin his discussion with Nerdist saying, “There are people who get appraised very quickly, and that turns out to be the opposite of wisdom. I think we are seeing some of that at the moment.”
Gregg goes on to praise the Captain Marvel film and notes his enjoyment of Carol Danvers’ origin story in the comics describing it as “one of the coolest.”
He then decides to attack fans, “There are people who get very bent out of shape about the fact that she’s a woman, and that Brie’s a woman, and wants to see women moving into an equal place in humanity to men.” He continues, “It’s sad. It must be sad to be that kind of dinosaur wandering toward the tar pits.”
In a shocking moment of irony, Gregg lists off a number of strong, female characters in the Marvel Cinematic Universe who didn’t face the criticism Captain Marvel and Brie Larson faced leading up to the release of the film.
Gregg states, “I’ve certainly come up in the Marvel Cinematic Universe with some amazing heroes like Natasha Romanov, Scarlet Witch, and Maria Hill for my money.” He adds, “And yet there’s something special about this moment, and this happening that my 17-year-old daughter having grown up in the Marvel Universe, and frankly growing up with the superhero Quake and the bio genius Simmons on Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D., she’s used to that. But there’s something special about this.”
He then decides to call Marvel fans “butthurt.”
“I think it’s easy for people to get, I don’t know if the expression is butthurt, about seeing someone else get a hero that looks like them, but that’s cause they’ve always had heroes that look like them.”
Gregg continues:
“I’ve seen at comic-cons young Asian, and Latino people, girls and boys coming to see Quake or Yo-Yo from the Secret Warriors on our show. I think it’s exciting that Marvel has finally taken this step. It wouldn’t have been a complete canvas without someone like Captain Marvel in the same way that it was never going to be a complete canvas without T’Challa in Wakanda.”
As we’ve heavily documented on this site, the criticism facing Brie Larson and Captain Marvel was not about the fact that she is a woman. As Gregg states so well, no one had a problem with any of the female characters he listed off. In fact, people embraced Wonder Woman. And American audiences have had no problem embracing women leads like Xena Warrior Princess, Buffy the Vampire Slayer, Kill Bill, Imperator Furiousa in Mad Max: Fury Road, Ellen Riply in Alien, Katniss Everdeen from The Hunger Games, Lara Croft, Alice from Resident Evil, Selene from Underworld, and the list could go on.
They had problems with Brie Larson and the way she and Disney were marketing Captain Marvel using radical political language like “intersectional feminism.”
They had an issue with Larson insinuating she wanted less white men to review Captain Marvel and provide media coverage on the press tour.
Marvel movie fans don’t have a problem with female actors and female characters, and to try to bludgeon them with this type of rhetoric is simply disgusting.
What do you make of Clark Gregg’s comments regarding Marvel fans?