Star Wars novelist and comics writer Chuck Wendig announced Friday that he had been fired by Marvel Comics for his posts on Twitter that the company deemed vulgar.
In the wake of Brett Kavanaugh's confirmation to the Supreme Court, Wendig launched an expletive-laced tirade online. In a series of tweets, Wendig said Republican senators like Mitch McConnell can "eat a boot covered in shit" and that "Winter is coming, you callous fucknecks, you prolapsed assholes. . . you vengeful petty horrors."
In another series of tweets posted on Friday afternoon and later consolidated into a blog post on his website, Wendig pointed out that his firing will likely be considered a win for the Comicsgate movement that harasses writers who seek to make comics more inclusive.
Basically, because I was not civil.
Wendig said that he was first targeted by the Comicsgate crowd after they caught wind that his Star Wars: Aftermath book introduced LGBT characters to the series. According to Wendig, the book immediately received negative reviews online, and the author faced various forms of harassment that required him to notify his local police department.
Some of it was bot stuff, obviously, or sock puppets, but some of it was pretty creepy, and very personal. I didn't call a lot of it out or even highlight, but it was there, a sort of... constant background noise.
Wendig still continued working on Star Wars projects and eventually began writing comics as well to financial success, even as the harassment got worse.
Of course, the harassment continued – and it got worse again when TLJ came out. Which I’m sure is no surprise to anyone who has ever tweeted, “Hey, I really liked THE LAST JEDI!” That’s really when I started to see lots of YouTube videos and stuff about me and it was…
Fast forward to this month, when Wendig tweeted that soon after announcing the Shadow of Vader series, he was taken by surprise that he was being fired Friday over his social media presence.
Today I got the call. I’m fired. Because of the negativity and vulgarity that my tweets bring. Seriously, that’s what Mark, the editor said. It was too much politics, too much vulgarity, too much negativity on my part.
He said specifically that his editor told him his Twitter had "too much politics, too much vulgarity, too much negativity on [his] part."
A source familiar with the situation told BuzzFeed News that while it is accurate that Wendig was fired for his vulgarity online, it is inaccurate to say that he was fired for his political views.
As Wendig suspected, Comicsgaters and their far-right allies have already taken his dismissal as another win akin to the recent firing of Guardians of the Galaxy director James Gunn over unsavory tweets, while others defended Wendig by pointing out issues with other people who Marvel Comics still employs.
A spokesperson for Marvel Comics did not publicly comment on the firing of Wendig.