According to The Hollywood Reporter, LucasFilms wanted to fire actress Gina Carano from “The Mandalorian” series before controversy surrounded the actress this week. The company took final steps to remove her from the popular Disney+ show on Wednesday after social media users expressed their disapproval of one of her recent social media posts.
As reported by The Daily Wire,
“Disney reportedly fired conservative actress Gina Carano on Wednesday because of a series of posts she made on social media that critics claimed were offensive.
The post that generated the most controversy was a screenshot of another person’s post that she then posted onto her own Instagram account…The screenshot stated:
‘Jews were beaten in the streets, not by Nazi soldiers but by their neighbors…even by children.
Because history is edited, most people today don’t realize that to get to the point where Nazi soldiers could easily round up thousands of Jews, the government first made their own neighbors hate them simply for being Jews. How is that any different from hating someone for their political views?’”
On Wednesday night, a Lucasfilm spokesperson confirmed in a statement,
“Gina Carano is not currently employed by Lucasfilm and there are no plans for her to be in the future…Nevertheless, her social media posts denigrating people based on their cultural and religious identities are abhorrent and unacceptable.”
But a source with knowledge of Lucasfilm’s thinking told THR this was not a new idea. “They have been looking for a reason to fire her for two months,” the person said, “and today was the final straw.”
THR cited Carano’s previous “contentious tweets,” including one in which she commented on the integrity of elections.
We need to clean up the election process so we are not left feeling the way we do today.
Put laws in place that protect us against voter fraud.
Investigate every state.
Film the counting.
Flush out the fake votes.
Require ID.
Make Voter Fraud end in 2020.
Fix the system. 🇺🇸— Gina Carano 🕯 (@ginacarano) November 5, 2020
As noted by The Daily Wire,
“…many of the things that Carano said in [the above] tweet have been things that conservatives have long championed, like requiring voter ID laws. In that tweet, Carano did not promote the claim that the election was stolen and rather appeared to focus on how people did not feel confident in the outcome of the election.”
The Hollywood Reporter described the election tweet as a time in which the actress “falsely suggested voter fraud occurred during the 2020 presidential election.” Another tweet that allegedly made Carano the “focus of social media ire for her political comments” was one in which she posted a meme about masks and Democratic leaders, described by the outlet as “mock[ing] mask-wearing.”
— Gina Carano 🕯 (@ginacarano) November 15, 2020
According to THR’s sources, Lucasfilm had previously decided against announcing Carano as the star of her own Disney+ series in November after she posted the above tweets. On Wednesday, the hashtag #FireGinaCarano was trending on Twitter, and the company did so. THR writes that after Carano’s most recent social media posts, “the decision to cut ties with the actor came swiftly.”
Carano played the strong, female character of Cara Dune on the Star Wars’ series. Dune was seen as a way in which the show was promoting inclusivity.
In a 2019 interview, Carano describes her experience portraying Dune.
“[The showrunner] Jon was like, ‘OK, I want your arms to show,’ and I was like, ‘Oh, I don’t like to show my arms.’ And he was like, ‘No, I want your arms to show. I want people to see a strong woman. I want them to see you and everything you are.’”
Carano says she had to “look inside” and “embrace” herself.
“‘And that’s what Cara Dune has done for me. She’s helped me embrace myself. She’s helped me be confident.’”
Carano was also dropped as a client from United Talent Agency following Disney’s actions.