Social media gets less social
Rick and Morty co-creator Harmon closes Twitter account amid culture wars
For creators of pop content, the social media reckoning is in full swing.
On the heels of Disney firing James Gunn from Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 3 over “indefensible” tweets from as far as a decade back, Rick and Morty co-creator Dan Harmon is weathering his own social-media storm.
In 2009, Harmon made a twopart satire — briefly posted to his Channel 101 website — titled Daryl, which spoofed the murderous Showtime drama Dexter. Last week, video resurfaced online from Harmon’s five-minute parody, in which the title character goes back in time and sexually assaults serial killers when they were younger.
In the unearthed video, Vulture reports, Harmon also appears onscreen, playing a therapist who molests a baby doll.
The video had resurfaced on the website 4chan and went viral last week after it was shared on the right-wing subreddit The_Donald, according to The Daily Beast. Similar to Gunn’s case, Harmon’s controversy has prompted an apology from the creator, his deletion of Twitter content and a statement from his employer condemning the source of the uproar.
The key difference is that Harmon has not been fired by his current employer for something he created nearly a decade ago. Representatives for the Cartoon Network programming block Adult Swim, which airs the recently renewed Rick and Morty, said in a statement that the video “demonstrates poor judgment and does not reflect the type of content we seek out.”
The network also noted that Harmon has acknowledged the inappropriate nature and apologized. (In Canada, Rick and Morty also airs on Teletoon.)
“In 2009, I made a ‘pilot’ which strove to parody the series Dexter and only succeeded in offending,” Harmon, who also created NBC’s Community, said in a statement.
“I quickly realized the content was way too distasteful and took the video down immediately. Nobody
Nobody should ever have to see what you saw and for that, I sincerely apologize.
DAN HARMON
should ever have to see what you saw and for that, I sincerely apologize.”
Gunn deleted many of his past controversial tweets — some of which he had described as “jokes” about rape and pedophilia — after conservative activists re-unearthed them and sparked a viral campaign last week. Harmon, by contrast, has taken the full step of deleting his Twitter account after the actions of the conservative subreddit. Harmon is more fortunate than Gunn in at least one respect: He works for an employer that traffics in edgy comedy, and he is beloved by Rick and Morty fans who have come to expect that his humor will push the envelope.
Gunn might be widely known for somewhat bent humor, but for most of the decade, he has worked for a major studio that mostly tries to burnish its “family entertainment” image.
Gunn’s departure followed Disney ’s firing of comedian Roseanne Barr from her ABC show after her racist Twitter rant in May. In this climate, who will be the next Hollywood creative to sign off of online life for good?