The comic book writer who created the Marvel Comics mega villain Thanos seen in the recent hit Avengers movies says he feels “violated” by the use of the character in a viral Trump campaign ad.
Much to the dismay of comic book writer and artist Jim Starlin, on Tuesday, the Trump War Room Twitter account posted a satirical video showing Trump as Thanos, snapping his fingers and erasing Nancy Pelosi (D-CA) and the House Democrat leadership.
The tweet featured a caption reading, “House Democrats can push their sham impeachment all they want. President Trump’s re-election is inevitable.”
Starlin, who created the comic book character in 1973, was less than pleased with the ad, according to the Hollywood Reporter.
Not seeing the humor in the ad, Starlin slammed the president for somehow endorsing a “mass murderer.”
“After my initial feeling of being violated, seeing that pompous fool using my creation to stroke his infantile ego, it finally struck me that the leader of my country and the free world actually enjoys comparing himself to a mass murderer,” Starlin told the outlet. “How sick is that? These are sad and strange times we are going through. Fortunately, all things, even national nightmares, eventually come to an end.”
In the Avengers movies, Thanos endeavors to wipe out half of the sentient life in the universe to resstore balance between living beings and nature throughout the universe. In the films, Thanos constantly says that his victory is “inevitable.”
The “inevitable” line is the phrase the Trump campaign seized on for its satirical ad.
But some have said that Thanos is an environmental activist taken to its logical ends where a reverence for sentient life takes a back seat to “saving” nature.
A few years ago, for instance, University of Texas Ecologist Eric Pianka insisted that we need to kill off 90 percent of humanity to save the earth. It begs the question. Does Mr. Starlin denounce wild-eyed enviros like Pianka who actually espouse mass murder? Or is he only upset at someone like Trump who has never advocated for the death of anyone?
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