"No One Is Responsible For My Mistakes But Me” – 11 Directors And Show-Runners That Have Apologised For What They've Done

    "I promise you – burying, baiting, or hurting anyone was never our intention. It’s not who I am."

    Benjamin Dzialdowski
    by Benjamin Dzialdowski

    BuzzFeed Staff

    Fans are quick to jump on a movie or a show when there's something they don't like, or even something problematic. Sometimes, fan sentiment can be so strong that a showrunner or film director has to come out and apologise.

    Universal Pictures

    So, here are 11 directors and showrunners that have apologised to fans:

    1. Batman & Robin

    Warner Bros.

    Known as one of the worst films of all time, it's clear that director Joel Schumacher wasn't happy with his butchering of the famous character. In fact, fan outrage so was stark that he felt obliged to apologise for his version:

    “Look, I apologise. I want to apologise to every fan who was disappointed because I think I owe them that. A lot of it was my choice. No one is responsible for my mistakes but me.”

    The anger from the fans was so intense that the director felt like he had to apologise to them. Speaking about the fan reaction, he said: “I was scum. It was like I had murdered a baby."

    2. Picard

    Paramount+

    Showrunner Terry Matalas had to make an apology to fans of the show, but for a pretty bizarre reason: people couldn't see what was going on. That's right, when episode four was initially released, on certain streaming websites the pictures were too dark to see anything. 

    After fans noticed on Twitter (now X), Terry stepped in to say that it was not supposed to look like that, and continued: “We are trying to fix this BIZARRE technical error for a second time. If you CAN’T wait, I encourage you to watch it a second time when it looks right later.” He added, “We are trying to fix it. Very sorry. You can imagine how upset I am.”


    3. The 100

    The CW

    Jason Rothenberg said sorry to fans for the way the show handled Lexa. When the episode called "Thirteen" was aired, fans were up in arms regarding Lexa's fate and were claiming that the show had adopted the 'bury your gays' trope that has been seen so often on screen. 

    In a long apology, Jason stated that this was never their intention, although did recognise the end result: 

    "The thinking behind having the ultimate tragedy follow the ultimate joy was to heighten the drama and underscore the universal fragility of life. But the end result became something else entirely — the perpetuation of the disturbing 'Bury Your Gays' trope. Our aggressive promotion of the episode, and of this relationship, only fueled a feeling of betrayal.

    While I now understand why this criticism came our way, it leaves me heartbroken. I promise you – burying, baiting, or hurting anyone was never our intention. It’s not who I am."

    4. Voltron: Legendary Defenders

    Netflix

    On a similar note, Voltron fans were let down by the series, after they advertised that there would be a prominent gay couple in the show, only for the storyline to last barely two minutes on-screen. Fans took to Twitter to display their disappointment: 

    "Congratulations to Voltron for announcing their gay couple on SDCC, showing a clip of them, heavily marketing on the fact we would meet Adam to the point of making their Netflix banners Shiro/Adam, and then almost immediately killing him while introducing m/f romances. classy!"

    Responding to fans, showrunner Joaquim Dos Santos wrote a letter and posted it to Twitter. It began, “First, I’d like to say that we created this version of Voltron with the intent of being as inclusive as possible within the boundaries."

    He continued: 

    “With regards to season 7 itself, if anyone for any reason took away from this season that our intention was to queerbait the VLD fandom I’d like to personally apologise. I can only speak to our intent and I can truly say we did not intend to bait anyone. I know that is not any consolation but it is the truth. We were aware of the ‘bury your gays’ trope. But hoped against hope that our struggle to confirm Shiro’s orientation would take centre stage here.”

    5. Law and Order

    NBC

    Showrunner Michael Chernuchin had to take to Twitter to apologise to fans after the promo for an episode of Law and Order was shown to fans. In the episode, the lead, Michael Chernuchin, frequently misgenders a victim of murder, Bobbi O'Rourke, who identified as a woman. Fans of the show were critical of the fumbled handling of the character, calling the episode a "misstep." 

    Michael responded to the criticism, saying:

    "I am so sorry that the promo for tonight's episode caused hurt and confusion. It was misrepresentative of the story... We apologise for any hurt caused by Benson's line. Your voices are heard and matter to us." 

    6. Gods of Egypt

    Lionsgatee

    Director Alex Proyas had to make a public apology before the movie, Gods of Egypt, had even come out. The reason was that the film, based on Egyptian mythology, was cast with predominantly white actors – something Hollywood has been guilty of over and over again. 

    Prominent voices were quick to criticise the casting, with filmmaker Matthew A. Cherry saying: 

    “Dear Hollywood, Egypt is in Africa. Northern to be exact. Why is that so hard to grasp? Stop gentrifying African countries.”

    The director responded to the criticism, saying:

    “The process of casting a movie has many complicated variables, but it is clear that our casting choices should have been more diverse. I sincerely apologise to those who are offended by the decisions we made."

    7. Aloha

    Sony Pictures Releasing

    In a similar vein, filmmaker Cameron Crowe apologised for the whitewashing after his film, Aloha, cast Emma Stone to play the quarter-Asian and quarter-Hawaiian character of Allison Ng. The film received a vast amount of backlash for the casting choice, so much so that Cameron came out to apologise: 

    “Thank you so much for all the impassioned comments regarding the casting of the wonderful Emma Stone in the part of Allison Ng. I have heard your words and your disappointment, and I offer you a heartfelt apology to all who felt this was an odd or misguided casting choice.” 

    He went on to add that he'd learnt from the experience, saying: “I am grateful for the dialogue, and from the many voices, loud and small, I have learned something very inspiring. So many of us are hungry for stories with more racial diversity, more truth in representation, and I am anxious to help tell those stories in the future.”

    8. Armageddon

    Buena Vista Pictures Distribution

    Director Michael Bay made an apology for Armageddon, and sort of TO Armageddon, years after it came out. Michael was apologising for the visual effects and how the movie looked, saying that the filming process was too rushed to make it how he'd have liked: 

    “I will apologize for Armageddon because we had to do the whole movie in 16 weeks,” Bay says. “It was a massive undertaking. That was not fair to the movie. I would redo the entire third act if I could. But the studio literally took the movie away from us. It was terrible. 

    My visual effects supervisor had a nervous breakdown, so I had to be in charge of that. I called James Cameron and asked ‘What do you do when you’re doing all the effects yourself?’ But the movie did fine.”

    9. House of Cards

    Netflix

    Beau Willimon, showrunner for House of Cards was sorry about the way they presented U.S politics in the show. He believed that, while they intended to show the true gritty side of politics in the states, they made it too optimistic:

    “Yeah, we really fucked up when we created the show. I wanted it to be a gritty allegory about the lengths that the powerful elite will go to in order to gain more power, but having learned more about how D.C. really works, we basically made a political version of Ted Lasso.

    Remember that ‘Schoolhouse Rock’ cartoon with the song about how a bill becomes a law? That’s pretty much what I see when I watch any of the episodes of the show now.”


    10. Heroes

    NBC

    Creator Tim Kring acknowledged that they got off to a bad start with the beginning of season two of Heroes, and failed to deliver on what the fans wanted. Talking about the slow pace of the start, Tim said: 

    ”We assumed the audience wanted season one — a buildup of intrigue about these characters and the discovery of their powers. We taught [them] to expect a certain kind of storytelling. They wanted adrenaline. We made a mistake.”

    Tim went on to add that they failed to raise the world-threatening stakes quickly enough, saying ”We took too long to get to the big-picture story."


    11. Community

    Bryan Bedder / Getty Images for ReedPop

    Showrunner Dan Harmon did make an apology to fans of the show, but not for anything that happened on Community, rather the drama that occurred off it. It was following the public feud that Dan had with Chevy Chase, an actor on the show. When Dan played an angry voicemail that Chevy had left him hat a comicbook event, the voicemail went viral, which stirred up the fanbase massively. 

    On playing the voicemail, Dan had this to say: 

    "The people that I really want to apologise to are the fans of the show... That was a dumb, unclassy, inconsiderate move on my part. I'm very sorry it's reflecting poorly on the show."


    When else has a director or showrunner apologised? Let us know in the comments below!