Star Wars: Mark Hamill Saves the Day Following Rian Johnson's Deleted Tweets

Last week, Star Wars: The Last Jedi director Rian Johnson deleted more than 20,000 of his old [...]

Last week, Star Wars: The Last Jedi director Rian Johnson deleted more than 20,000 of his old tweets in the wake of James Gunn's firing. The removal of those tweets meant that many fans saw replies to them from Johnson vanish, but fortunately Mark Hamill was on hand to save the day.

Following Johnson's Twitter purge, a fan named Rob Taylor responded to the director, noting that a response he called "the pinnacle of his Twitter career" was now gone and joked that now all he had was the hope that someday Hamill would fill that void. As Taylor soon found out, Hamill is a hero on social media just as he is in the Star Wars franchise. Check out Hamill's response below.

Hamill responded to the fan with a GIF of himself -- as Luke Skywalker -- saluting. The gesture went over well, with the delighted fan thanking both Hamill and Johnson for what he called "the long-game assist".

All joking tweets aside, the issue of how much damage old tweets -- or any social media posting -- can do to one's career is something that's been a bit of a hot topic since Gunn was fired when offensive, decade-old tweets the Guardians of the Galaxy director had written resurfaced. Gunn apologize and since his firing numerous celebrities have spoken out in support of the director. Guardians star Michael Rooker and Hellboy alum Selma Blair both quit Twitter in a show of support and today, the cast of Guardians of the Galaxy issued a statement in support of is reinstatement for the third installment of the franchise.

As for Johnson, his purge wasn't in response to anything surfacing. Instead, the director noted that he was simply removing ammunition for those who might decide to take things out of context.

"No official directive at all, and I don't think I've ever tweeted anything that bad. But it's nine years of stuff written largely off the cuff as ephemera, if trolls scrutinizing it for ammunition is the new normal, this seems like a 'why not' move," he wrote.

What do you think, both about Hamill's save and Johnson's remarks? Let us know in the comments below.

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