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Joe Rogan Sounds the ‘Cancel Culture’ Alarm on Robert Downey Jr.’s “Impossible” ‘Tropic Thunder’

Published 04/05/2024, 7:00 AM EDT

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Joe Rogan loves comedy. After all, besides being a commentator and a podcast host, he is also a comedian himself. Moreover, the 56-year-old also has a special love for comedy movies. But Rogan recently talked about some of the comedy movies in the past and claimed that those movies may not get permission to be made in today’s time, including the Robert Downey Jr. starrer, ‘Tropic Thunder’.

Comedy movies are designed to make people laugh. As simple as that. However, in the pursuit of what makes the audience laugh, some movies end up creating controversies for going above and beyond with their jokes. As such, Joe Rogan, who was joined by Matt Serra, Din Thomas, and John Rallo, talked about a few movies that may not be able to see the light of day in 2024.

Joe Rogan claims movies like ‘Tropic Thunder’ cannot be made in 2024

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While having a conversation with the aforementioned guests on the ‘JRE MMA Show‘, Joe Rogan turned his attention to talk about comedy movies. Just then, Matt Serra mentioned the 2006 movie, ‘Idiocracy‘, which he seemed to love it. Even the Rogan loved the movie too. However, he claimed that it would be tough for movie makers to make another such movie and win the audience’s approval in today’s time. Rogan stated, “It’s [Idiocracy] a great movie… it’s not at all [politically correct] but it holds up. You almost cannot make it today.”

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Joe Rogan then brought up the cult classic ‘Tropic Thunder‘, which is one of Robert Downey Jr.‘s best movies, where he dawned on the role of an African-American army man. Despite the movie being dubbed as one of the finest comedy flicks ever, Joe Rogan claimed that the Downey Jr. starrer would suffer the same fate as ‘Idiocracy’ in 2024, especially due to ‘cancel culture‘. “Tropic Thunder would be impossible today, impossible today… That’s a great movie,” Rogan added. While making a movie with critical jokes could be a risk now, the cast of ‘Tropical Thunder received backlash for the movie years after its release.

The cast of ‘Tropic Thunder’ faced backlash for the movie

Many people thought that Robert Downey Jr. portraying the role of an African-American, even though he’s Caucasian, could spark controversies, but it did not. It was a bold choice for the 59-year-old since he bagged the iconic role of Marvel’s ‘Tony Stark‘ after doing his iconic comedy flick. Nevertheless, the movie was criticized by viewers who believed that the filmmakers did not do justice reading the portrayal of differently-abled people.

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The movie also went all guns blazing with the jokes. For many people, the movie also highlighted the thin line between being funny and offensive. However, the cast of the movie, especially Robert Downey Jr. and Ben Stiller, remained unapologetic about the movie. The latter even shared a tweet mentioning that cared very little about the critics of ‘Tropic Thunder’.

Although comedy movies like ‘Tropic Thunder’ may not be allowed to flourish in the current times, comedy is still thriving with many popular stand-up comics. Some of them even found their place on social media, especially on YouTube podcasts. It remains to be seen if more hurdles take shape for comedians in the future, especially when it comes to freedom of speech!

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Written by:

Himanga Mahanta

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Himanga Mahanta is a senior UFC writer at EssentiallySports. An all-rounder in his coverage of the sport, Himanga is a reliable voice with a knack for providing analytical coverage of breaking stories from the world of MMA. His 1700+ articles include perspective pieces on trending UFC stories, and both live and post-event coverage of weekly events.
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Edited by:

Joyita Das