Is Mel Gibson Ready for a Comeback?

The first rule of celebrity culture in America (no, it’s not “don’t talk about celebrity culture in America”) is that there’s always a comeback. Always.

The NFL season that just wrapped up was more fascinating in cultural dramas than in nail-biting games. We watched as Brett Favre fell to sex scandals, illustrating beautifully the principle that acting like a douche can tarnish your rep no matter how long you’ve been perceived as a classy older gent of the game. And we watched Michael Vick win over fans’ hearts again, exemplifying that you can always polish a tarnished image (even if that image is “puppy killer”) provided your comeback game is good enough.

In the football off-season, Mel Gibson is about to combine the narratives of both Favre and Vick: He’s tarnished his rep as a classy older gent of the game (a couple times)—but what remains to be seen is whether his comeback game is good enough to polish his image and win over fans again, a la Michael Vick.

Oddly, the film Gibson seems to be betting his comeback on is a little movie called “The Beaver,” in which he plays a classy older gent who turns into an insufferable asshole, at which point he uses a beaver hand puppet as a proxy for himself. The beaver talks in some approximation of Gibson’s native Australian accent, and says the things Gibson can’t.

It seems an strange choice for a comeback role, specifically because the point of a comeback is that it’s the man himself who must win back the hearts of his alienated audience, not some hand puppet proxy of himself. When Michael Vick got out of jail, he didn’t try to win back his potential by sending the team mascot out onto the field.

Then again, I haven’t seen the movie. And it looks like I won’t be seeing it soon. Deadline reports that the “The Beaver” has been pushed back once again from its original March release at least until May 20, ostensibly because Jodie Foster is going to be too busy shooting another movie to promote it in March. Douglas’s schedule probably isn’t packed with as many offers, but then again, you probably don’t want him pulling all the weight in promoting this movie. That is, of course, unless he does press as The Beaver with a puppet on his hand.

It may take more than a goofy voice and a beaver puppet to redeem Mel Gibson. Stranger things have happened, but this would have to be one hell of a movie. I guess we’ll find out at some point this year, sooner or later.