When watching the Fantastic Beasts franchise, it might be a sudden shock to notice that Johnny Depp is no longer a part of the franchise. Years after the incident, Johnny Depp responds to being replaced in the hit spinoff franchise.
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More than four years after his abrupt exit from the Fantastic Beasts franchise, the actor revealed what was going through his mind when Warner Bros. asked him to step aside for the third installment.
“F–ck you,” he recalled thinking during an interview with The Telegraph, which was published on July 5. “There are far too many of me to kill. If you think you can hurt me more than I’ve already been hurt, you’re gravely mistaken.”
The studio made the decision days after the 62-year-old lost his libel case against The Sun in November 202, a case that centered upon an article labeling him as a “wife beater” about his marriage to ex Amber Heard.
While Depp denied the claim, a judge ultimately ruled that the tabloid’s portrayal of the actor was “substantially true”.
Even though he lost that initial case, Depp triumphed in a separate defamation lawsuit against Heard in 2022. Even so, his loss in the U.K.’s High Court brought his involvement in the Harry Potter spinoff to an end.
“It literally stopped in a millisecond, while I was doing the movie,” He told The Telegraph. “They said, ‘We’d like you to resign.’ But what was really in my head was that they wanted me to retire.”
At the time that Depp was asked to step down from the franchise in 2022, Depp issued a statement saying he had “respected and agreed” to Warner Bros’ request to resign from the role while also thanking his fans for standing by him.
“I’d like to thank everybody who has gifted me their support and loyalty,” he wrote in a post on Instagram following his departure. “I have been humbled and moved by your messages of love and concern, particularly over the last few days.”
Johnny Depp played Grindelwald in Fantastic Beasts, and was replaced by Mads Mikkelsen in 2022’s The Secrets of Dumbledore.
While Warner Bros. believed that they were making the best decision for themselves, the replacement didn’t stop Depp from continuing his amazing, diverse career. Even after his amazing win against ex-wife Amber Heard, he’s still an iconic actor well-known for his roles in the Pirates of the Caribbean franchise, Sweeney Todd, Edward Scissorhands, and many more.
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