According to People, over 3 million people have signed a petition to have Amber Heard removed from Aquaman and the Lost Kingdom.
According to People, the petition aimed at DC and Warner Bros. was started in 2020, and interest has grown since Johnny Depp filed a defamation suit against the actress over a 2018 Washington Post op-ed in which she claimed she was a victim of domestic abuse. While Depp’s name was not mentioned in the piece, he alleges it harmed his career and is now suing his ex-wife for $50 million.
According to the petition, Heard has “systematically crusaded to ruin Depp in Hollywood, repeating multiple accounts of fake incidents in which she had actually abused Johnny Depp, but lied and created false accounts of him being the abuser.” She is set to reprise her role as Mera in the film’s sequel. Heard was accused of slashing Depp’s finger with a glass bottle during the trial. She, too, has accused Depp of violence and sexual assault, both of which his representatives have denied.
“You will hear in the most graphic and horrifying terms about the [sexual] violence that she suffered,” her attorney, Ben Rottenborn, said at the beginning of the case. “You’ll hear that straight from her.”
On Wednesday, Heard is expected to testify in court. Depp’s agent, Jack Whigham, claimed on Monday that Heard’s op-ed harmed the actor’s career “dismally,” and that he was set to earn $22.5 million if he starred in the sixth Pirates of the Caribbean film. Disney, on the other hand, went in a “different direction,” according to Whigham.