Jerry Bruckheimer Reveals Johnny Depp Could Return To His Most Notable Franchise

Johnny Depp could be heading back to the Pirates of the Caribbean series, years after Disney cut ties with him. Producer Jerry Bruckheimer told Entertainment Weekly that he’s had talks with Depp about playing Captain Jack Sparrow again in a planned sixth movie.

Depp’s departure from the franchise happened back in 2018, during a time when his personal life was under intense public scrutiny. He was in the middle of a messy and highly publicized legal battle with his ex-wife Amber Heard.

Both accused each other of abuse, and Disney quietly moved away from him. In court in 2020, Depp said he lost the role of Jack Sparrow just days after a newspaper called him a “wife beater,” something he has always denied.

By the time Depp won a defamation case against Heard in 2022, Disney had already started moving forward with plans to reboot the Pirates films with new characters. The studio never gave an exact reason for dropping him, but insiders say Disney had been considering fresh stories and spin-offs even before the controversy.

Now, the door may be opening again. Bruckheimer says Depp hasn’t ruled out returning. “If he likes the way the part’s written, I think he would do it,” Bruckheimer told EW. “It’s all about what’s on the page, as we all know.”

The last Pirates movie, Dead Men Tell No Tales, was released in 2017 and brought back familiar faces like Geoffrey Rush, Orlando Bloom, and Keira Knightley. A sixth film has been talked about since at least 2019.

Bruckheimer has said it will be a reboot, but he still wants Jack Sparrow to make an appearance. “It’s a reboot, but if it was up to me, he would be in it,” he explained. “I love him. He’s a good friend. He’s an amazing artist… He created Captain Jack. That was not on the page; that was him doing a little Pepé Le Pew and Keith Richards. That was his interpretation of Jack Sparrow.”

Right now, the script is still in development. “We are still working on a screenplay,” Bruckheimer said. “We just got to get the right screenplay. We haven’t quite gotten there yet, but we’re close.” Writers Craig Mazin and Ted Elliot were originally working on it before the 2023 Hollywood strikes paused production. Later, Jeff Nathanson, who wrote Dead Men Tell No Tales, took over.

In May 2024, Bruckheimer said Nathanson had nailed the ending. “He’s got an amazing third act. We just gotta clean up the first and second, and then we’ll get there. But he wrote a great, great third act.”

If Depp does return, it would be a big turnaround for both him and Disney. During his 2022 defamation trial, Depp famously said he wouldn’t come back even for “$300 million and a million alpacas.” In court, he explained, “There was a deep and distinct sense of feeling betrayed by the people that I’ve worked hard for… People that I delivered a character to that they initially despised, but I stuck to my guns with the character, and it seemed to work.”

Since that trial, Depp has focused on smaller, independent projects away from big Hollywood productions. Whether or not he puts on the pirate hat again will come down to the story, and right now, it sounds like the decision is in his hands.

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