Was Amber Heard's role in Aquaman 2 ACTUALLY cut down due to Johnny Depp trial?

During the infamous defamation trial between Amber Heard and Johnny Depp, the actress suggested that her role in Aquaman and the Lost Kingdom had been cut down due to the negative publicity surrounding the court case.

The first Aquaman movie, starring Jason Momoa in the title role alongside Heard as Mera, was a major success for DC Comics as it earned well over $1 billion at the global box office. The sequel will deal with Arthur Curry / Aquaman protecting Atlantis from an ancient evil that arises.

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During the trial, “entertainment industry consultant” Kathryn Arnold suggested that Heard was purposefully left off promotional material for Aquaman 2, while the studio pressured director James Wan to minimise her role as much as possible.

READ MORE: Amber Heard feeling the pressure ahead of Aquaman and the Lost Kingdom release

Arnold said that Wan and Momoa fought hard against this, however.

Now, Wan has explained that Mera's role was always going to be smaller in the second movie.

“I always pitched this to everyone from the get-go. The first Aquaman was Arthur and Mera’s journey," he told Entertainment Weekly.

"The second movie was always going to be Arthur and Orm. So, the first was a romance action-adventure movie, the second one is a bromance action-adventure movie. We’ll leave it at that.”

Shooting schedule on Aquaman 2 nothing to do with Heard

The fractured shooting schedule on Aquaman and the Lost Kingdom led many to believe this was partly due to the Heard-Depp trial, but Wan has denied this, saying it was due to the schedules of all the actors involved.

"We have big actors in this movie, and everyone’s schedule is really hard," he explained.

"So, we had to break up our shooting schedule into sections. We’ll shoot a bit here now, because this actor’s available, and then we’ll do another shoot now, because this guy’s available. People are like, 'Oh, they’re doing a whole bunch of different shoots!'

"No. If we actually combined them all together, it’s actually not that many number of days at all.