Fantastic Beasts actor Mads Mikkelsen hints at Johnny Depp’s return to the franchise: ‘He won the suit…’

After Depp was asked to leave the project, Mikkelsen was roped in to play the villainous Gellert Grindelwald in the Harry Potter spinoff series. The franchise itself is facing an uncertain future, after the third film — Fantastic Beasts and the Secrets of Dumbledore — bombed at the box office and received mediocre reviews. Warner Bros had initially said it would observe how well the film is received before committing to more sequels.

Mikkelsen had also spoken about how he was initially hesitant about to stepping into Depp’s shoes. “I’m a big fan of Johnny. I think he’s an amazing actor, I think he did a fantastic job. Having said that, I could not copy it. There was no way I could just copy it, because it’s so much him. It would be creative suicide. So, we had to come up with something else, something that was mine, and build a bridge between him and me. So, yes, it was intimidating. His fans were very, very sweet, but they were also very stubborn. I didn’t interact too much with them, but I could understand why they had their hearts broken,” the actor had told GQ.

Depp has already begun making a comeback. He was recently cast as King Louis XV in a new film, and recently announced that he will direct Al Pacino in a biopic about Italian painter Amadeo Modigliani.