Johnny's Depp's take on the Tonto character has been called derivative by some critics.

Los Angeles—Disney announced last week that they had cancelled plans to finance the upcoming “Lone Ranger” film with Johnny Depp slated to play Tonto. The reasoning Disney gave was that costs just kept rising, but a source close to both Disney and Depp has said that the real reason was Depp’s vision of the character of Tonto.

For months now, Depp had been lauded for saying Tonto would be less of a sidekick and more of a partner, raising the status of the Native American character from that of a broken-English-speaking lackey in the old films, and putting him equal with the main character. But it seems Depp had even more radical ideas about changes to Tonto.

“He saw Tonto as being a Native American pirate and having scissors for his hands,” the source said. “At first, Disney executives thought he was kidding and brushed it off. But Johnny had some photos taken of his vision, with him all made up like a pirate with scissor hands. When the suits at Disney saw the pictures, they lost it. They couldn’t pull the plug fast enough.”
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