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By Jamie Burton
Senior TV & Film Reporter (Interviews)
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Odds are that if you've been on social media at all in the last two months, you'll have come across a viral video involving the Johnny Depp and Amber Heard trial.
Depp's fans are thrilled to see that he has now officially joined TikTok, the social media site that proved instrumental in winning over the public during his recent defamation case against his ex-wife. Depp won the trial after claiming defamation against Heard who had written a 2018 op-ed claiming to be a survivor of domestic abuse.
Depp's TikTok account has already gained over 2.4 million followers, despite the fact that the account hasn't posted yet, hasn't liked a video, and doesn't follow anyone else. It is a verified account though and Depp's official Instagram account posted a link to the TikTok account.
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Throughout the trial, hashtags relating to the case were trending across social media, with TikTok in particular seeing a huge upturn in pro-Depp related terms.
A simple click of the hashtag #JohnnyDepp on TikTok shows that videos including the hashtag have a massive 33.7 billion views, with that number likely to continue to rise. Comparatively, #AmberHeard has 19.1 billion views.
Terms with a more obvious skew towards supporting Depp also have more views. #JusticeforJohnnyDepp videos have a combined total of 20.2 billion views, while the term #JusticforAmberHeard has just 86.3 million views. Videos with negative connotations involving Heard's name also proved unstoppable, with #AmberTurd generating 4.4 billion views.
Throughout the televised trial, gestures, witness testimony and reactions went viral, with many of them once again proving supportive of Depp. TikTok challenges were also born out of witness testimony. Examples include fans reenacting and mocking Heard's testimony that Depp had hit her.
Depp's fans celebrated his emergence on TikTok across social media. Ethan Trace, an actor with 3 million TikTok followers, posted a video highlighting the news to his followers and suggested that Depp could now join in with trends relating to Jack Sparrow.
News of his arrival on the platform jumped over to Twitter too, another site which proved pivotal in maintaining the actor's popularity during the trial.
Trending terms and viral tweets were influential amongst people online, with Heard even bringing it up to the jury during her final witness testimony. She detailed the abuse she received online while social media forensic expert Ron Schnell also testified that the millions of tweets using the "#JusticeForJohnny" hashtag were "all" negative toward Heard.
Depp fan accounts on Twitter were quick to highlight his arrival on TikTok.
"guys, did Johnny Depp just receive 1 million followers on tiktok in one day?! holy moly.. wow," commented @VioletFuchsia.
In response to this, someone predicted that Heard and her friend Eve Barlow will also be joining soon but another fan warned them against it. "hope they do. The whole TikTok is against them," @Deo95703234 wrote.
"Not Johnny getting TikTok hahaha I love him," @GellertDepp wrote in all caps. They added: "I can't believe I'm having to dig out my old TikTok for a 58 year old."
Depp's TikTok account has been up for less than 24 hours and he's already got millions of followers. Other than the verified blue tick next to his name, the only other detail to suggest it's him is his bio which reads "Occasional Thespian."
Newsweek has reached out to Depp's representatives for comment.
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