It’s been over 10 years since Channing Tatum starred in G.I. Joe: The Rise of Cobra so it would be understandable if you’d forgotten about that. No one would make fun of you either for not remembering that Tatum returned for G.I. Joe: Retaliation and almost immediately died in the film’s opening scene. Tatum took on the role of “Duke” in the film, a key character from the larger GI Joe franchise, but he’s very publicaly spoken about how he was very unhappy with the original movie. In a new interview, wherein Vanity Fair had him take a lie detector test, Tatum was asked directly if he asked to be killed off in the first scene of the sequel. He had a one word answer.
“Yes,” Tatum bluntly replied to the query. The follow-up from the person delivering questions for his lie detector test was: “Do you regret that choice?” This prompted another one word reply from Tatum, “No.” He then elaborated, “The first one, I passed on seven times but they had an option on me and I had to do the movie. So the second one, I obviously just didn’t want to be in that one either.” To put a cherry on top for all of it, Tatum’s answers were clarified by the person administering the li detector test who added, “He’s telling the truth.”
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The time between now and the G.I. Joe movies has only made Tatum more comfortable talking about his disinterest in his role. Speaking previously in an appearance on The Howard Stern Show back in 2015, Tatum frankly said: “Look, I’ll be honest. I f—king hate that movie. I was pushed into doing that movie…The script wasn’t any good, and I didn’t want to do something that I … was a fan of since I was a kid and watched every morning growing up – and didn’t want to do something that was (1) bad and, (2), I just didn’t know if I wanted to be G.I. Joe.”
After the two G.I. Joe movies featuring Tatum were released the franchise went a little stagnant. Eventually the reboot Snake Eyes: G.I. Joe Origins was released, but not other movies have been announced or put into development (that we know of) in the time since then.
