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He’s ducked out on the Ducks. Deadline reports that Emilio Estevez will not be reprising his role as former Ducks coach Gordon Bombay for the second season of Disney+’s hockey show The Mighty Ducks: Game Changers. Sources told Deadline that Estevez was not willing to provide proof of compliance with the show’s COVID-19 policies, which include a mandatory vaccination requirement for all actors. Reportedly, creative differences may have also played a role. (Neither Disney nor Estevez have commented on the exit.) The actor was also an executive producer on the show.
In the first season of The Mighty Ducks, which is a follow-up to the ‘90s film franchise, Bombay is recruited to help an underdog team of young hockey players formed by a mother-son duo (Gilmore Girls’s Lauren Graham and Good Boys’s Brady Noon). The show was renewed for another installment back in August, with production planned to start in early 2022. Graham and Noon are still set to return to star for season two, alongside Maxwell Simkins, Swayam Bhatia, Luke Islam, Kiefer O’Reilly, Taegen Burns, Bella Higginbotham, and DJ Watts. All that’s missing is the Ice Palace owner. Good luck, Ducks!