Jim Carrey once refused to promote his own movie and was called by fans to return the ‘millions’ he made from it

Jim Carrey once refused to promote a movie he made, going as far to slam it.

This led fans at the time to call for him to return all the money he made from it, or donate it to a cause.

The comedy legend is back in the news as he stars in Sonic the Hedgehog 3 after reversing a retirement announcement from 2022.

Jim Carrey came out of retirement to play Robotnik in Sonic the Hedgehog a third time (Paramount Pictures)

The film in question was Kick-Ass 2, with Carrey outright refusing to promote it.

Quite naturally, the news came as a shock to creator Mark Millar.

Millar put out on his blog: "[I'm] baffled by this sudden announcement as nothing seen in this picture wasn't in the screenplay 18 months ago."

Carrey refused to promote the movie due to the Sandy Hook school shooting, which took place just under a year before the film came out.

In a tweet announcing the news, Carrey said: “I did Kickass a month b4 Sandy Hook and now in all good conscience I cannot support that level of violence. I am not ashamed of it but recent events have caused a change in my heart."

Millar’s reaction to Carrey deciding not to the promote the film went on to say: “A sequel to the picture that gave us Hit-Girl was always going to have some blood on the floor, and this should have been no shock to a guy who enjoyed the first movie so much.

“This is fiction and... Kick-Ass avoids the usual bloodless body count of most big summer pictures and focuses instead of the consequences of violence...

"Our job as storytellers is to entertain and our toolbox can't be sabotaged by curtailing the use of guns in an action-movie."

The Sandy Hook shooting saw a 20-year-old by the name of Adam Lanza tragically shoot and kill 26 people on December 14, 2012. 20 of the victims were between six and seven years old.

Carrey played Colonel Stars and Stripes in Kick-Ass 2 (Universal)

Though many supported Carrey’s principled stand, it did raise questions on him accepting being paid to act in the film.

One fan at the time tweeted: "So what charity will you be donating your 'Kick Ass 2' paycheque to? Just curious."

And another said: "I like Jim Carrey but his recent stand against Kick Ass 2 has p*ssed me off. If he's really that bothered he'd give all his pay to charity."

Despite the controversy, it appears it didn’t spoil things between Mark Millar and Carrey.

The Kick-Ass creator later said that they couldn’t have paid for the publicity Carrey’s decision bought them.

He said: “People keep saying to me, ‘Are you pissed off at Jim Carrey?’ No, I’m delighted with Jim Carrey, this is amazing.

Carrey rarely discusses Kick-Ass 2 (Axelle/Baeuer-Griffin via Getty Images)

“For your main actor to publicly say, ‘This movie is too violent for me’ is like saying, ‘This porno has too much nudity. We’ll have to go and see this now’. A movie like Kick-Ass doesn’t normally get into the mainstream news, we’ll get into cult or movie news.

“But it’s weird that we were talked about for 20 minutes on Good Morning America and British television. It was all down to Jim Carrey.”

The idea that it was a publicity stunt was rubbished by the director Jeff Wadlow, who said: “There has been a strange accident in that people have been talking about the movie because of his tweets, but that wasn’t by design”.