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‘Criminal Minds’ Writer Virgil Williams Opens Up About Thomas Gibson Firing Amid Ratings Crisis, Boycott To Bring Back Hotch

By Shaunee Flowers
Published on: 10:42 PST, Nov 12, 2016

Fans of Thomas Gibson have been upset since his firing from Criminal Minds. They want Gibson back and have gone so far as to boycott the show with the #NoHotchNoWatch hashtag gaining traction on social media. As the pressure mounts to bring back the beloved character, Hotch, Criminal Minds writer Virgil Williams opened up with more details about what happened leading up to the kick that got Gibson fired from the show.

Thomas Gibson’s last episode of Criminal Minds was Season 12, Episode 2, titled “Sick Day.” News of Gibson’s firing shocked viewers since he was a longtime actor on the CBS hit. The network has maintained their stance on Thomas Gibson’s exit from the show after an incident on set just a few months back.

As the Inquisitr previously reported, the iconic actor was dismissed from his longtime role on the show when news broke that he had been accused of kicking a writer on set. Gibson claimed previously that he didn’t mean to kick Virgil Williams and that the whole thing was a misunderstanding. After months of maintaining his silence. Williams has finally offered up more details on what happened on the Criminal Minds set that caused his argument with Thomas Gibson that ultimately turned physical.

According to Virgil Williams, the firing Thomas Gibson for the argument that escalated was totally justified. Even then, Williams still managed to wish the former Criminal Minds star well after going into detail about what went down during Gibson’s last day on set.

Williams recently spoke to a group of students at the Ghetto Film School in Los Angeles when he opened up about the kick that ended Thomas Gibson’s run on Criminal Minds. According to Perez Hilton, he said the whole ordeal evolved because of a line that Gibson wanted to have changed, but Williams refused to make the change.

“He came to me with a line change that he wanted,” Williams recounted. “Because of this particular episode, the change that he wanted hurt the story. I offered him a fix. He didn’t accept the fix. He said, ‘Fix it so I’m happy’ and then walked off.”

It wasn’t over after that, and Virgil Williams said that he still refused to change the line. He recalled that he was looking for the showrunner in order to explain the disagreement and decide if the line would be changed, and if so, to what. Williams didn’t get that far, though, because he said that Gibson came back up to him. Williams claims that Thomas Gibson came back up to him and kicked him in the shin before walking on by.

According to People, Thomas Gibson’s account wasn’t so sinister.

“He came into that room and started coming towards me. As he brushed past me, my foot came up and tapped him on the leg,” Gibson explained. “If I hadn’t moved, he would have run into me. We had some choice words, for which I apologized the next day, and that was it. It was over. We shot the scene, I went home – and I never got to go back.”

Thomas Gibson’s abrupt firing has Criminal Minds fans reeling. Many have complained that the show just isn’t the same in Season 12 with Gibson and another longtime favorite, Shemar Moore, now gone. Moore retired from the show at the end of Season 11 and wasn’t expected to make an appearance in the new season, but that, coupled with Thomas Gibson’s absence, has changed the CBS show.

Gibson’s die-hard fans have come to his defense in this “kick-gate” situation and have demanded that their beloved actor is put back on Criminal Minds. They were even able to get the hashtag #NoHotchNoWatch trending as many tried to boycott the show in hopes that producers would rehire Gibson to play the role of Aaron Hotchner.

Others have chimed in in defense of the Criminal Minds writer, Virgil Williams, who was physically assaulted on set. They maintain that Williams shouldn’t be forced to work under conditions like the ones he described, and they support the firing of Thomas Gibson.

The loss of Gibson’s character doesn’t seem to have helped the case since Season 12 ratings haven’t improved over the previous season. To make matters worse, Pop Crush reported that Season 11 ratings saw a 17 percent drop than the previous season, and now Criminal Minds may be in serious jeopardy of getting canceled by CBS. Even with all the ratings woes, producers have refused to return Thomas Gibson to the set.

[Featured Image by Jason Merritt/Getty Images]

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