Hulu’s King of the Hill revival honored actor Jonathan Joss two months after his shocking death.
In an onscreen tribute at the end of season 14, which premiered Monday, August 4, there were side-by-side photos of Joss’ King of the Hill character, John Redcorn, and the actor holding a dog.
“In Loving Memory … JONATHAN JOSS,” read the message. Joss was best known for voicing John Redcorn in King of the Hill after taking over in season 2 when the original actor, Victor Arron, died in a car accident in 1996.
Joss continued to play John until the series concluded in 2009. He was expected to reprise the role in the newly announced revival, and recording had already begun for the series when news broke about Joss’ death in June.
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The actor was killed after an alleged altercation with a neighbor in San Antonio, Texas. Authorities were dispatched to a shooting where they found Joss lying “near the roadway.” While “life-saving measures” were attempted while waiting for EMS, Joss was ultimately pronounced dead at the scene when paramedics arrived. Officers detained their suspect, Sigfredo Alvarez Ceja, after he initially fled the scene in a vehicle. Ceja was booked for murder, and the investigation is still ongoing.
After Joss’ death, his husband, Tristan Kern de Gonzales, claimed the incident was the result of a hate crime.
“My husband Jonathan Joss and I were involved in a shooting while checking the mail at the site of our former home. That home was burned down after over two years of threats from people in the area who repeatedly told us they would set it on fire,” read a statement shared via Facebook in June. “We reported these threats to law enforcement multiple times and nothing was done.”
Kern de Gonzales alleged he and Joss were the targets of “openly homophobic” harassment. When visiting their former home, Kern de Gonzales recalled seeing “the skull” of one of their dogs and its harness, which caused “severe emotional distress.”
“We began yelling and crying in response to the pain of what we saw,” the statement continued. “While we were doing this a man approached us. He started yelling violent homophobic slurs at us. Jonathan and I had no weapons. We were not threatening anyone. We were grieving. We were standing side by side. When the man fired Jonathan pushed me out of the way. He saved my life.”
Kern de Gonzales’ emotional post honored Joss’ memory, adding, “To everyone who supported him, his fans, his friends, know that he valued you deeply. He saw you as family. My focus now is on protecting Jonathan’s legacy and honoring the life we built together. If your concern is how someone coped with trauma or how loudly they speak when recounting injustice and being ignored by authorities then you never truly cared about my husband. Jonathan saved my life. I will carry that forward. I will protect what he built.”
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Police chief William P. McManus later explained why officials had yet to charge the murder suspect with an alleged hate crime.
“One of the most common questions that we’ve received is why this case isn’t being charged as a hate crime at this point,” McManus shared during a press conference in June. “Why didn’t SAPD charge him with the murder and a hate crime? In Texas, hate crimes are not separate charges. Instead, they are addressed through sentencing enhancements.”
McManus continued, “We don’t charge with hate crimes. We gather the facts, and we give those facts to the district attorney’s office, and then that hate crime designation is determined at sentencing, but we don’t charge hate crime.”
In addition to King of the Hill, Joss also appeared in Parks and Recreation, Tulsa King, Ray Donovan, True Grit, The Magnificent Seven and more.
