After the 21st Century Fox/Disney merger, it was made clear that Marvel Studios would be taking over Fox’s Marvel projects which included Deadpool 3 and the X-Men. They made sure to let it be known publicly that while other Fox/Marvel characters would be getting hard-reboots, Ryan Reynolds’ Deadpool would be carrying over to the Marvel Cinematic Universe.
The X-Men reboot film according to Kevin Feige isn’t part of their five-year plan, but he did give a shoutout to mutants last summer at San Diego Comic-Con.
Last month it was confirmed by Ryan that Deadpool 3 is officially in the works at Marvel.
REYNOLDS: “Yeah, we’re working on it right now with the whole team. We’re over at Marvel now, which is the big leagues all of a sudden it’s kind of crazy. So yeah, we’re working on it.’
This comes after Reynolds teased the film for a Phase 5 release and a meeting at the Marvel offices on his Instagram account.
When it comes to what Deadpool 3 might look like we already have an idea of what Ryan had on his wishlist before the merger.
While star/producer Ryan Reynolds was promoting Deadpool 2 in South Korea (via StarNews) in May 2018, he mentioned that if Deadpool 3 were to happen it would likely become X-Force instead and still waxed on the possibility of one day making his Wolverine/Deadpool movie.
REYNOLDS: “For a Deadpool 3, it might be odd to say, but I don’t think there will be a Deadpool 3. I think going forward it would be an X-Force movie, which would be his team so to speak, but the X-Force is much different than say Avengers or something. X-Force is generally made up of people that are morally flexible there are guys that would do work that X-Men wouldn’t or couldn’t do. So you’re dealing with a kind of ragtag group of men and women who don’t have the strong moral compass that the Avengers do or X-Men.”
“Beyond that, I know it’s a pipe dream that would probably never come true but I’d love to see a Deadpool/Logan movie, I’d like to see a Wolviepool movie, if I may. That would be fun. But Hugh Jackman is apparently retired despite the fact I’ve been protesting almost hourly.”
Keep in mind, these quotes were made almost a full year before the X-Men moved over to Marvel Studios post-merger. While Fox might have had issues throwing a new actor into the role of Wolverine into the mix so soon after Logan, with the character now firmly over at Marvel Studios it would be easier to allow this MCU version to be introduced in a popular film like a third Deadpool movie.
We know that Ryan will be officially reprising the role of Wade Wilson in whatever Deadpool 3 becomes and that it is now confirmed to be in the works over at Marvel Studios with screenwriters Rhett Reese and Paul Wernick also involved.
Paul Wernick stating last year that Marvel/Disney had assured them that Deadpool could stay in the mature world of the two previous installments, reaffirming previous statements from Disney/Marvel that the Deadpool movies could indeed keep a mature R-rating.
Including Wolverine in Deadpool 3 wouldn’t that be surprising given the two characters connections via Weapon X/Department H and X-Force.
Ajax’s underground operation to turn humans into mutant conscripts for the black market could be further explored to reveal it’s connections to the Weapon X Program and Wolverine.
It would also give Marvel a reason to cover Logan’s origin story for the Marvel Cinematic Universe, instead of doing that in the main X-Men film. Fans are sort of hoping that the MCU X-Men films won’t become Wolverine-focused again and spreading him around to other films wouldn’t be terribly shocking given how much of a crossover character he is in the comics. unde
Covering Weapon X and Team X in an R-rated movie feels like the right move to be honest.
The Deadpool movies under 20th Century Fox seemingly had a restrictions on which mutants could be used in the films because of Hugh Jackman’s retirement and other characters being elsewhere in the messy timeline. Marvel now rebooting most of the X-Men means that handing over X-Force members like Wolverine and Psylocke potentially won’t be as much of a headache as it once was.
Setting up X-Force is also a big maybe.
There is always a chance that Wolverine could very well be introduced or teased elsewhere in the MCU before the release of Deadpool 3.
With Madripoor (1st introduced in New Mutants comics) seemingly being introduced in the upcoming Disney+ series The Falcon & The Winter Soldier (via set photos) there is a good chance he could be first introduced/teased there given it was a key location in the first volume of the solo Wolverine comics.
Madripoor in the comics is ruled over by Viper/Madame Hydra (Wolverine and Viper were once married), then changed over to Jessan Hoan aka Tyge Tyger (a character from solo Wolverine comics), and then by his son Daken (a member of the Dark Avengers).
It could also be a place used to create super-soldiers via an MCU version of the Weapon X Program given the criminality and corruption of the local government.
The location isn’t the only way Wolverine connects to the project, as in the comic books Bucky Barnes (while brainwashed as The Winter Soldier) assassinated Logan’s Japanese wife Itsu, so there is already bad blood there.
While it’s hard to believe they’d quietly cast an actor playing Wolverine for the series, teasing him is very much in the cards given their access to him and the studio is well-known for planting seeds for future characters.
I’d personally like to see Wolverine tackling solo adventures before joining the main X-Men team in their reboot film.
A Marvel villain that could become a good fit for Deadpool 3 would be Omega Red. A villain that give a reason for both Wolverine and Deadpool to work together, as the villain is an enhanced mutant that moves from the hands of the KGB to The Hand could easily have connections to HYDRA in the MCU (possibly linkage to The Winter Soldier as well).
Seeing the HYDRA experiment fall into the hands of Department H or a criminal syndicate like the folks running Madropoor. When Omega Red was first introduced he was also working alongside Psylocke and the children of HYDRA’s Baron Strucker.
When Deadpool 3 could be released is a little bit of a mystery at the moment, outside of Ryan Reynolds teasing last summer that the film could be part of Marvel’s Phase 5 release lineup. But with the film officially in development there could be an announcement in the very near future.
