Womp, The New Deadpool Movie's Release Date Got Pushed Back

Large-scale mergers between companies are rarely something the average movie watcher cares about, but Disney’s acquisition of 20th Century Fox in 2019 was rare. The two entertainment behemoths had two major franchises split between them — Star Wars and Marvel — and the merger put Humpty Dumpty back together, as it were. But fans were also concerned this would end some of their favorite Fox Marvel characters. Thankfully, the confirmation of Ryan Reynold’s Deadpool 3 proves at least one 20th Century superhero has come through intact.

At the time of the merger, the conventional wisdom on Disney’s Marvel Cinematic Universe reacquiring The X-Men and Fantastic Four franchises from the Fox vaults was that president and CEO Kevin Feige would reboot both from the ground up. Though Marvel never said one way or the other, the one-two punch of Dark Phoenix and The New Mutants as box office bombs suggested the MCU would choose to go clean slate. And if so, that would include rebooting the one X-Men character who was a box office success: the R-rated, dirty-minded, filthy-mouthed Deadpool, played by Ryan Reynolds.

But Deadpool is Reynolds’ passion project. He spent a decade lobbying Fox to allow him to make the first film, and he took that same salesmanship to Feige. It only took two years, but in January 2021, Feige promised a new Deadpool film would be on its way and maintain its very unDisney risque R-rating.

Here’s what else to know about the upcoming Deadpool 3.

Deadpool 3 Filming Updates

The first sign that Disney was seriously looking into a Deadpool 3 sequel came just ahead of Feige’s confirmation it was happening when Deadline reported the Molyneux Sisters (the team behind the animated hit Bob’s Burgers) would take a run at the script. Since then, they’ve left the project, but at least it was a sign of something.

The following announcement didn’t come until March 2022, when Deadline revealed director Shawn Levy was in negotiations to helm the new film. The director already had one box-office success with Renolds with Free Guy, confirming that Deadpool aimed to put Reynolds with a proven team. But it wasn’t until September 2022 that fans began to get real details of where this was headed via Ryan Reynold’s Twitter.

Deadpool 3 Cast

Until Sept. 27, the only actor confirmed for a Deadpool sequel was Ryan Reynolds as Wade Wilson, aka Deadpool. The first two films in the 20th Century run had almost wholly different leading casts surrounding Reynolds. The only actors who appeared in multiple films were Morena Baccarin, who played Vanessa, Wade’s girlfriend/fiancée; Leslie Uggams played Deadpool’s elderly roommate Blind Al; and Karan Soni played taxi driver Dopinder. Also, X-Men characters Brianna Hildebrand as Negasonic Teenage Warhead and Stefan Kapičić as Colossus appeared in both Deadpool films but not in any other X-Men franchise iterations. It was unclear if the MCU planned to bring any of them back.

However, cameos from the other X-Men franchise iterations were a staple of the Deadpool films, teasing the standalone franchise’s status, including the actor who has been a throughline from the first 1999 X-Men to the franchise’s final films under the 20th Century banner, Hugh Jackman as Logan, aka Wolverine.

Jackman and Reynolds have a faux feud over Wolverine’s appearances in the Deadpool films. As the tweet above shows, Jackman will now reprise his character, officially making his Wolverine canon in the MCU.

Deadpool 3 Teasers & Trailers

Levy and Reynolds had already proved a winning combination with Netflix’s The Adam Project and for Disney with Free Guy, a rare box office success during the shutdown-depressed 2021 theater year. Free Guy was also the first time Reynolds managed to work his Deadpool character into an official MCU appearance, in a YouTube skit starring himself as the titular superhero alongside Taika Waititi’s Korg from the Thor and Avengers franchises. (Waititi had a role in Free Guy, so this was a natural crossover.)

Deadpool 3 Plot Predictions

It’s impossible at this stage to know what the new Deadpool film will be about, though, as Reynold’s tweet above suggests, it will be a tad more “stabby.” Fans can also probably count on the film to have plenty of innuendoes, bad-taste humor, over-the-top silly brutality, and at least one moment where Deadpool turns to the camera and shrugs.

Deadpool 3 Release Date

When Feige confirmed Deadpool 3 was happening back in January 2021, reports said filming would not begin until mid-2022 “at the earliest.” In September, post-D23, Marvel announced an official release date of Sept. 6, 2024. However, it wasn’t long before rearrangement began, and after Blade was delayed, Deadpool 3 fell to Nov. 8, 2024.

Deadpool and Deadpool 2 are streaming on Hulu, where most of Disney’s “more adult” titles are currently found.