First Deadpool Director Reveals What He Really Thought of Deadpool 2

Deadpool director Tim Miller briefly addressed its sequel, the David Leitch-directed Deadpool 2, when promoting Terminator: Dark Fate at San Diego Comic-Con.

“Oh, yeah,” Miller told Variety when asked if he saw the followup to his 2016 hit. “I thought it was an interesting evolution of the film.”

Miller’s departure from the sequel came as a surprise in October 2017: the first-time feature director steered the Ryan Reynolds-led pet project to a $783 million worldwide haul, making it the then highest-grossing R-rated film of all time.

The filmmaker later told CG Garage his exit came because he wanted to “do the same thing” as the first movie, a relatively small scale effort with a budget that came shy of just $60 million.

“I didn’t want to make some stylized movie that was three times the budget,” Miller said.

“If you read the internet — who cares, really? But for those of you who do, I wanted to make the same kind of movie that we made before because I think that’s the right movie to make for the character. So don’t believe what you read on the internet.”

Despite his stepping away, Miller had no bad blood for replacement Leitch or studio Fox, the then owners of the X-Men IP.

“I love the character and I think it’s great, and I love all the actors and I want to see them successful again,” Miller said.

“I haven’t met David, but he’s a great guy from everything I’ve heard. I want nothing but the best for the character. And for Fox, too. They deserve to make more money. They need to make more money [laughs]. They were great. They were terrific.”

When asked about Miller’s exit in a November interview with GQ, DP2 star, producer and co-writer Reynold said he was “sad to see him off the film.”

He added: “Tim’s brilliant and nobody worked harder on Deadpool than he did.”

Miller later told THR his leaving DP2 meant he could reinvigorate the Terminator franchise and “do something new.”

“I felt like there was more stories to tell there, but I’m happy that somebody else is telling them. There was a sense of relief in that I get to do something new versus Deadpool 2,” Miller said.

“I think it would’ve been a great movie, but it was also going to be a continuation of what we had done. This really gave me a chance to do something new.”

The filmmaker added he felt “like there was so much more to be done with these characters.”

Introduced in the bigger-budgeted sequel were time-traveling mutant mercenary Cable (Josh Brolin) and fortuitous mutant Domino (Zazie Beetz), who ultimately enlisted in super-group X-Force.

“I mean, I wanted to make Deadpool 2. I was going to do that, until I wasn’t,” Miller said.

“So, there was that, which took up about seven months of my time. But even then, [Terminator producer] David [Ellison] and I were talking, like after Deadpool 2, it was going to be this [Terminator].”

Terminator: Dark Fate opens November 1.