The Deadpool franchise may bring plenty of slightly-obscure X-Men characters to the big screen, but one beloved mutant had a surprisingly prominent role in Deadpool 2.
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Spoilers for Deadpool 2 below! Only look if you want to know!
Almost from Deadpool 2‘s first frame, the film carries on the tradition of poking fun at Logan Howlett/Wolverine (Hugh Jackman) in a pretty literal way. The film opens with Wade Wilson/Deadpool (Ryan Reynolds) winding up a music box, which depicts a miniaturized version of Wolverine being impaled with a branch, as seen in his death scene in last year’s Logan.
Logan – or particularly, Deadpool accusing the film of stealing his R-rated thunder – ends up playing a somewhat-frequent role within Deadpool 2. Aside from the delightfully macabre music box, another Logan easter egg comes about in the film’s end, as Wade sacrifices himself to save Russell Collins (Julian Dennison) while wearing a power-dampening collar. In an arguably too long death sequence, Wade lays dying on the ground surrounded by his found “family”, as the music cue from Logan‘s death scene plays in the background.
But, as you would expect, the film’s Wolverine references extend beyond his most recent (and seemingly last) onscreen appearance. Later on in the film, Deadpool crashes through the orphanage to find a child eating a box of “Hero Flakes”, a Wheaties-style cereal that features a picture of Wolverine front and center. As you would expect, Deadpool autographs the box himself, before carrying on with his mission.
But it’s the film’s mid-credits montage – which has since been confirmed to be canonical – that really takes Wolverine’s role in the film to the next level. After Deadpool gets access to Cable’s (Josh Brolin) time-traveling device, he decides to jump around in the timeline to correct some things. Part of this involves revisiting the events of X-Men Origins: Wolverine – particularly, when Wolverine faces off against a grotesque-looking Deadpool, whose mouth has been completely sewn shut. The archival footage then gets interrupted by the current iteration of Deadpool, who shoots his former self several times in an attempt to “clean up the timeline”.
All in all, it’s a pretty wide array of Wolverine nods and Easter eggs, all without having Jackman actually need to officially reprise the role. And it sounds like the cast and crew of Deadpool 2 primarily think that’s for the best.
“I know that’s something Ryan [Reynolds] has been harassing Hugh Jackman about for a long time,” producer Simon Kinberg explained of a Wolverine/Deadpool crossover in a recent interview. “But I produced Logan and I think we all felt that was a really fitting end for that character. So, is there a chance? There’s always a chance, I suppose, but we felt that was the best goodbye for Hugh as Wolverine.”
What do you think of Deadpool 2‘s various Wolverine jokes? Did they help soothe the pain of Logan, or rip open the emotional wound all over again? Let us know what you think in the comments below.
Deadpool 2 is in theaters now.
