Deadpool & Wolverine Teases the Deaths of Multiple Marvel Movie Icons

Deadpool & Wolverine has a lot going on – so much so that it’s hard to catch every rapid-fire joke, Easter egg, or mention. Case in point: Marvel movie fans were thrilled by surprise cameos that came with the film’s “Resistance” group who opposed Cassandra Nova’s conquering of the Void realm – but did you catch the mention of how many Marvel movie icons fell in the war for the wasteland? 

Deadpool & Wolverine SPOILERS FOLLOW! 

When Deadpool and Wolverine get to the wasteland, they meet Resistance fighters Johnny Storm/Human Torch (Chris Evans), Laura Kinney/X-23 (Dafne Keen), Eric Brooks/Blade (Wesley Snipes), Elektra Natchios (Jennifer Garner), and Remy LeBeau/Gambit (Channing Tatum). However, when Deadpool and Wolverine get up the moxie to confront Cassandra, they’re informed that the resistance has lost several key members to the fight: 

• Daredevil – Ben Affleck’s Daredevil is not only amongst the dead, he also gets a meta-joke jabbed at him by his ex-wife Jennifer Garner, after the two met on the set of the Daredevil (2003) movie. 
• The Punisher – It’s unclear if the reference is to a specific Punisher actor or all of them (Dolph Lundgren, Thomas Jane, Ray Stevenson) but the gun-blazing Marvel anti-hero is definitely living up to his skull insignia.
• Quicksilver – Again, it’s not specified that it’s Evan Peter’s Fox Universe Quicksilver who died – but given that Deadpool & Wolverine is all about the Fox X-Men movies, he’s the likely culprit (corpsprit?) 
• Magneto – Ian McKellen’s Magneto was no stranger to surviving dystopian timelines (see: X-Men: Days of Future Past), but it seems that Cassandra Nova had a grudge against Prof. X’s best frienemy as much as she did her brother. 

These characters serve as double-layered head nods to elements of the Fox-Marvel Universe that were cut out early and/or recast. Those who are left behind (Blade, Elektra, X-23, Gambit) lean more toward those who never got their proper due, either because they were ahead of the times (Blade), didn’t get the larger franchise saga promised (X-23) or didn’t make it out of development at all (Gambit). A lot of Deadpool & Wolverine hinges on the notion that the fans in the audiences were there for the ups, and downs of the Fox-Marvel Universe behind the scenes (reading blogs, interviews, etc) as much as they were for the films themselves. 

Deadpool & Wolverine is now in theaters.