Free Guy Star Ryan Reynolds Explains The Green Lantern Jokes

Ryan Reynolds is no stranger to having some fun at his own expense. While the actor best known to the comic book movie audience for his role as Deadpool calls Free Guy his “best movie”” yet, he can also recognize the one glaring dud on his resumé which is commonly mocked. Reynolds starred in Green Lantern (2011), a DC Comics movie, which is solely remembered for not being good. Rather than allow fans to pester him over the film, Reynolds embraced the poor reception and used it to his advantage, often making jokes about the movie. During a press event for Free Guy, Reynolds opened up about the Green Lantern jokes he is often making.

“I think it’s more about just laughing at myself, not laughing at other people, necessarily, that are involved in a project,” Reynolds said. “But laughing at myself and my own contribution to that failure or however you want to characterize it. It was just something that I thought was worth examining, you know? And in examining it, you take that energy that is – typically, maybe it’s hurtful or maybe it’s something that’s dragging you down – and you end up creating a sort of mental Judo with it. You’re using its energy against it and creating something positive out of it.”

The most popular joke about the film was in Deadpool, when Wade Wilson requested his super suit is not “green or animated.” Reynolds came up with that crack himself.

“I wrote it into the Deadpool script, I think where my character says something like, ‘Please don’t make this suit green or animated,’ when he’s being shoved into the superhero factory or whatever,” Reynolds explained. “And I noticed that it felt good to shine a light on that for a second. So I don’t know, it’s just something I’ve always done, but the most significant thing that’s ever happened in my career is laughing at myself always. Like, since the start of the work. And there’s plenty there to laugh at … Everybody has their own, you lay in bed at night and you think, ‘Oh God, this thing I did was so awful or silly or ridiculous.’ I think that’s got this fuel for lots of stuff.”

Don’t expect jokes of this sort to surface in the future at the expense of Free Guy. While the movie is still just trying to find its way to theaters, a beloved cast is ready to drum up some laughs in what looks like a delightfully emotional ride.

“I do think [Free Guy is] the best movie making experience that I’ve ever had easily but also I think the best movie I’ve ever done,” the Deadpool star said. “You know, it’s the most kind of pertinent to our times, in that sense. I mean, you know, where I feel Deadpool was like a movie that was pertinent to the comic book culture when it came out. This really to me speaks to a broader kind of spectrum of where we are in the world, and not only that, but how we are in the world. So, I think that’s one of the reasons I think it’s my favorite movie. But it’s also, yes, the experience certainly plays into that, but also this incredible cast.”

Free Guy is scheduled to hit theaters on December 11, 2020.