It’s looking increasingly likely that Deadpool 3 won’t ever see the warm light of day.
Though Ryan Reynolds is still very much committed to the Merc With a Mouth, and key figures from Marvel Studios (see: Kevin Feige) have gone on record to play down fears that Wade Wilson was about to fade into obscurity, the man behind Deadpool, Rob Liefeld, recently admitted that Marvel doesn’t have any plans for a third standalone movie. In his eyes, the first two films starring Reynolds as the fast-talking Merc are already part of the past, and anything that comes next will steer things in a different direction.
Speaking to Inverse (h/t /Film), Liefield outlined exactly why we won’t be seeing Deadpool 3 in the near future – if at all.
I don’t know. Here’s what people don’t want to hear, but thank God I’m a realist. I feel like Deadpool, the movies, they’ve set sail. We got two brilliant movies, and we live in a culture that always looks forward because all they’re ever selling us is ‘next, next, next.’ It’s the fever.
20th Century Fox and Ryan Reynolds struck gold with the back-to-back release of Deadpool and its star-studded sequel, so it was really a question of when, rather than if, a third movie would enter development. Hell, there was even chatter of a potential X-Force spinoff.
But all that changed when Disney acquired 20th Century Fox and its precious assets, leaving the Merc in a state of limbo. At least, that’s the message coming from Rob Liefield, whose bleak outlook directly contradicts any cautious optimism expressed by Ryan Reynolds, screenwriter Paul Wernick, and director David Leitch.
Via Inverse:
For me, as the fever calms down, people just need to calm down and realize that Deadpool 1 and 2 were released within two years of each other, 2016 and 2018, and I just can’t… I’m not really that crazy about Marvel’s plan right now. [Deadpool 3] would come out in four years. I can’t get excited about that. Know what their plan for Deadpool is right now? Goose egg. Zero. Zero!
Only time will tell whether Liefield’s bleak forecast proves accurate, as Marvel Studios still has Phase 4 of the MCU to contend with before dealing with Deadpool and his mutant allies. And with the likes of Black Widow delayed due to Coronavirus, it’ll be some time yet before we have the answers fans so crave.
