You’ve heard of it, haven’t you? The leaked reel of test footage for Deadpool?
After years spent languishing on the brink of development over at 20th Century Fox, that 2014 leak proved to be the long-awaited catalyst, effectively forcing the Powers That Be into action to officially recruit Ryan Reynolds to star and Tim Miller to direct the Merc’s standalone debut. And though Reynolds has been typically flippant about the entire ordeal (“I would have [leaked the clip] if I had known it would have caused that!”), while speaking in an interview with Collider (via ComicBook.com), Tim Miller recalled the almighty feeling of dread upon learning that the fabled Deadpool test reel had escaped the confines of Fox’s firewall.
At the time, Miller feared that the ramifications of said leak would result in the project being scrapped altogether, which makes it all the more delightful that an unfortunate leak yielded such a phenomenal, critically-acclaimed result. But first, a history lesson from Tim Miller:
This guy Drew Crevello was working on the X-Men movies, and he saw that trailer. He tracked me down and said, ‘Hey, maybe you shouldn’t be some other director’s b*tch. You should be directing your own thing. You haven’t directed anything, but I got this small little movie called Deadpool – have you heard of it?’
That inkling of Deadpool‘s adaptation – the tone, the dialogue, the effortless charisma from Reynolds – was all channeled into Fox’s test reel, which would later go on to become the film’s opening sequence, where the Merc leaps down from a nearby freeway to take care of some armed goons.
We developed it. We did the little test. It just didn’t happen. In Hollywood, stuff gets to a point – you get a budget, you get a movie star and everything – then the studio says yes or no. If they say no, then everyone walks away quickly.
And then, the fuse was lit.
The leak which happened at Comic Con. I literally got home from Comic Con, put my bags down from getting off the train, and my phone starts blowing up. Like, ‘Dude, your s*it’s online. Oh my f*cking god!’ I was horrified. I felt sick to my stomach. I thought Fox would kill me.
The Merc With a Mouth will storm theaters once more on June 1st, 2018. If there’s one superhero that can fly in the face of convention, it’s Deadpool, so we’re quietly confident that David Leitch’s follow-up will be able to skate around the sophomore slump.
