The forthcoming Deadpool 3 marks the first film in the franchise that will be produced after Disney bought 20th Century Fox. Fans have expressed concern that the R-rated Merc with a Mouth might become just another kid-friendly jokester under the new ownership. Screenwriters Rhett Reese and Paul Wernick eased those fears in a recent interview with Den of Geek.
“Deadpool is gonna be Deadpool,” said Wernick.
The duo, who wrote the first two installments, was not initially aboard for the third go-round. But they were brought on after Wendy Molyneux and Lizzie Molyneux-Logelin penned a previous draft. And they’re enthusiastic about being back — and also about having the entire Marvel Cinematic Universe to play with.
“It’s a thrill,” Reese said about the merger of Marvel properties previously held separately by the two studios. “It’s an absolute thrill to have the band back together, to have a new backdrop in the MCU with new characters, new villains, that kind of thing. You know, it’s never a marriage we necessarily saw coming, Fox and Disney, that was an external thing [apart] from our storytelling process. But we’re absolutely finding the serendipity and the gold in that situation, or we’re trying to.”
What about their habit of making fun of other Marvel franchises and/or pushing the envelope of superhero humor while under the watchful eye of the Mouse House’s brand shepherds?
“Don’t worry about that,” said Reese. “They’ve been very supportive with regard to that. Now when it comes to a particular joke, if we cross a line, maybe we’ll hear at some point, ‘Maybe not that joke.’ But I think they’ve been incredibly supportive of what we’re doing, because obviously we were doing it separate from them for a long time, and I think they’ve seen the success and they’ve had their own even greater success. So hopefully it’ll be a marriage made in heaven. But we’ve definitely got their support, and that’s a great thing to feel.”
