Deadpool & Wolverine certainly had its fair share of cameos, blowing some fan’s minds with appearances from Weslleyy Snipes’ Blade and Chris Evans as The Human Torch.
But some fans couldn’t help but feel that significant cameos were missing, especially after some rumblings of Ben Affleck’s Daredevil and Nicolas Cage as Ghostrider surfaced online.
While appearing on Entertainment Weekly’s Awardist podcast, Deadpool himself, Ryan Reynolds, and director Shavy Levy discussed the possible scene-stealing bits we’ll never see. And, after much speculation, we’ve learned we could’ve seen Affleck and Cage after all.
“They were in early drafts,” Reynolds confirms. “We had versions of that [sequence], but then as it shook out, you’re sort of looking…We’re trying to make the movie responsibly, as well. It’s a big budget. It’s the biggest budget of any of the Deadpool movies, but you want to give yourself as much constraint, which really, I think, facilitates asymmetrical thinking and creativity. If you have too much time or too much money, it usually murders that kind of creativity. So, yeah, you’re shrinking things.”
“But we did talk to Nic Cage,” the actor continues. “We tried to get him, but he was a no-go… I would’ve loved him.”
As fans could see in the final product, some were willing to play, primarily due to Reynolds. “Luckily, we got a lot of yeses,” Levy says. “Mostly because Ryan would just call them directly,” the filmmaker adds. “He’d often do an ambush FaceTime and put them on the spot.”
Wolverine is recovering from his injuries when he crosses paths with the loudmouth, Deadpool. They team up to defeat a common enemy.”
Deadpool & Wolverine is directed by Shawn Levy (Free Guy) and stars Ryan Reynolds and Hugh Jackman alongside Fox/Marvel veterans Jennifer Garner (Elektra), Stefan Kapacic (Colossus), Brianna Hildebrand (Negasonic Teenage Warhead), Morena Baccarin (Vanessa), Karan Soni (Dopinder), Leslie Uggams (Blind Al), Shioli Kutsuna (Yukio), Lewis Tan (Shatterstar), Rob Delaney (Peter), Aaron Stanford (Pyro), and Tyler Mane (Sabretooth) with new additions including Matthew Macfadyen (Succession) as Mr. Paradox and Emma Corrin (The Crown) as Cassandra Nova.