Yeah, we sort of figured this was eventually going to be the case with the “Deadpool” standalone film spawned from “X-Men Origins: Wolverine.”
At the end of July, talks turned into negotiations for Robert Rodriguez to direct the film, but it sounds like any plans of a Ryan Reynolds fronted “Deadpool” could be premature.
“Deadpool” comic creator Robert Liefeld recently hit Twitter to reveal: “Warner Bros. just trying to protect their investment. They don’t want Ryan Reynolds playing Deadpool AND Green Lantern.” This tweet was in response to a story that he posted just before the aforementioned quote linking to an ObsessedWithFilm article about the new “Green Lantern” sequel writer that asked, “what does this mean for Deadpool?” So essentially, we read this as him saying this is some kind of ploy to keep “Green Lantern” films in production to stave off Reynolds leaving the series for a Fox-lead competing comic-book film property.
Warner Bros. are very excited and feeling confident about their latest comic franchise even going so far as to hire “Harry Potter & The Order Of The Phoenix” scribe Michael Goldenberg to write the sequel. The move is pretty ballsy, considering the first film is still in post-production and a long way off from its June 17, 2011 release date.
And honestly, with “Green Lantern 3” already being whispered about and rumors of a potential “Justice League America” movie in the offing, it’s not surprising that Warner Bros. want to protect their franchise and make sure the only hero Reynold’s face is associated with is that of Green Lantern. But this is just Liefeld’s posit and we’re guessing he really doesn’t have much inside information on what the two studios are thinking, especially Warner Bros., the studio that he has nothing to do with.
But don’t think “Deadpool” will simply go away. With or without Reynolds it’s clear that 20th Century Fox want to push forward with the project and the fact that he’s now becoming a big name is a huge reason why Fox will go to bat for the film even harder, but they may have to go elsewhere if ‘Lantern’ does tie him up for years. Fans may cry foul at the role being re-cast, but it’s not the end of the world. Yeah, Reynolds was fine in “X-Men Origins: Wolverine” but it’s not unreasonable for the role to be switched. Hell, “The Hulk” is already on its third actor in less than ten years.
So let the random speculation and rumor mongering begin on who could take over the role if you like, but it’s probably even a little too early for that right now. We’ll see how this all plays out in the next few months. No word yet if Rodriguez will add the project to his slate, but we would be surprised if he did. With so many films on his potential plate, he may not want to wait around for a comic franchise to get its moving parts in order.