Exclusive: Reese & Wernick on keeping Deadpool’s R-rating under Disney

Last Updated on July 30, 2021

Over the course of two films, Deadpool (Ryan Reynolds) has remained delightfully vulgar and overflowing with R-rated humour and action; However, now that Disney has acquired 20th Century Fox and folded Fox's Marvel characters into the Marvel Cinematic Universe, there's the question of just how to fit the R-rated character into its PG-13 universe.

While speaking with Rhett Reese and Paul Wernick during the ZOMBIELAND: DOUBLE TAP press-tour, our own JimmyO asked the DEADPOOL screenwriters if they had any concerns about keeping Deadpool's R-rated humour and violence intact under Disney's Marvel.

I think the good news is, I think Marvel knows what they have in the property. There is a promise that we're going to continue to explore DEADPOOL and its R-rated universe. And then the great news, the great wrinkle on top of that is that, you know, moving forward, the hope is that we get to jump into the MCU sandbox a little bit and play with some of their toys too and bring DEADPOOL into that world. So it's a wonderful new adventure that we're all looking forward to diving into. It’s timing that’s the one issue, in the sense that Ryan [Reynolds] is super busy, as we are, and then the other issue is finding that right idea. Very much like ZOMBIELAND, we weren't doing it unless it's great, you know, or if we think we can make it great. So it's finding that right idea. And, you know, we’ve got a text chain going with Ryan in that, sometimes you get going at three in the morning if we wake up in the middle of the night. And then we think we've discovered the next great idea for DEADPOOL only to wake up the next morning and realize that it was shit. We’re constantly kicking around ideas and once we land on something that we all get excited about, I think it'll be off to the races pending schedule.

Getting to see Deadpool interact with other Marvel characters is always a delight, and now that he's a part of the MCU, his universe has greatly expanded with hundreds of new characters to play around with. Rhett Reese and Paul Wernick are still looking at which MCU characters would fit into the DEADPOOL universe, but Reese said that he's "sadly mourning Chris Evans' departure because I always wanted Captain America and Deadpool to have to deal with each other." That would have been amazing. "But I think we need to, ourselves, take a look at how the Marvel Universe is shaking out and find the characters that are really good foils for Deadpool," Reese continued. "Like, you know, we always liked characters who feel like if you drop them in a room with Deadpool, they would immediately be in conflict with them because of his ridiculous, irreverent personality. Now, that may apply to anything, but the Marvel Universe is certainly full of those kinds of characters. And then also villains. They have much better villains on that side than Fox had in their stable. So that'll be great when it comes down to finding antagonists."

While we await the hopefully R-rated return of Deadpool, Rhett Reese and Paul Wernick have plenty of other projects in the works, including CLUE, the big-screen adaptation of the Hasbro board-game. Reese and Wernick dropped a few small hints about the film, with Reese saying, "I think that it'll have suspense, and hopefully it'll be thrilling, but most of our movies are comedy first, and thrills second. So we’re definitely leaning in hard on the comedy. It's going to be really fun." Wernick also confirmed the recent news that Jason Bateman would direct and co-star in the film alongside Ryan Reynolds, and Reese teased that their hope "is to make it in the vein of ZOMBIELAND and DEADPOOL in terms of its comedy."