We’re really genuinely happy that Ryan Reynolds has found his niche and put his distinctively Canadian charms to good use in a legitimate blockbuster franchise, but he had to slog through a lot of crap to get there.
Before Deadpool, he starred in 2011’s Green Lantern, whose one redeeming feature is that he met future wife Blake Lively on set, allowing him to spread his handsome seed and become half of Hollywood’s most adorable couple.
In a recent interview with Entertainment Weekly, Reynolds gave a candid assessment of why Green Lantern didn’t work, saying that, while he had high hopes for the project, it fell victim to the blockbuster machine. He said:
“With Green Lantern, I don’t think anyone ever figured out exactly what it was. That isn’t to say the hundreds of men and women didn’t work their fingers to the bone to make it as good as possible. It also fell victim to the process in Hollywood which is like poster first, release date second, script last. At the time, it was a huge opportunity for me so I was excited to try and take part in it.”
After portraying a version of Deadpool in 2009’s X-Men Origins: Wolverine, Reynolds was keen to get a solo film off the ground, and says he begged to take a crack at it before committing to Green Lantern:
“I did however write a letter to Fox right before I had to decide whether or not I was gonna do Green Lantern. I asked one last time sort of like the groom standing at the altar, ‘Will you please be my wife?’ and they said they couldn’t pull the trigger on Deadpool. For too many reasons too boring to illustrate, it just didn’t work.”
Deadpool is currently the seventh-highest grossing film of the year, with an international gross just under $783 million, and a sequel scheduled to begin shooting in the northern summer of 2017.
Director Tim Miller was instrumental in getting the first film off the ground, and was responsible for much of the ‘leaked’ footage that got fans so hyped up, but in October of this year, he dropped out of the sequel, citing creative differences.
Per reports at the time, their key differences involved a disagreement about the tone of the film – Reynolds wanted to maintain the “raunchy, fourth-wall breaking” feel of the first while Miller wanted something more stylised.
The two reportedly also clashed over the proposed casting of Kyle Chandler as villain Cable – Reynolds didn’t like the idea, and the studio ultimately took his side. Deadpool 2 is due for release in 2018.
Source: Entertainment Weekly.
Photo: Handout / Getty Images.
