At long last, a third “Deadpool” movie is in the works with Shawn Levy in negotiations to direct the project for 20th Century Studios according to THR.
Levy and Ryan Reynolds have become filmmaking BFFs of late with Levy helming Reynolds in last year’s pandemic-era hit “Free Guy” and the sci-fi comedy “The Adam Project” which premieres on Netflix today.
He would succeed Tim Miller who directed the first and David Leitch who helmed the second.
Rhett Reese and Paul Wernick, who penned the first two films, have also come onboard to work on the third one, replacing “Bob’s Burgers” duo Wendy Molyneux and Lizzie Molyneux-Logelin who penned the early drafts.
Both previous “Deadpool” films earned around $780 million worldwide each, but this will be the first of them following Disney’s acquisition of 20th Century Fox and the pandemic so its grossing potential is unclear right now.
The news comes just hours after Levy, in a separate interview for the same outlet, spoke of his desire to team Reynolds and Hugh Jackman on screen. Levy and Jackman worked together on the well-regarded “Real Steel” and have been hoping to re-team. Jackman also recently helped promote “The Adam Project”. Levy said in that interview:
“What we want is to fold it all in together and make a big, fat bromance sandwich of a movie, because the world wants the Hugh Jackman-Ryan Reynolds movie. I don’t know exactly what it’s going to be, but I know it needs to be me who directs it.”
Could that finally happen with “Deadpool 3”? Who knows but this will fuel plenty of speculation. Levy meanwhile is in pre-production on “Backwards” and is attached to the mini-series “All the Light We Cannot See” and the remake of John Carpenter’s “Starman”.
A release date for “Deadpool 3” has yet to be announced.