Deadpool 2is hiding a pretty epic cameo that fans have been waiting for. The sequel finally arrives in theaters this weekend and the secrets that the marketing team has been doing a bang-up job of hiding are now out of the bag. This movie does a lot of things right. Like, for example, finally connecting these movies the largerX-Menmovie universe.
Warning: major spoilers ahead forDeadpool 2. Wade Wilson joked in the first movie about the fact that none of the otherX-Menare there when he shows up at the X-Mansion, save for Colossus (Stefan Kapicic) and Negasonic Teenage Warhead (Brianna Hildebrand). This time, he makes the same observation but with a very different outcome, as a handful of the major characters from the current iteration of the movies are at the X-Mansion while Deadpool is there. Beast (Nicholas Hoult), Quicksilver (Evan Peters), Storm (Alexandra Shipp), Cyclops (Tye Sheridan), andCharles Xavier(James McAvoy) all make a cameo in a brief but amazing moment.
In the first act ofDeadpool 2Vanessa (Morena Baccarin) dies, which leads Ryan Reynolds' character down a dark path. He attempts suicide unsuccessfully, only to have Colossus come by and literally pick up the pieces. He brings Wade to the X-Mansion to recover and, once he’s feeling a bit better, Wade ponders why nobody is there, save for the trio of Colossus,Negasonic Teenage Warheadand her new girlfriend Yukio (Shioli Kutsuna). As this is happening, we see an open door behind Wade featuring the group ofX-Mengathered together. Beast then shuts the door quietly and Deadpool has no idea it ever happened.
This is a very brief moment, but a meaningful and important one. Yes, it certainly made for one of the best jokes in the movie as well, but this does carry with it some significance. Up to this point, it has seemed to some degree like theDeadpoolmovies exist in their own little universe. By bringing in the current group ofX-Men, even if only for a moment, it does really cement the idea that these characters all do exist in the same universe. It can’t necessarily repair the very messy timeline and, in fact, it arguably makes that even more complicated, but it does firmly place theMerc With a Mouth in the same universe as Professor Xand his gifted youngsters.
As for the messy timeline, Wade does his best to clean that up inDeadpool 2’s epic post-credits scene. We reported ahead of the movie’s release that some late reshoots were done that added a significant cameo that crushed with test audiences. It’s hard to say for sure, but it certainly seems like this is the cameo that report was referencing. There is also the Brad Pitt cameo during theX-Forcesequence, but it seems like that must have been planned earlier on. Even if it may have muddied up the timeline a bit more, Fox did the right thing by including theX-Men. It was funny, important and very on-brand for the franchise. Well played.
