Deadpool & Wolverine has its fair share of villains, but the real evil-doer in the movie (at least in Deadpool's opinion) is Fox.
Deadpool 3 was the first film featuring Ryan Reynolds' Merc with the Mouth to be produced under the Marvel Studios banner. Before this, the rights to Deadpool, and all the X-Men characters, were held by a different studio, 20th Century Fox.
Then in 2019, Disney completed its acquisition of Fox, moving all of the studio's titles under the Disney umbrella and finally freeing Deadpool up to enter the Marvel Cinematic Universe.
Deadpool & Wolverine Makes Lots of Scathing Fox Jokes
The Deadpool movies have always been self-aware, but this reached new heights in Deadpool & Wolverine as the character took many chances to throw barbs at his old studio.
At one point in the movie, when Deadpool is captured by the Time Variance Authority and is shown images of the Avengers in the Marvel universe he says "Suck it Fox, I'm going to Disneyland."
Given that Deadpool and Deadpool 2 were released under Fox's umbrella, this is Deadpool's less than subtle reference explaining the behind-the-scenes legalities of the film, explaining that he's jumping ship from Fox to move to Disney.
One very self-aware sequence in Deadpool & Wolverine sees the two characters fight in the Void over the remnants of a decaying 20th Century Fox logo. This fight is meant to symbolize the death of Fox as the company is technically no longer operating and has been renamed to 20th Century Studios under Disney. At the end of the fight, Deadpool says, "Rest in Peace, Fox."
In many ways, the entirety of Deadpool & Wolverine acts as a send-off to the Fox era of Marvel movies which includes the likes of the X-Men franchise, Elektra, Blade, and Fantastic Four. Thanks to Marvel's multiverse concept, many of the actors from these Fox movies reprised their old roles in the film, taking the opportunity to have a final send-off for their characters.
The movie then ends with a behind-the-scenes highlight reel from some of Fox's X-Men movies throughout the years, acting as something of a eulogy to that era of superhero movies and allowing Marvel Studios to essentially take the reigns with Deadpool and the X-Men from now.
Deadpool's Behind The Scenes Issues With Fox
Deadpool's disdain for Fox in Deadpool & Wolverine may refer to more than just the studio merger.
For starters, when Reynolds first played Wade Wilson in X-Men Origins: Wolverine, the character was essentially butchered. He was depicted with laser eyes and a mouth sewn shut and did not at all resemble the Deadpool of Marvel's comics.
Many fans were unhappy with this portrayal, and Reynolds told Entertainment Weekly that the decision to portray the character in this way came from "studio mandates", which seemingly puts Fox to blame.
Fox did rectify this decision, although it took almost seven years. The studio was initially hesitant about the R-rating that Deadpool would require and was not convinced by initial test footage. However, after fans responded strongly to the leaked footage, it convinced the studio to greenlight Deadpool, a movie that eventually made them $783 million.
It seems that Fox was never all that easy to deal with from a behind-the-scenes standpoint. In 2016 io9 reported that the studio cut $7-8 million from the film's budget at short notice, forcing a last-minute rewrite and the removal of about nine pages from Deadpool's script.
After the release of Deadpool 2, Reynolds revealed to Entertainment Weekly that Fox forced him to remove a joke about Disney in the film, again hinting at the unyielding creative control the studio had over the franchise.
Given all this, it is not all that surprising that Reynolds snuck in a few jokes at Fox's expense when Deadpool & Wolverine gave him the opportunity.
Deadpool & Wolverine is now streaming on Disney+.
