'Deadpool 2' Almost Made The Merc With The Mouth A Daddy

Deadpool 2 is hitting theaters in a little over a week, and we'll finally get to see what kind of trouble the Merc with the Mouth gets into this time. So far we know that Wade Wilson feels compelled to stop the steel-armed, glow-eyed mutant Cable from killing a kid named Russell, played by Julian Dennison from Hunt for the Wilderpeople. But Deadpool almost had a kid of his own to protect in the original draft for Deadpool 2.Entertainment Weekly has been unloading a series of Deadpool 2 stories since Ryan Reynolds was on the cover of the magazine recently. The most recent tidbit of information has an interesting detail about the direction a Deadpool 2 early draft almost took. Reynolds explained what he and co-writers Rhett Reese and Paul Wernick first cooked up and how it evolved into the story we'll see on the big screen next week:

"The genesis of it was "What if Deadpool had a child?" Like, what if we started five years later and what would that be like? By page 1.5, it was totally untenable. We were just like, 'Nope. Nope. No, no, no. This is never, ever going to work.' We went back to the drawing board and kind of reworked it in a way about wanting to have a child, which is something that so many people I know experience on a daily basis — wanting to have a child but can't."

Flashing forward five years and giving Deadpool and his girlfriend (or maybe wife) Vanessa (Morena Baccarin) a child of their own sounds like it would certainly change the dynamic of those characters. But it also seems like too drastic of a change after just one movie spent with the sarcastic assassin.

As we've seen briefly in the trailers, the motivation for Deadpool wanting to protect this kid seems to stem from the desire he and Vanessa have to eventually have a kid of their own. That's why we hear Vanessa say in the trailer "Kids give us a chance to be better than we used to be. He needs you." So maybe can expect some kind of growth for Deadpool as a character, no matter how immature he continues to be.

The question is whether this Russell character will have a strong bond with Deadpool, or if it will be a bit of a Dutch situation where they don't get along with each other for most of the movie, but then come around to having a mutual respect for one another. I'm betting the two quickly become buddies since both seem to have a chip on their shoulder and some choice words and hand gestures for anyone who gets in their way.

The presence of Russell will certainly change the game a bit for audiences. As Reynolds points out, "The first movie is a love story masquerading as a comic-book movie, and this one is kind of a family film masquerading as a comic-book film again." Who doesn't love a family film with endless swearing, insults and pop culture references?

Deadpool 2 hits theaters on May 18, 2018.