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Disney currently exploring best ways to adapt Deadpool, X-Men for the MCU
How will the X-Men, Fantastic Four, and Deadpool eventually factor into the MCU? Well, according to a new report from Variety, Disney is figuring that out as we speak. Marvel Studios president Kevin Feige promised at this year's San Diego Comic-Con that these characters would be blended into the shared universe now that 20th Century Fox's entertainment properties (and licenses) are owned by the Mouse House. Even so, there's a ton of logistics to work out, particularly for Deadpool, who makes his bread and butter off of blood, gore, and profanity.
"The studio is also grappling with how to fit the very R-rated Deadpool into its PG-13-rated Marvel Cinematic Universe," reads Variety's report. "The goal is to find a way for the character to move seamlessly between Avengers spinoffs and bloody, profane stand-alone adventures."
That's a really interesting point, one that holds a lot of promise for the MCU, which could be split between the regular Disney banner and the company's more adult-oriented Buena Vista banner. Moreover, it offers up plenty of comedic fodder. Imagine Wade Wilson (hopefully played by Ryan Reynolds once again) showing up in a regular MCU movie and having all of his usual R-rated antics censored by bleeps and black bars; it's ripe for meta dialogue on the character being in a family-friendly studio film.
As for the rest of the mainstream X-Men and their universe? If Variety's report is to be believed, it sounds like Josh Boone's New Mutants — which puts a horror spin to the mutant premise but has been mired by reshoots and delays — still faces an uphill climb. According to the report, "The studio is unimpressed with New Mutants, an X-Men spinoff with a haunted-house vibe, and believes it has limited box office potential." (That doesn't necessarily mean, though, that Disney is averse to getting spooky with its big-ticket titles: After all, the Doctor Strange sequel In the Multiverse of Madness, out in May of 2021 from returning director Scott Derrickson, is meant to be the MCU's first-ever horror movie.)
Still, the Mouse House has an ace up its sleeve: the MCU's celebrated architect, Kevin Feige.
"Disney is optimistic that handing Fox superhero properties such as Fantastic Four and X-Men to Marvel Studios president Kevin Feige will improve the quality of these movies, but bumps must be smoothed over in that transition," adds the report, which notes, per a studio insider, that "[many] original scripts and optioned properties have been 'paused' from going into production" while the studio opts to focus on "more broadly commercial projects" like James Cameron’s Avatar, which will release four sequels through 2027.
