Unused Deadpool & Wolverine Scenes That Didn’t Make The Final Cut

“Deadpool & Wolverine” blew everyone away at the box office and danced into the hearts of viewers around the globe, combining crowd-pleasing cameos and blood-splattering action with a wicked sense of R-rated humor. While the film feels packed to the brim and makes full use of its 128-minute runtime, it could have had even more memorable moments had the filmmakers and other parties not said “bye bye bye” to several scenes and concepts. So, what exactly was left on the proverbial cutting room floor? Quite a bit, actually.

From Wade Wilson meeting a famous Avenger to Deadpool fighting a real-life animal in the film, a number of potentially mind-blowing segments didn’t make the final cut. As fans, it remains interesting to ponder what could have been and if these additions might have helped to address some of the biggest unanswered questions in “Deadpool & Wolverine.” Even if they added nothing from a narrative perspective, they sure would have been fun to see.

In the early stages of “Deadpool & Wolverine,” Wade Wilson meets Jon Favreau’s Happy Hogan in 2018, with the intention of joining the Avengers and bringing meaning to his life. While they discuss Tony Stark, the man known as Iron Man doesn’t show up in the film — except through archival footage shown on the monitors at the Time Variance Authority. Many fans wondered if the scene where Wade pitches himself to become an Avenger was meant to include Mr. Iron Man himself, Robert Downey Jr. They received their answer when “Deadpool & Wolverine” co-writers Paul Wernick and Rhett Reese confirmed the existence of a “Downey draft” to The Hollywood Reporter.

“Ryan [Reynolds] wrote a Downey scene, and it was the two of them,” Reese said. “And then the feeling was, if Downey either decides not to do it, or if Marvel decides not to have him do it, or for whatever reason it doesn’t work out, [it would then] be tailored for Happy Hogan. Jon was amazing about it. He hung in there while it was still undetermined for a little while, and then ultimately, he was very gracious about having it expand out a little bit.” The pair disclosed that they don’t know for sure why the Downey idea was knocked back, but they assume that it likely had something to do with Robert Downey Jr.’s MCU upcoming return as Doctor Doom for “Avengers: Doomsday.”

The cameos in “Deadpool & Wolverine” tickle all the sweet spots, as heroes and villains from yesteryear return for one last hurrah. The latter feels slightly weaker, though, as not many of the original actors who portrayed the roles appear in the film. One notable absentee is Vinnie Jones, who plays the Juggernaut in 2006’s “X-Men: The Last Stand.” Instead, Aaron W. Reed portrays a version of this character in “Deadpool & Wolverine.” Was Jones ever set to put on the dome-shaped helmet again? According to director Shawn Levy, there were talks, even if they didn’t last too long.

Jones confirmed this in a March 2024 interview with Yahoo! UK. Fans might have thought he was bluffing like Andrew Garfield did about his participation in “Spider-Man: No Way Home,” but Jones proved himself as a reliable source of information. He said: “I spoke to the director and I just said it’s such a drama putting that suit on mentally and physically. I mean, it had its mental toll as well because you’re in it and you can’t do anything all day, you can only drink through a straw. So we couldn’t strike a deal for [‘Deadpool & Wolverine’].”

Marvel Comics fans love a good Fastball Special, a move invented by Wolverine and Colossus that has been copied many times over the years. It’s when a super-strong hero tosses a comrade at high speed. Colossus and Wolverine’s beloved tag-team move transcended to the live-action world in “X-Men: The Last Stand,” with the brawny X-Man hurling Logan at a Sentinel during a Danger Room training simulation. The maneuver almost showed up again in “Deadpool & Wolverine,” as revealed in a behind-the-scenes video of the battle sequence in which Deadpool and Wolverine face off against Cassandra Nova’s many goons.

Posting the video on X (formerly known as Twitter), Ryan Reynolds wrote: “A few people asked if we were tempted to try a ‘Fastball Special.’ The answer is yes. Except instead of throwing Deadpool or Wolvie, we chucked this guy… it didn’t make the cut, sadly.” The slow-motion scene sees Wade Wilson and Logan grab hold of one of the nameless villains and launch him into the air, all set to the tune of Celine Dion’s “It’s All Coming Back to Me Now.” It’s a beautiful, full-circle moment that would have tied in nicely with Dion’s past contribution to the “Deadpool 2” soundtrack.

Internet commentators provide the wildest and most hilarious suggestions. In 2019, for example, a Change.org petition to make Danny DeVito the Marvel Cinematic Universe’s Wolverine received over 63,000 signatures from fans. When rumors surfaced that variants could feature in “Deadpool & Wolverine,” the internet ran away with all the possibilities, including the debut of the fabled and fearsome DeVitorine.

Speaking to The Hollywood Reporter, Paul Wernick and Rhett Reese dispelled and confirmed a few rumors about what fans could have seen. Wernick mentioned that DeVito was a consideration to appear in the scene in which Deadpool travels the multiverse and meets the various Logan variants. He would have played the smaller, more comic book-accurate version of the character. Reese added: “It was pitched, yeah. And ultimately it was thought it was just funnier to see Hugh [Jackman]. A short version of Hugh was funnier, and that was inspired, obviously, other than by the comics that was inspired by Tim Conway’s ‘Dorf on Golf.'”

While the possibility of the DeVitorine was on the table, the writers confirmed that Daniel Radcliffe — another actor mooted as a serious contender to become the MCU’s Wolverine — was never in line for a cameo.

Ryan Reynolds and Rob McElhenney remain glued at the hip ever since they purchased the Welsh soccer club Wrexham AFC in 2020. Not only do they star in the “Welcome to Wrexham” series, but they also hang out a lot in real life, to the point that everyone presumes they’re besties. Many fans speculated that McElhenney would feature in “Deadpool & Wolverine” somehow — perhaps even as a Deadpool variant.

While the rumors of McElhenney’s participation in the film turned out to be true, he was actually cast as a TVA agent. Unfortunately, viewers didn’t get to see McElhenney on screen, since the scene was cut, as the actor confirmed on X. Posting a picture of himself in TVA agent attire and holding Wolverine’s claws while Hugh Jackman smiles at him, McElhenney poked fun at how he traveled so far to film a cameo that never made it into the movie.

Speaking more about it to Variety, McElhenney said he didn’t know the reason his performance had been cut from the film, but he hoped Marvel Studios would give him and Reynolds permission to use it in “Welcome to Wrexham.” He added: “I know that there was a lot of visual effects that were supposed to go into the sequence, and we thought it would be funny, because obviously that might be the reason that it got cut — because it’s probably too expensive.”

“Percy Jackson and the Olympians” star Walker Scobell collaborated with Ryan Reynolds and Shawn Levy on “The Adam Project.” While working together, Scobell made no secret of his love for Deadpool