Blake Lively’s one note on the ending of Deadpool & Wolverine made it a better movie.
Deadpool & Wolverine proved to be just what the MCU needed after a few years of diminishing returns. The movie’s irreverent humor and undeniable heart fit perfectly into the MCU. The movie was a labor of love from director Shawn Levy and star Ryan Reynolds, and their hard work paid off. Deadpool & Wolverine was a massive success, and fans have learned more about the film in its home release, thanks to the director’s commentary available on physical editions of the movie. This commentary showed just how important Lady Deadpool actress Blake Lively was to the ending, as she came up with the idea to not immediately show that Deadpool and Wolverine survived the destruction of the Time Ripper.
In the commentary, per GamesRadar, Reynolds set the scene for the changes made to the movie by saying, “We did just a day and a half of reshoots on the movie, which we’re very proud of. These kinds of movies typically involve weeks of reshoots. But this speech that Matthew [Macfadyen] has is one of the pieces we reshot. And he is miraculous.”
Levy then added, “And credit where credit is due. It used to be that there was no suspense, that the power room blew up, and our heroes had survived. And it was Blake Lively who said to us, ‘You know, I’ve been with you this whole movie. I want to sit in the fear that they’re lost. Let me be in that place of suspense so the triumph of their survival is more emotional and visceral.’ That was a Blake note and it really opened up a new way of thinking about this part of the movie and it’s why we did this reshoot… and, here, the payoff is so much more satisfying.”
Deadpool & Wolverine went through many changes before fans saw it, but this change is easily one of the most important. The ending did an amazing job of making viewers actually believe that maybe the two heroes were dead, making their survival that much more visceral. Lively’s intervention in the movie proved crucial and took a scene that viewers had seen a million times before and added something to it. This cliffhanger may have seemed a given, but the way the other characters sold it made it work so well.
Deadpool & Wolverine introduced movie fans to many great characters, including Lively’s Lady Deadpool, but her one note on the ending was her greatest contribution to the film.
