There’s only one upcoming Marvel movie lined up for 2024, but it’s a big one. Among the things we know about Deadpool and Wolverine is, as is clearly indicated in the title, it features the return of Hugh Jackman as Wolverine, who’d originally retired from the role after 2017’s Logan. He’s sharing leading man status with Ryan Reynolds’ Wade Wilson, but that’s just the tip of the proverbial iceberg when it comes to special appearances. The Deadpool 3 cast features plenty of other cameos from past Marvel movies in order, and director Shawn Levy talked about how he and Reynolds decided on who would show up, though they “didn’t start off with a wish list.”
How Deadpool And Wolverine’s Team Picked The Movie’s Cameos
Just like Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness, Spider-Man: No Way Home and Loki, Deadpool and Wolverine is playing around with the Marvel multiverse, as Wade Wilson will be pulled out of his reality by the Time Variance Authority and embark on a mission with a Wolverine different from the one who appeared in the original X-Men movies. While speaking with EW, Levy explained that he, Reynolds and the other writers (Rhett Reese, Paul Wernick and Zeb Wells) wanted to ensure that there was a legitimate narrative reason for characters to show up, as opposed to them simply being included for the hell of it. As he explained:
I’ll say we didn’t start off with a wishlist. From the day we started devising this Deadpool and Wolverine story, we let the story dictate the characters, not the other way around. Aaron and his return as Pyro was an outgrowth of that, and that applies to pretty much all the characters you’ll see in the movie.
The first Deadpool and Wolverine trailer revealed Aaron Stanford’s involvement as an alternate version of Pyro, whom he originally played in X2: X-Men United and X-Men: The Last Stand. While we don’t know how this Pyro fits into the story yet, evidently he has an important role to play in it if Shawn Levy, Ryan Reynolds and the rest of the team felt it was necessary to thrown him in. That was the rule they followed with all the cameos, although obviously doesn’t mean these characters will all have roughly an equal amount of screen time.
What Other Marvel Characters Are Cameoing In Deadpool And Wolverine
Excluding Wolverine, Pyro and mainstays from the previous Deadpool movies coming back, including Morena Baccarin’s Vanessa and Leslie Uggams’ Blind Al, other characters set to cameo in Deadpool and Wolverine include Dogpool, Sabretooth (as shown in leaked set photos), Lady Deathstrike and Azazel (with those latter two being quickly shown in the second trailer). It was also reported in 2023 that Jennifer Garner will reprise Elektra from 2003’s Daredevil and her 2005 spinoff movie, although that still has yet to be officially confirmed.
As far as the wilder Deadpool 3 cameo rumors go, they range from Karl Urban and Taron Egerton playing Wolverine variants, to Channing Tatum playing Gambit, which he’d been set to do for a long time until the character’s movie got scrapped. Not all of these will end up happening, and ultimately this is a movie that has to prioritize Wade Wilson and Logan’s journey together. Still, I am interested to see the final lineup of characters in a few months and learned why they were deemed worthy of inclusion.
Deadpool and Wolverine opens July 26 on the 2024 movies schedule. Revisit the first two Deadpool movies ahead of time with your Disney+ subscription.