Green Lantern Screenwriter Reacts To That Deadpool 2 Scene
The screenwriter of Green Lantern has finally gotten around to seeing Deadpool 2 — and when he stuck around for the credits, he got an unexpected surprise.
Like its 2016 predecessor (and the comics that inspired it), Deadpool 2 is a winking, reference-heavy superhero romp with more than a few barbs to spare about its peers in the genre.
From comments about the dark tone of the DC movie universe to jokes about the X-Men, no one is safe from the Merc with a Mouth's biting commentary — not even Ryan Reynolds' former creative partners, who got it the worst of all.
One of the highlights of Deadpool 2 is the collection of epilogue scenes cut into its credit sequence, in which Reynolds' Wade Wilson travels back through time to fix the mistakes of the past. And the mistakes aren't just from the movie — they're from the real Ryan Reynolds' career.
One of the jokey scenes sees Wilson go back in time to sometime around 2011, when Reynolds would have first read the script for the superhero movie Green Lantern.
While the actor was enthusiastic about the project at the time, the movie ended up falling flat and flopping hard. To keep the critically-panned movie from coming to fruition, Deadpool shoots the real-life Reynolds in the head, spraying blood all over the pages of the Green Lantern script.
The scene has left audiences roaring with laughter — but imagine how it'd feel to be Marc Guggenheim, one of the screenwriters for the Green Lantern movie, watching the scene play out.
Guggenheim didn't get around to seeing the Deadpool sequel until a month after its release. When he saw how Reynolds really felt, the writer shared his thoughts in a post on his Twitter account. Instead of raging against Reynolds, Guggenheim's response was a professional tip of the hat.
"Just saw Deadpool 2," he wrote. "Well played, @VancityReynolds. Well played."
It's a measured response to a savage joke, but you shouldn't feel too bad for Guggenheim. After all, he's not the only one responsible for that movie being a mess. He shares that credit with three other writers: Michael Green, Michael Goldenberg, and Greg Berlanti.
All four of the writers have found massive success with other projects both before and since Green Lantern, with Guggenheim being one of the chief architects behind the CW's successful Arrowverse. In other words, he's a writer who knows what he's doing — but when it came to Green Lantern, everybody dropped the ball.
Warner Bros. will be trying the character again with an all-hands-on-deck Green Lantern Corps movie, written and produced by comic book writer/former DC Entertainment president Geoff Johns. It's not like there's a lot to lose in taking another chance; Hopefully the first movie stays the worst movie.