James Mangold had DEADPOOL AND WOLVERINE chats w/ Hugh Jackman while filming LOGAN

LOGAN director James Mangold isn’t particularly thrilled that Hugh Jackman is returning as Wolverine in DEADPOOL 3. “I can’t say that there’s a part of me that doesn’t wish that we’d let it be,” he told Variety while promoting his upcoming film ‘Indiana Jones and the Dial of Destiny.’ “As much liquid as they can squeeze out of that rag, they’re going to try to.”

Speaking with Inverse, he clarified, “I never was under any illusion that there wouldn’t be a new movie, even with potentially a new Wolverine, coming out in the not-too-distant future. With properties like this, I just view them as opportunities to make my version. For me, Logan was just my ideal version of a kind of Logan story.”

Mangold revealed that he and Jackman had discussed “how joyful” a Wolverine/Deadpool project could be: “I’ve made a bunch of movies with Hugh Jackman now. We’re good friends and we talked a lot. And one of the things we talked about a lot, even while we were making Logan, was the idea of how joyful a kind of Midnight Run or 48 Hrs. with Deadpool and Logan would be. So I completely understand those guys chasing that idea.”

Last year, Jackman told Variety about the ’48 Hrs.’ idea: “I went to a screening of ‘Deadpool.’ I was 20 minutes in, and I was like, ‘Ah, damn it!’ All I kept seeing in my head was ‘48 Hours’ with Nick Nolte and Eddie Murphy. So it’s been brewing for a long time. It just took me longer to get here.”

Deadpool is going to be his usual self, but expect variations of Wolverine, including a “tougher, gruffier, meaner” version to fully play this scenario out.

Deadpool 3 (Deadpool and Wolverine?) arrives in theaters May 3, 2024.

Source: Inverse, Variety