The Deadpool franchise has always had great marketing ever since the first movie came out in 2016. For the third movie, Deadpool & Wolverine, they've pulled out all the stops — which means including the wild life.
Ryan Reynolds' Deadpool has Dogpool, or in real life, Peggy who's a pug and Chinese crested mix and voted Britain's Ugliest Dog last year. But what does Hugh Jackman's Wolverine have?
According to the movie's X (formerly Twitter) account, it's the Gulo gulo luscus or the North American wolverine. Reynolds, who did the voice over for the video, calls it “a kinda boring animal.”
Meet the North American wolverine
Since I have a soft spot for “boring animals,” I took it upon myself to look up wolverine fun facts.
- Its scientific name, Gulo gulo luscus, is Latin for glutton-eyed. So wolverines are nicknamed “The Glutton. Wolverines are voracious eaters and not picky at all.
- Even though wolverines only weigh between 25 to 45 pounds (or the same weight as a medium-sized dog), they still chase much larger predators like bears, mountain lions and wolves off their kills.
- They can be found in three continents: North America, Northern Europe and the coldest parts of Asia. There are wolverines in both the US and Canada, Norway, Sweden, Finland, northern Russia and into Siberia.
- They are incredible long distance travelers. Wolverines usually travel between 18 to 20 miles a day. The Tahoe National Forest once sighted one who traveled more than 600 miles from Idaho.
- They have an amazing sense of smell and have been known to find and kill hibernating animals. However, they are also incredibly stinky.
The highlights of what Reynolds claims was a 15-hour video, mainly consist of the wolverine just laying in the snow. He goes on to say that the wolverine is a member of the weasel family “known for its thick, oily fur and pungent aroma,” and is “one of the largest and laziest members of the weasel family.”
Deadpool & the case of the forfeited paycheck
The video then segues into a clip of the X-Men Wolverine. Reynolds, continues, “Here we see an older male Wolverine, sadly sulking out of its den one last time, probably for a paycheck.”
There's a hint of comical bitterness there since the actor has spoken about letting go of “getting paid to do the movie just to put it back on the screen,” in reference to the first movie.
He added that he paid his co-writers Rhett Reese and Paul Wernick out of what salary he had left just so they could join him on set to “form a de facto writers room.”
The first movie was made with just a reported $58 million budget. But Reynolds got the last laugh because the film made $132.4 million in just its domestic opening. All told, the movie earned a worldwide gross of $782.6 million, making it the ninth highest-grossing film of 2016.
That was quite an achievement because in that same year, Marvel's Captain America: Civil War came out (made $1.15 billion globally on a $250 million budget) and so did Rogue One: A Star Wars Story (earned $1.05 billion on a $200 million budget). The two movies were number one and two, respectively.
Deadpool & Wolverine: LFG!
It is the complete opposite of how Reynolds describes the wolverine: f***ing sucks.
And the upcoming third movie, Deadpool & Wolverine, is projected to earn a conservative estimate of at least $200 million on its opening weekend alone. Marvel's first R-rated film could break records if it does earn that much.
Oh, and the best part about the new video clip? It's for National Geographic's Underdogs, which was narrated by Reynolds and was announced in January 2023. I like to think that the actor just went in and chose that one clip of the wolverine, added a voice over, spliced in that millisecond clip of Jackman as Wolverine and then called it a day.
Deadpool & Wolverine will open in cinemas July 26.
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