A PG-13 Cut Of ‘Deadpool 2’ Set To Arrive In Theaters This December
Twentieth Century Fox just announced some changes to its release schedule, and apparently that wiseguy Deadpool is involved. A PG-13 version of the hit sequel, Deadpool 2, is going to hit theaters during the holiday season, Polygon reports.
Ryan Reynolds seems to have confirmed the information on his Instagram profile. Reynolds posted a photo of himself dressed as Deadpool, reading to Fred Savage in a clear callback to The Princess Bride.
The family-friendly edit of Deadpool 2 replaces Alita: Battle Angel for a December 21 release. That long-awaited James Cameron film adaption will now be released on Valentine’s Day weekend, to coincide with the Chinese New Year. Valentine’s Day was the original release date for the new X-Men film, Dark Phoenix, which has now been moved down on the schedule to June 7, 2019.
Every shuffle causes another shuffle, and Dark Phoenix moving causes Channing Tatum’s upcoming movie, Gambit, to be scheduled for release in 2020. The film has been in pre-production for four years, and was attached to three different directors. All of those directors left the film, reportedly for scheduling reasons.
MovieWeb reports that the film will be bookended by scenes of Deadpool reading to Savage, so it appears the Instagram post wasn’t just a fun way to reveal the news, but an actual clue about what the edit will look like. Savage appears to be reprising his role from The Princess Bride and is wearing a similar football jersey as he sits in bed, while Deadpool reads him a story. The storybook he’s holding looks similar to the limited-edition version sold with the Super Duper cut of the film at Target.
The new version of the film will eliminate the R-rated jokes and language, and may even feature footage from both movies as Deadpool tells the story. Interestingly, this could be a more slippery slope than Fox realizes. If the PG-13 version performs really well, it might be a cue for Disney to gear the whole franchise into a PG-13 version moving forward.
Having a clean version of an R-rated film isn’t new, as most films have a clean edit to show on television or airplanes, for example. But it is one of the few or maybe only times an airplane version of a film has been released in the theater. It’s not clear if new scenes have been shot beyond the ones with Savage, or how they will be editing out the offensive material. However, it seems in the spirit of the character to squeeze every last drop of income out the sequel.
