Deadpool 3 finally got a release date — we can expect to see Ryan Reynolds in the red spandex once again on November 8, 2024. The fandom is super-excited about the upcoming film. We’ll finally get to see the Merc with a Mouth team up with Wolverine, and if it resembles their brief but comedic moments from the Deadpool video game, we’re all in for a treat. Expect nothing less than laughter-induced stomach pain.
The production of a third film, this time as part of the Marvel Cinematic Universe under Disney, is scheduled to begin later this month (May 2023) in London, but apart from the Wolverine-Deadpool team-up, nothing much is known about the film. For a long time, fans even wondered who else has been cast; this was particularly true regarding the character of Vanessa Carlsyle, Wade Wilson/Deadpool’s fiancé, portrayed in the earlier film by Morena Baccarin. And for the longest time, fans wondered will Deadpool 3 gives the Merc with a Mouth a happy end with Vanessa.
Fortunately for the fandom, Morena Baccarin will reprise her role of Vanessa Carlsyle in the upcoming Deadpool 3, though it’s currently unknown just how much screen time she’ll get. Before her appearance in the movie was confirmed, the actor confirmed that she was in negotiations to reprise her role as Deadpool’s love interest. However, Disney drives a hard bargain, and while they did approach the actor about being in the film, there were some disagreements about the terms of her appearance.
In a week following her statement regarding negotiations with Disney and Marvel, Baccarin’s portrayal of Vanessa was confirmed, along with Stefan Kapičić’s voicing of Colossus. But wait, leading hard negotiations over a portrayal of a dead person, which basically reduces a role to a cameo, seems kind of pointless, right? After all, Vanessa was killed in the first 20 minutes of the second film, which basically set the entire plot of the movie in motion. And that right there is the key to Vanessa’s return.
Vanessa is the most important secondary character in the Deadpool franchise. You basically can’t have a Deadpool movie without her. You can most certainly try, but you’ll be losing the only plot device that makes Deadpool into what he is and what motivates him — at least in the films.
In the first movie, Wade makes a call to a shady recruiter after finding out he has cancer so that he can survive and be with Vanessa. Unfortunately, good fortune was not in Wade’s corner for this, and he ended up superpowered but deformed, like a crossover between Freddie Kruger and a topographical map of Utah, as it has been so eloquently described.
So, he went on a mission to find Ajax/Francis — portrayed by Ed Skrein — to find a re-re-cure and even save Vanessa from the villain himself. The couple got back together until the moment in which she was killed in the second film, sending Deadpool on a “suicidal” mission of trying to kill the one remaining guy he blamed for the death of his fiancé — himself.
However, the best part of all these frayed plotlines is that Vanessa isn’t really dead. In the end-credits scene of Deadpool 2, we see Negasonic Teenage Warhead and Yukio fixing Cable’s time-traveling device, which Wade uses to go back in time and rescue Vanessa, much like Cable did for his family. He also took the liberty of “cleaning up” certain timelines, like killing the X-Men Origins: Wolverine’s iteration of Wade Wilson/Deadpool and killing Ryan Reynolds right after he finished the Green Lantern movie script. And then, there’s the Baby Hitler scene (we won’t go there).
So, if the upcoming film continues where the credits scene ended, it’s entirely possible that Vanessa is still alive and well in Deadpool 3 and that she’ll most likely influence Wade to embark on the upcoming adventure. Unfortunately, the details of the Wade/Wolverine upcoming but likely violent romp are unknown, except for the fact that Logan will be making an appearance — as teased in the end-credits scene — and that the duo is likely to have to take on a powerful villain together. But the extent of Vanessa’s role in the upcoming film still remains unknown.
She might be just a cameo, after all, or she might assume the role of the most important secondary character in the cinematic franchise, apart from Colossus. If the latter is true, there’s no reason why Vanessa and Deadpool couldn’t have a happy end (pun intended) in Deadpool 3. After all, Deadpool is a romantic comedy and feel good franchise despite the katana and bullet-fueled premise, so giving the two a happy ending as they ride or time travel into the sunset is pretty much aligned with the tone of the previous films. We’ll just have to wait for November of next year to find out.