With his hilarious take on the character, Ryan Reynolds made Deadpool one of the most loved superheroes in pop culture. The success of Deadpool & Wolverine proved that the antihero always provides an essence to the genre. Interestingly, there was a time when we were also set to receive the Merc with a Mouth in animation before it was canceled due to a controversial Taylor Swift episode.
Ryan Reynolds undoubtedly deserves the most credit for popularizing Deadpool among worldwide Marvel fans. However, we could have received a much different approach to the character by Donald and Stephen Glover in their canceled FX series.
What went wrong with the Deadpool animated series?
Following the success of Marvel Television and FX’s collaboration Legion, an animated show on Deadpool was also planned by the parties. Donald Glover, who was also a part of FX’s critically acclaimed series Atlanta then, was attached to write, executive produce, and act as a showrunner for Deadpool: The Animated Series alongside his brother, Stephen Glover.
After already getting to see the character’s craziness on the big screens, fans were keen to see him breaking all bounds in the animated medium. Sadly, it was soon reported to be canceled by FX. The network stated that the adult-animated series was canceled due to creative differences, but the Glover brothers revealed that there were more factors involved.
In a presently-deleted tweet (via Comicbook) by Stephen Glover, he wrote that an extremely “HILARIOUS” episode, made on Taylor Swift, acted as the final blow to the show.
There really was a Taylor Swift episode. It was HILARIOUS. And it definitely was the last straw lol.
Donald Glover, who was set to give a distinct voice to the antihero, also added that their “show wasn’t too black” but he believed it would have given strong competition to Rick & Morty. Going forward, the Spider-Man: Homecoming actor also shared 14 pages from the script in a series of presently-deleted tweets, that were praised by both Ryan Reynolds and Deadpool fans.
The fans are still up for a promising Deadpool animated series
While the FX animated show never got to see the light of day, a rejected test footage went viral on X. According to Comicbook, this test footage was submitted by an animation studio, Titmouse. The footage shows Deadpool taking on numerous villains while sporting iconic lines from the first live-action film.
The footage was ultimately rejected to make way for Floyd County Productions, the studio popular for making FXX’s animated hit, Archer. However, it raised a buzz among the audience for its style. The fans still look disappointed in its cancellation and demand Marvel to bring it back.
Here are some fan reactions collected by us:
When FX Chair John Landgraf was asked in 2018 about the cancellation of the show, he admitted to Deadline that it was Marvel’s decision. He stated that he liked the show’s idea but Marvel could not trust in Stephen and Donald Glover’s vision.
However, it must be admitted that Deadpool’s craziness can be explored even better in animated medium. A memorable episode from the Ultimate Spider-Man series has already proved that Wade Wilson’s tone-downed PG-rated version can also work well if written well. It will be exciting to see if Marvel Animation also attempts to make an R-rated show on the character.
