LAS VEGAS – The Walt Disney Studios showed 75 minutes, yes almost an hour and a half of film footage for movies it’s releasing over the next 12 months at CinemaCon 2024. Most of which will not be released publicly. We’re pretty sure if you’re reading this article there is one movie you’re interested in the most, “Deadpool & Wolverine.” Let’s get to it, shall we?
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Appear on stage with Marvel Studios CEO Kevin Feige, “D&P” director Shawn Levy made sure to preface the nine minutes of footage we were about to watch was the most spoiler-free they could show without star and executive producer Ryan Reynolds assassinating him. It starts out with Wade Wilson (Reynolds) stapling a hairpiece to his head and centering his nametag for his new job as a car salesman. Working at a fictional version of CarMax, we see him take a family of four for a test drive that goes quite badly. Not only is he swearing in front of the kids, but isn’t exactly good at his new gig. In the employee workroom, he runs into his colleague and old X-Force friend Peter (Rob Delaney) who tries to convince him to be a superhero again. He even has Wilson’s Deadpool costume in his locker (he just wants to be a hero again too, his own costume is there too). Wilson is dead set against it. They head back to his place, but not before he notices a construction worker taking a photo of him down the block. When they arrive in his apartment he has a surprise party waiting. His now ex-girlfriend Vanessa (Morena Baccarin) on hand along with Blind Al (Leslie Uggams), Colossus (completely CG), Negasonic Teenage Warhead (Brianna Hildebrand), and Yukio (Shioli Kutsuna), among others.
There are some very funny bits in this scene with Blind Al asking if Wade has any cocaine and Wilson saying cocaine was “the one thing Feige said was off limits.” They then improv a whole bunch of other names for the drug which Wade says they can’t say either. In this party montage, Peter again says that maybe Wade needs to be a hero again to break out of his mid-life crisis. The door then knocks and five TVA agents are in the hallway. Wade immediately thinks they are hired strippers and says if they are gonna use those sticks (the time sticks from “Loki”) they need to go down the hall. He’s also bottomed before. It’s not his first time being pegged and it might get messy. A time window opens behind him and Wade is thrown out of his own timeline.
He awakes in a TVA conference room where Mr. Paradox (Matthew Macfadyen, an inspired and delightfully geeky Brit choice by the “Succession” Emmy winner) is waiting for him. He brings Wade into the main TVA situation room (a recreation of the “Loki” set, although not as well done, frankly) where he sees Captain America clips on the monitors. After Wade salutes him, Paradox informs our anti-hero he has a mission for him to protect the “sacred timeline,” a “Marvel” timeline. Wade asks, “Is it cinematic?” Yes, yes it. Wade is so excited he jumps up and down and then breaks the fourth wall grabbing the camera looking into it and yelling, “Suck it FOX! I’m going to Disneyland!” (This writer, laughed out loud). He then notices a clip of him dying with Thor (Chris Hemsworth) crying over his body, but Mr. Paradox tells another employee to remove that shot of a future timeline “Far, far in the future.”
Oh, and Wade meets the TVA tailor who suits him up with a new costume with adamantium swords and slaps his ass while fitting it on him. Honestly, he slaps his ass a lot.
A montage then appears of footage mostly from the Superbowl Trailer and we then cut to Deadpool in a car with Wolverine (Hugh Jackman) driving down a quiet country road. Deadpool wants to know if the X-Men hate him. “Why do your friends let you leave the house looking like you play for the Los Angeles Rams?”
Needless to say, with no “gratuitous cameos” spoiled (Wade literally says it out loud), it was a fantastic preview and will make Disney stockholders very happy this summer.
Convention attendees were no doubt thrilled about the “Deadpool & Wolverine” sneak, but it was the footage from “Captain America: Brave New World” that was a bigger surprise. The current Captain America himself, Anthony Mackie, was on hand to introduce it. Feige had prefaced that “Brave New World” was a more “grounded” Marvel Studios film in the vein of the massive hit “Captain America: The Winter Soldier” and the footage shown lived up to that.
Sam Wilson (Mackie) finds himself in the White House meeting the recently elected new president and former general Thaddeus “Thunderbolt” Ross (Harrison Ford stepping in for the departed William Hurt). Wade makes a comment on his “new” appearance and Ross says he had to get rid of the mustache to get elected. Ross then informs Wilson that the events in “Winter Soldier” have changed his opinion on superheroes and he now wants him to recruit a new team of Avengers. Wade asks what if these Avengers didn’t want to take the president’s orders?
The next sequence finds the president speaking during a small ceremony surrounded by glass display screens thanking Wade and Joaquin Torres (Danny Ramirez, as the new Falcon) for securing a very valuable asset that could be deadly in the wrong hands. On hand is Isaiah Bradley (Carl Lumby), who was experimented on with the Super Soldier serum in the 1950s. Strangely, an old standard song begins to play through the speakers as the president is speaking. Bradley and a select few others seem to be “awoken” by this and appear under a hypnotic spell attempting to assassinate the president. Ross is saved, but Wilson finds himself chasing Bradley through the White House trying to get him to come to his senses. Bradley shows his superhuman strength and eventually escapes jumping through a second or third-story window. The preview ended with Wilson in full Captain America with wings garb.
The fact Disney screened the “Brave New World” footage was surprising as the cast and crew are headed back to Atlanta imminently to shoot major new sequences. Feige and his team must have faith that it will make the movie worth the wait. Moreover, the best news about the footage was how great Kramer Morgenthau’s cinematography looked. A massive improvement over “The Falcon and the Winter Soldier.” It was strange, however, that director Julius Onah‘s name was never mentioned once.
Other highlights of the presentation included Barry Jenkins presenting the first teaser trailer for “Mufasa: The Lion King” (or something akin to a teaser trailer). The footage demonstrated Jenkins’ Oscar-winning cinematic eye even if it didn’t reveal much of the movie’s storyline. Jenkins also said that even though everyone asks him about the songs in the film, he isn’t allowed to reveal who will be singing or songwriting on the soundtrack yet.
The event actually kicked off with 13 minutes of compelling footage from Wes Ball’s “Kingdom of the Planet of the Apes” which arrives in theaters in a little less than a month. It’s very much in the vein of the previous films but was visually impressive. No talent was on hand.
Amy Poehler stopped by to introduce 30 minutes, yes, 30 minutes of Pixar’s “Inside Out 2.” Anyone doubting Pixar’s ability to reach big box office heights again will be proven wrong with this sequel. The new characters, er, feelings (Anxiety, Envy, Ennui, and Embarrassment) were pitch perfect and there were a ton of in-jokes that should kill with adults. Honestly, this is the Pixar movie that would kill at Cannes (although don’t get us started on the initial critical turn on “Elemental” last year).
A long sequence was also screened from Fede Alvarez’s “Alien: Romulus.” A somewhat young cast for an “Alien” movie (why are they all out in space?), the characters’ dialogue was a bit too 2024-specific (a slight distraction). That being said, Alvarez has worked his magic on some genuinely tension-inducing sequences. It’s not Ridley Scott, James Cameron, or David Fincher level, but you can see why 20th Century Studios is excited about its potential box office.
Another 20th Century Studios released push to next April, “The Amateur” with Rami Malek, Rachel Brosnahan, Caitriona Balfe, and Laurence Fishbourne was much less compelling. Malek plays a spy agency analyst who decides he wants to go into the field after his wife is killed. Directed by veteran television director James Hawes, whose indie “One Life” has done remarkably well at the box office worldwide, it simply looked flat and inspired.
The afternoon ended with Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson appearing on stage to introduce a scene from this Thanksgiving’s highly anticipated “Moana 2.” The musical number centered on our heroine (Auli‘i Cravalho) fronting an ensemble of her Oceania village singing a track we’re assuming is titled “We’re Back.” Originally intended as a direct to Disney+ endeavor, the animation wasn’t exactly stimulating, but perhaps there is time to give it a boost.
Other notable news from the Disney presentation was Feige revealing both “The Fantastic 4” and “Thunderbolts*” will be shot in IMAX and, yes, that asterisk is an intentional part of the latter’s title. He promised it would make sense after the movie is released next year.