“Is that Thor? Why is Thor crying?”
To quote a certain Madonna song, “Life is a mystery.” One of the biggest mysteries of Deadpool & Wolverine: Why was Thor crying over Deadpool? Even Shawn Levy, who directed the cameo-filled Marvel movie, doesn’t know the answer. When Wade Wilson (Ryan Reynolds) is brought to the Time Variance Authority — an organization outside of space and time that monitors the multiverse — Mr. Paradox (Matthew Macfadyen) shows him television screens displaying some of the most heroic moments in the Sacred Timeline (Earth-616, the prime setting of the Marvel Cinematic Universe).
The reel of the MCU’s greatest hits includes Captain America (Chris Evans) saluting in 2011’s Captain America: The First Avenger, Earth’s mightiest heroes assembling for the first time in 2012’s The Avengers, and the mighty thunder god Thor (Chris Hemsworth) sobbing as Deadpool dies in his arms. Wait, what? (You can watch Deadpool’s “why is Thor crying” running joke in the official TV spot below.)
“What is that?” Wade asks over repurposed footage from 2013’s Thor: The Dark World (where it was Thor’s adoptive brother, Loki, in Deadpool’s place). “Is that Thor? Why is Thor crying?” Mr. Paradox kills the feed, leaving viewers to question whether it was a glimpse into an alternate timeline or events yet to happen (potentially in the conclusion to the Multiverse Saga, the Anthony and Joe Russo-directed Avengers: Doomsday and Avengers: Secret Wars).
“I have to be honest with you, we really set out to make a movie that was not a setup for another movie or a sequel to anything. Kevin [Feige] never insisted that we service some story beyond,” Levy told Entertainment Weekly. “I’ve been asked, for instance, why is Thor crying. The answer being: I don’t f—ing know. No one does, but I’d sure love to be the guy who helps find out why.”
Though there are hints of what Deadpool and Wolverine’s future could look like — the film ends with the yellow-suited Logan variant (Hugh Jackman) joining X-23 (Dafne Keen) in the X-Men movies timeline on Earth-10005 — Levy said, “As for what’s beyond, I genuinely don’t know. I genuinely hope and intend to be a part of telling those stories. We never once were asked to service a broader storyline or phase. To this day, I couldn’t tell you what phase our movie is in. Is it like 14? I sincerely couldn’t tell you.”
Deadpool & Wolverine, which is part of Phase 5 of the MCU, also saw the return of such timeline-displaced heroes as Gambit (Channing Tatum), Elektra (Jennifer Garner), and Blade (Wesley Snipes), who are hinted to have escaped the Void by the film’s end. For now, whether Deadpool and Wolverine will return in Doomsday or Secret Wars — or a potential Deadpool 4 — is a mystery.
Marvel Studios’ Deadpool & Wolverine is now playing only in theaters.
