“Deadpool & Wolverine” is not the best written Marvel movie — in fact, it’s not even the best “Deadpool” movie. But what this cameo and reference delivery system of a movie has going on for it is a true love and appreciation for the superhero movie genre and its history. Rather than a teaser for Deadpool’s role in the MCU moving forward, or a bunch of table setting for Marvel’s future, this is more of a goodbye to the 20th Century Fox Marvel movies.
This extends to beloved movies like the original “X-Men” and “Blade,” but also to failures like “Fantastic Four” and “Elektra,” and even the movies that never got made. That’s how we get what is the best character in the movie, and one of the greatest cameos in a superhero movie ever: Channing Tatum as Gambit. This is more than just bringing back an actor to reprise a beloved role years later, like Tobey Maguire and Andrew Garfield in “Spider-Man: No Way Home.” What makes Channing Tatum’s brief appearance so great is that the whole joke is that he never got a chance to bring this character to life on the screen — and, as the movie constantly jokes, the world might be a better place without Tatum’s Cajun accent.
Unfortunately, Tatum’s Remy Etienne LeBeau was killed alongside the other Fox Marvel characters when Alioth the sentient trash compactor ate everyone left in The Void — or did he? Some eagle-eyed fans online may have discovered proof of Gambit’s survival hidden in “Deadpool & Wolverine.”
Is Gambit alive at the end of Deadpool & Wolverine?
During the post-credits scene of “Deadpool & Wolverine,” Deadpool goes back to the TVA headquarters specifically to find footage that proves Johnny Storm said a bunch of nasty and profane things about Cassandra Nova, in what is one of the best post-credits scenes in all of Marvel history. Before he finds the tape, Wade looks around the different monitors at the headquarters, and you can very briefly see tiny images of Gambit walking around. Because the monitors are supposedly showing live footage, it means Gambit is alive — whether in The Void or somewhere else.
It’s a nice ending to a fantastic character who has arguably the most surprising cameo in the movie — one that pays off a decade of development for the failed Gambit movie. It helps that Channing Tatum makes Gambit his own, the same way Ryan Reynolds did with Deadpool. As director Shawn Levy told Variety, Tatum added a lot of the Cajun flavor to the script, like “when he sees Hugh drinking his liquor and he throws a charged-up card his way, he says something that sounds a lot like cooyain-zwah — where I don’t f***ing know the words,” Levy said. “When Deadpool kept saying ‘That’s not a word. Who is your dialect coach … the Minions?’ that was very much all of us on set. We absolutely loved it.”
