Ever dreamed of seeing Deadpool teaming up with the Avengers? Well, your dream might come true. The Disney-Fox deal on Friday resulted in The Walt Disney conglomerate acquiring 21st Century Fox in a massive $71.3 billion investment.
Disney now has under its belt all of the characters that Marvel had earlier sold to Fox. These include many of Marvel’s iconic franchises like X-Men, Deadpool and Fantastic Four. Marvel had to sell these character rights to competing studios before it had become a successful movie studio in itself. Marvel also sold Spiderman to Sony and partial rights of Hulk to Universal. That is why we never got a solo Hulk movie.
This buyout is also a chance to widen its influence in India. It has gained access to the National Geographic Channels, Star India, FX and Fox networks. Marvel had retained the movie rights to Iron Man, Captain America, Thor, Hawkeye, Black Widow, Ant-Man, Guardians of the Galaxy and many more. In 2008, Marvel scripted an incredible comeback with the movie ‘Iron Man’, that launched the Marvel Cinematic Universe or MCU and formed its own team, using these characters.
On the other hand, Fox’s X-Men franchise received mixed reviews. The fate of X-Men is under heavy speculation. Will the actors who solidified the franchise reprise their roles? Most importantly, will Hugh Jackman come back as the iconic Wolverine? Chances are slim as the actor announced his retirement from the character after the commercially successful and critically acclaimed “Logan” on the Graham Norton Show.
Marvel will now also have to decide whether they want to continue Deadpool where Fox left off? To tell the truth, Deadpool is unimaginable without Ryan Reynolds behind its mask. Same is the case with Fantastic Four which was recently rebooted with little success.
