Weirdly, it felt like there wasn’t a lot of news that came out of San Diego Comic Con this year, which is odd because Comic Con is now more a trade event than a fan one. That’s why it was strange this year when the biggest comic book movie related news came from leaks off-site. Like the test footage featuring Ryan Reynolds as Deadpool.

Shrewd fans will recognize that Reynolds played the part before in the less-than-well-thought-of X-Men Origins: Wolverine. That movie was a critical and commercial bomb, but the idea of Reynolds playing the “Merc with the Mouth” in a solo film has been held on to for the last five years.

With this provocative test footage though, Deadpool fans, and they are legion, are wondering if now might be the time we might see some action on the project? In a recent op-ed piece I wrote for Nerd Bastards though, I argued that it’s likely still unlikely to happen.

Don’t get me wrong, I’d like to see it happen, and I think it would fun if 20th Century Fox decided to open up the movie X-Men world to all sorts of X-Men characters, but a hard-R-rated, ultra-violent Deadpool in the current risk averse Hollywood landscape? I’m doubtful.

You can read my full opinion piece on Nerd Bastards here.