One of the best decisions that Fox ever made with the X-Men film property — which, due to complicated rights issues, aren’t the prevue of Marvel Studios — was make Deadpool: the little spinoff that could. Beyond the piles of money they raked in when people clamored over one another to see it opening night and the vibrant new film franchise its success spawned, it opened the door for increasingly minor characters of the various X-Men titles to have a shot at appearing in a movie, rather than the usual lineup of increasingly stale mutants.
The strength of the X-Men comics has always been its expansive cast of incredibly diverse characters. Unlike many comic properties, which featured a compelling lead and maybe a couple of memorable villains, the X-titles have always overflown with fascinating, dynamic and unforgettable characters of all stripes: whether hero, villain or somewhere in between.
You didn’t just get straight-laced Cyclops and badboy Wolverine duking it out for their red-headed love-interest over decades of published adventures. You had Storm, a literal goddess who was as deadly as a weather-changing mutant as she was a “normal,” depowered woman. You had Shadowcat’s quest to find her place as both a superhero and a teenager. Hell, just look up Super Doctor Astronaut Peter Corbeau sometime.
The upcoming Deadpool sequel is seemingly taking this concept and running with it full-tilt. The first movie hadn’t even finished before they announced that Cable — the kind-of, sort-of, future / extradimensional son of Cyclops and Jena Grey — whose backstory has heretofore been far too hopelessly complicated to explain in a maninstream X-Men movie, was going to headline the next film in the franchise. And now we have tangible confirmation that the long-rumored character Domino — another peripheral X-character whose low mainstream profile allows her to frequently collaborate with the ‘Merc with a Mouth’ — is set to appear in Deadpool 2 as well.
In a photo shoot which directly calls back to the first Deadpool‘s viral marketing, we see Neena Thurman — the woman better known as the mutant mercenary Domino — sprawled out on what can only be adequately described as a “Deadpool-skin rug” in front of a roaring fire. Strapped to the nines with as many weapons as she could pin to her curvaceous body, her untamed mop of hair and easy confidence immediately bring images of Luke Cage‘s Misty Knight to mind.
Covering a patch of skin around her left eye is a chalky white discoloration: a clever reversal of her comicbook appearance, which has a black discoloration around the same eye, breaking up the rest of her stark white skin. The tactical gear, easy posture and excessive armaments all embody the version of the character that fans will fondly remember from the comics.
Although it remains to be seen exactly what this version of the character’s relationship is with the film’s title character, the image gives us a couple clues about what we can expect. The limp, sprawled-out body of Wade Wilson suggests that — like many of their comic interactions — they’ll be at odds with one another. The sensually suggestive setting implies that they will be somehow romantically involved, a possibility that doubtless won’t sit well with Vanessa, the girlfriend he saved in the first movie.
With a little under a year before the movie hits theaters, this is likely just the tip of the marketing iceberg for the film. The previous movie in the newly christened franchise had an extensive, cross-media campaign that was as much a part of the movie-going experience as actually sitting down to the film in theaters. It’s safe to say that we can expect the same type of treatment the second time around.
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