Despite the film becoming the highest-grossing R-rated film of all time, the sequel to irreverent superhero film Deadpool is on unsteady ground at the moment. This past weekend, we reported director Tim Miller had dropped out of the follow-up, supposedly over “amicable” creative differences with star Ryan Reynolds. And the internet hates a void, even one so fleeting as the temporary loss of a director to a comic-book action film (especially such a void, really), so an enterprising fan named Carl Champion Jr. (slogan: “My last name is Champion”) has launched a Change.org petition to recruit Quentin Tarantino for the job.
“If there was ever a chance to see Tarantino do a project almost guaranteed to make a billion dollars, this is it,” begins the pitch, which is a strange way to start, given that almost no one’s No. 1 dream project for the idiosyncratic director is “something that makes a billion dollars,” unless that someone is Quentin Tarantino. But really, Champion Jr. just seems to think it would be a good match of artistic vision. He elaborates on the director’s strengths in genre-mashing, ultra-violent action, and the all-important writing. “Quentin Tarantino is the master of writing dialogue, and Ryan Reynolds is a master of delivering dialogue,” he argues, and for their part, neither the actor nor director has stepped in to disagree.
As of this writing, the petition is more than 90 percent of the way to hitting its goal, not surprising when you consider what the internet likes to reward: Fun and inventive movies, and in this case, one that also vaguely resembles the cinematic equivalent of a particularly inspired Reddit joke thread.