This article contains spoilers for Deadpool & Wolverine.
As well as its two title stars, Deadpool & Wolverine boasts a number of cameos and surprise appearances from other Marvel characters, many of which draw upon the legacy of the Fox Marvel Universe, and serve as something of a last hurrah for the actors who played them. So, there’s Wesley Snipes as Blade (the daddy of the Marvel movie, and a New Line character), Jennifer Garner as Elektra, Chris Evans as not Captain America, but The Human Torch, and Channing Tatum as Gambit, the character he was set to play in his own solo movie, but never got the chance.
But the most emotional appearance in the movie goes to Dafne Keen, who reprises her role as Laura/X-23, the young mutant who effectively became Wolverine’s surrogate daughter in James Mangold’s masterful Logan back in 2017. Her campfire scene in the movie, sharing a heart-to-heart with Hugh Jackman’s Wolverine (one who, crucially, has never met her, but can feel their unshakeable bond anyway) is perhaps the most pivotal in the film. It gives Keen, now 19, a chance to reunite with Jackman, and to play a role she feels a huge connection with. “She fills every creative void in me, in a big way,” she says.
We were delighted when Keen popped along to the Empire Podcast studio to sit down with Chris Hewitt for an in-depth chat about how she returned to the role of Laura, the experience of shooting the film, and what may lie ahead. You can hear the full interview, including a spoilerific detour into her recent role in The Acolyte, on this week’s Empire Podcast – but here are five things we learned from our chat with her.
She Wasn’t Expecting The Call
“I honestly didn’t think it was going to happen,” says Keen. When she got the call from her agent, she was in the bath, of all places. “She was like, ‘I’m really sorry for the late call, but I thought you would want to hear this ASAP: ‘you’re doing Deadpool if you want to.’ I was like, ‘I don’t think I can say no to that! I got out of the bath — could not give less of a shit – and walked over, completely soaking, to my friend’s house and was like, ‘I don’t know what just happened!”
Alfonso Cuaron Was Among The First People To Know
Keen’s best friend, it turns out, is Bu Cuaron, the daughter of Alfonso. And if she was the first to hear Keen’s special news, her dad was not too far behind. “Alfonso came in from a long day of shooting Disclaimer,” laughs Keen, “and Bu was like, ‘Dafne’s in Deadpool!’ He was like, ‘Oh, cool’. Random.”
She Loved Her Reunion With Hugh Jackman
Jackman has remained a major presence in Keen’s life since Logan, although they hadn’t seen each other for a while. “Since the Empire Awards in 2018, actually,” Keen reveals. “Getting to act with him again was wonderful. I genuinely don’t think I’m better with any other actor. My best acting is when I’m with him.” The campfire sequence — which initially featured Reynolds as Deadpool — was particularly memorable for her. “It was a really beautiful scene that they wrote for us,” she says. “It perfectly encapsulated Logan’s guilt and Laura’s guilt for not having said ‘thank you’. She's getting a second chance, which you don’t usually get.”
"She’s such a fun character to play emotionally, she’s so demanding physically, which is something that I love doing. I’d kill to do it again."
She Enjoyed Indulging Her Action Heroine Side
In one scene, at Cassandra Nova’s lair, Keen gets to pop Laura’s claws again, getting involved in a confrontation with this week’s Juggernaut (Aaron W Reed). “It was just really fun to get back into the action,” says Keen. “That’s how I discovered the character to begin with. She has such a specific sound that I created for her when I was eleven. Finding that sound again as a 19 year old immediately snapped me into the way she screams. A lot of those fights were trying to simulate exact moves from Logan."
She’s Up For Continuing Laura’s Journey
At the end of the movie, Laura has been plucked from The Void and plonked in Deadpool’s world alongside Jackman’s Wolverine variant. Which means she may well be around when Avengers: Doomsday and Avengers: Secret Wars come into play. For her part, Keen is, well, more than keen to carry on playing the character. “I would 100% do this for the rest of my life,” she says. “She’s such a fun character to play emotionally, she’s so demanding physically, which is something that I love doing. I’d kill to do it again.” No need for action that drastic. We imagine an email to Kevin Feige will suffice.
To hear more from Keen, check out this week’s Empire Podcast here.