Free Guy director Shawn Levy explains how Disney’s acquisition of 21st Century Fox affected the film’s Easter eggs. The Ryan Reynolds-starrer initially began development at the studio known then as 20th Century Fox, before the Walt Disney Company acquired it and all its intellectual properties in 2019. Following this merger, Free Guy was one of the first projects Disney decided to continue development on under the new name, 20th Century Studios. After three postponements due to COVID-19, Free Guy is now playing in theaters.

With Levy at the helm and a script from Matt Lieberman and Zak Penn, Free Guy follows Guy (Reynolds), an unassuming bank teller who discovers he is actually an NPC (non-player character) inside a brutal, open-world video game. Once he discovers the truth of his existence and breaks free from his code, Guy decides to become a hero, rather than a bystander, and save his friends from being deleted by Antoine (Taika Waititi), the game’s creator. Given Free Guy‘s virtual setting, this gave the film’s creators a ton of leeway to include various pop culture references and nods to famous video games.

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Now, in honor of the film’s theatrical release on August 13, Free Guy director Shawn Levy gave an interview to IndieWire. In it, he discusses how he was able to tap into Disney’s vast back catalog of IPs after the company purchased Fox in March of 2019 and took over the project. Levy recounted the events below:

We noticed that our new owners were Disney, which has arguably the greatest toy chest in the history of the movie business, and we wrote them an email. I literally wrote them: “Dear Disney, this is Shawn and Ryan. We’re making ‘Free Guy.’ Can we use some of your toys?”

Free Guy‘s director went on to reveal he sent this email to then-CEO of Disney, Bob Iger, and another executive, Alan Horn. Though, Levy purposefully omitted the names of the other department heads he contacted in an attempt to avoid spoilers. It’s known Free Guy is filled with Disney Easter eggs, but Levy was careful not to reveal any more information than that. With the film now playing in theaters, audiences will have to go and see its bevy of references for themselves.

One of the first indications Free Guy might include references to the studio’s various IPs was a reaction trailer featuring Reynolds’ Deadpool and Waititi’s Korg, both Marvel characters owned by Disney. However, Reynolds says his Deadpool doesn’t a cameo appearance in the actual movie. Space Jam: A New Legacy was the latest movie to feature a preponderance of references to its studio’s pre-existing IPs. Hopefully, Free Guy includes enough exciting Easter eggs and cameos to live up to past promises.

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Source: IndieWire

Key Release Dates
  • Free Guy (2021)Release date: Aug 13, 2021
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Adam Bentz
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Adam Bentz is a movie and TV news writer for Screen Rant. From a young age, Adam has been interested in a wide range of movies and television, but it was talented auteurs like Quentin Tarantino, Paul Thomas Anderson, and Aaron Sorkin who ultimately sparked his interest in the craft. Motivated by his love for the screen, Adam studied creative writing with a concentration in screenwriting at Southern New Hampshire University.

After graduating, Adam interned as a writer with The Borgen Project, a nonprofit organization working to end extreme poverty. Other than writing for Screen Rant, Adam reviews films on his website adambentz.wordpress.com

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