Deadpool & Wolverine originally planned to show an 'intentionally bad' fake movie in theaters

Ryan Reynolds is pulling back the curtain on how Deadpool & Wolverine nearly snuck into movie theaters under a very different title. 

While braving the Hot Ones gauntlet with costar Hugh Jackman on Thursday, the actor revealed that its team had initially planned to create and release a crappy fake movie that would play on screen for about five minutes before cutting to the actual film. 

"I'm shocked that we managed to get through this without some of our biggest surprises ending up even being hypothesized online, but, man, it’s hard to keep a secret," Reynolds confessed. "I’ve never talked about this before, but… the original idea with this movie was to shoot a fake movie called Alpha Cop that was intentionally bad. I even had one of the posters made." 

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Reynolds explained that the fictional movie’s premise centered around "two guys who are sharing one brain and together they make the ultimate cop."

"The poster says, 'Alpha Cop: two cops, one brain, all balls,'" he said. “And it was meant to be kind of, like, horrible, so 10 people in America would go to see this movie on opening weekend and five minutes into the movie, the Marvel logo would flip up and it would actually be Deadpool & Wolverine.” 

They ultimately didn’t go through with the idea because it would have been "heartbreaking" if news of the gag leaked ahead of the film's release, Reynolds added. "But we’ve been lucky on this one! Some stuff has come out, but not [much]."

Hot Ones host Sean Evans noted that it would have been equally devastating for audiences really looking forward to seeing Alpha Cop. "That’s true," Reynolds conceded, laughing. 

The team behind Deadpool & Wolverine worked hard to combat leaks during production, with Reynolds going as far as posting doctored set photos last December that featured him hanging out with Mickey Mouse, the Predator, and Steve Urkel. 

Meanwhile, director Shawn Levy recently told Entertainment Weekly that the practical sets they used were worth the leaks online. 

"With that decision came risk, and that risk was illustrated on day one, shooting in a quarry where a phalanx of paparazzi was perched up above on a hillside," he said. "That's the price we paid for wanting a movie that felt grounded and real. And I will tell you, that's a price we're comfortable paying when it comes to some of the secrets and surprises in the movie."

Alpha Cop — sorry, Deadpool & Wolverine — hits theaters on July 26. Watch Reynolds and Jackman eat some hot wings and dish on it in the video above.