Apparently the venerable Sir Patrick Stewart has no idea what the word “retire” means. Despite announcing he would no longer play Professor Charles Xavier following his and Hugh Jackman’s final joint appearance in the hugely successful Logan, the 76-year-old British thespian has already teased a possible Deadpool 2 cameo. To complicate matters even further, Stewart told The Late Late Show‘s James Corden he was game for a gig on the hit FX series Legion — a show that just so happens to concern his character’s son.
“There will never be a more perfect time, a more appropriate time, than to say thank you and goodbye to this franchise,” Stewart said amidst the audience’s collective groans of sadness. “However,” he added, “somebody has mentioned Deadpool… it’s not for me to say.” Stewart’s reference to his discussing the possibility with MTV drew plenty of cheers from Corden’s studio, but it was Legion‘s Dan Stevens who brought up the fact his character, David Haller, was technically the son of Xavier.
“What about Professor X in Legion?” Stevens asked Stewart. Everyone in The Late Late Show audience loved the idea — including the elder actor — when Stevens explained his reasoning. “Technically Patrick, Sir Patrick, plays my father. I mean, Professor X is David Haller’s father in the Marvel universe. An excited, if not somewhat surprised Stewart asked Corden if he already knew about this, and when the show host quizzed him about the possibility, the elder actor said “absolutely, 100 percent!”
Of course, whether or not Stewart will ever appear in Noah Hawley’s excellent series remains to be seen. After all, Haller the the nature of his parentage — let alone Haller himself — is at the core of Legion‘s many mysteries. So perhaps Stewart’s involvement isn’t all that necessary. Then again, as Logan director James Mangold told us, “Patrick’s been kind of killed twice” but still managed to return to the X-Men franchise following his character’s first death. So who knows?
