20th Century Fox has revealed the first trailer forFree Guy. This is the latest from director Shawn Levy (Real Steel,Night at the Museum) who has partnered withDeadpoolstar Ryan Reynolds for his latest big screen effort. In this case, Levy is tackling a video game movie, but not one based on a real video game. Instead, Reynolds is playing a character in a fictional video game, but with something of aTruman Showtwist. After a couple of teasers that didn’t contain any actual footage, the studio has finally provided us with our first real look at the movie.
As teased in yesterday’sFree Guy infomercial, the story centers on a bank teller (Ryan Reynolds) who is settled into the simple routine that is his life. However, things are shaken up in a big way when he discovers he’s simply an NPC, a non-playable character in a massive, violent open world video game. Surprisingly, this lowly bank teller ends up being caught up in a much larger story. Hollywood has a complicated history with video game movies.
They’ve been a staple of the industry since the mid-90s, but only recently did studios begin to crack the code. Interestingly, Ryan Reynolds was part of that equation with this year’sDetective Pikachu. ThisFree Guy trailerproves this to be something of a different beast though, as it’s not adapting a real game.
A bank teller who discovers he is actuallyNPC in an open-world video game, decides to become the hero of his own story…one he rewrites himself. Now in a world where there are no limits, he is determined to be the guy who saves his world his way…before it is too late. Starring Ryan Reynolds, Jodie Comer, Joe Keery, Lil Rel Howery, Utkarsh Ambudkar and Taika Waititi.
Shawn Levy has had a very successful career directing family-friendly movies such as theNight at the Museumtrilogy and comedies likeDate NightandThe Internship. In recent years, he’s had a great deal of success as a producer, as one of the creative forces behind Netflix’s hitStranger Things. Ryan Reynolds, in addition to his starring role, serves as a producer. Greg Berlanti and Sarah Schechter, the team behind the CW’s Arrowverse shows, are on board as producers as well. The script was penned by Matt Lieberman (The Addams Family,The Christmas Chronicles).
The cast also includes Taika Waititi (Thor: Ragnarok,What We Do in the Shadows), Channing Tatum (21 Jump Street,Magic Mike), Utkarsh Ambudkar (Brittany Runs a Marathon,Pitch Perfect), Lil Rel Howery (Get Out,Uncle Drew), Jodie Comer (Killing Eve, Doctor Foster}) and Joe Keery (Stranger Things,Molly’s Game). This is one of the projects that was in the pipeline before Disney completed its $71.3 billion merger with Fox earlier this year. So far, many of the movies produced by Fox that Disney has subsequently released have bombed at the box office, withDark PhoenixandStuberserving as just a couple of examples.
This, however, seems like the kind of movie that could wind up becoming a hit, as all of the right ingredients seem to be in place. Reynolds has becomea bankable and in-demand starin recent years, largely thanks to theDeadpoolfranchise. Perhaps this can help turn things around on that front for Disney.Free Guyis set to hit theaters on July 25, 2025, from20th Century Fox. Be sure to check out the trailer for yourself.
