Viewers of Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2 next year can thank Deadpool for the appearance of Ego the Living Planet in the upcoming sequel.

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Speaking at a Q&A, as reported by The Playlist, Deadpool co-screenwriter Paul Wernick revealed that 20th Century Fox and Marvel Studios agreed to essentially swap the use of Ego in exchange for allowing the Deadpool creative team to use Negasonic Teenage Warhead with different powers than her comic book counterpart in this year's Deadpool."Kurt Russell [‘s Ego the Living Planet] in the new ‘Guardians’ movie was the character that Fox swapped with Marvel to [change] Negasonic Teenage Warhead powers," Wernick said.Fox had to sign off on the changes being made to Negasonic, according to Wernick, and the result was that Ego could appear in the upcoming Guardians sequel. Though all specific character rights are not known, Fox has the film rights to certain corners of the Marvel comics universe (X-Men and the Fantastic Four included), while Marvel has retained and regained rights to certain characters.Previously, Fox lost the rights to Daredevil , who has since appeared in the Marvel Cinematic Universe via the character's Netflix series, while Marvel also regained the rights to Ghost Rider , who is currently appearing on Marvel's Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D Wernick also confirmed that Deadpool 2 would, like its predecessor, work with a smaller budget and that Wernick, along with co-screenwriter Rhett Reese don't plan on filling the movie with X-Men characters Fox is currently looking for a director to direct Deadpool 2, following Tim Miller's departure from the project . John Wick director David Leitch, Luke Cage director Magnus Martens and The Martian writer Drew Goddard are all reportedly in the running Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2, meanwhile, will hit theaters on May 5, 2017. The film's first teaser trailer was recently released alongside a new poster.

Jonathon Dornbush is an Associate Editor for IGN. Find him on Twitter @jmdornbush