Channing Tatum’s love for Ryan Reynolds goes deep.
On Monday, the “21 Jump Street” star posted a pair of Instagram photos that showed him and the “Deadpool” actor attending San Diego Comic-Con back in 2015 and almost a whole decade later at this weekend’s event.
The now-and-then snapshots were teamed with a heartfelt caption in which Tatum thanked his friend for supporting him through thick and thin.
Writing about how he witnessed the first preview of the first “Deadpool” movie at Comic-Con nearly 10 years ago, the “Magic Mike” star remembered, “I ran back stage right after and found him and I think I just hugged him and was like holy shit you did it man.”
“It’s perfect,” he said of the full-circle moment. “I didn’t know him really at all back then. But since then I can say that there is almost no one that has had my back in this industry more than Ryan.”
Tatum, who appears in the new “Deadpool & Wolverine” as the X-Men character Gambit, then thanked Reynolds for helping him make his superhero dreams a reality.
“I thought I had lost Gambit forever,” he said, referring to how he was first cast as the Cajun mutant in a standalone Gambit film only for the project to be shelved by Disney in 2019.
Albert L. Ortega via Getty Images
“But he fought for me and Gambit,” Tatum said. “I will owe him probably forever. Cause I’m not sure how I could ever do something that would be equal to what this has meant to me.”
“I love ya buddy. Shawn Levy as well,” he wrote, giving a shoutout to “Deadpool & Wolverine” director Levy. “Truly such a brilliant creator on every single level.”
“All things happen for a reason. I’m so grateful to be in this movie,” the “Fly Me to the Moon” actor added. “It’s a masterpiece in my opinion. And just pure bad ass joy. I was literally screaming in the theater. LFG!!”
Reynolds’ help finally getting Gambit onto the screen clearly meant the world to Tatum, who previously told Variety that when his initial X-Men project was canceled, he was so heartbroken he couldn’t bear to watch anything from the Marvel Cinematic Universe.
“Once Gambit went away, I was so traumatized… I shut off my Marvel machine,” he said in 2022. “I haven’t been able to see any of the movies.”
“I loved that character. It was just too sad. It was like losing a friend because I was so ready to play him.”
