Ryan Reynolds reveals baby #4 is a boy during meeting with a father who lost his son
He met with a father who previously lost his son, a huge Deadpool fan, sharing in his memory.
A year and a half after welcoming baby #4 with his wife, Blake Lively, Ryan Reynolds has officially confirmed that the couple are proud parents to a boy—a big deal given that the Lively-Reynolds home had previously been filled with adorable leading ladies. Reynolds’ surprise reveal came during his promotional tour for Deadpool & Wolverine, with the actor sharing their son’s name and sex on two separate occasions.
First, Reynolds thanked his daughters James, 9, Inez, 7, and Betty, 4, before dropping the name of their fourth child, Olin, in a speech at the New York City premiere of the film on July 23, as reported by E! News.
“I hope that, if I’m lucky, this moment will be the most traumatic thing—that is, the contents of this movie—that happens in your wondrous life,” he said of his four kids. I love that my entire family is here,” he added. He also praised Lively for her perfectly on-theme outfit at the premiere. “Her outfit is amazing, spoiler alert,” he said.
Then, Reynolds returned to his hometown of Vancouver, where he met John Bell, a soccer fan who lost his young son, Jake, to suicide. Bell, a huge Wrexham AFC fan, now honors Jake by advocating for mental health awareness, walking 270 miles carrying a decorated bathtub—a poignant representation of “the burden of weight that people carry when they struggle with mental health,” as Bell pointed out.
Reynolds treated Bell to “the proper Hollywood Deadpool treatment,” by way of realistic movie makeup along with his Deadpool suit, inviting him to share in memories of Jake.
“Where do I start? He was just so funny, so comical—and we did everything together. He was my firstborn son. He was just absolutely everything to me,” Bell said of his late son.
Bell admitted he was “in a very dark place” after losing Jake, adding, “I was planning my own death and talking myself into staying because my family needs me, my kids need me. What I do now keeps me alive daily because I’ve made my peace with death. I’m gonna be reunited with him at some point, but it damn right ain’t now.”
Reynolds commended Bell for his bravery amid such unimaginable pain. “The resilience it takes to, you know, put one foot in front of the other as many times as you’ve done it, and transmute that much grief into something powerfully useful,” he said. “I’m very grateful that you shared his story.”
“I want to share with you that I too have a son and that if… boy, John, if I love him one-tenth as much as you love Jake, I feel like I’ve done a pretty damn good job,” he added.
In the film, little Olin even makes his big screen debut as Baby Pool alongside big sister Inez, who plays Kid Pool. Lively makes a cameo as well, starring as Lady Deadpool. And it turns out that the couple might even be considering baby #5—Reynolds recently told E! News, “The more the merrier,” joking they’d like “as many as possible. As many little heartbeats as possible, just running around, wrecking stuff in the house. I love it. Let’s have more!”
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