Ryan Reynolds says his critically panned box-office flop ‘Green Lantern’ taught him a lifelong lesson

“Green Lantern” wasn’t loved by fans or critics, but it did leave its leading man, Ryan Reynolds, with a lifelong lesson that has been critical to his later successes.

“Too much money, too much time wrecks creativity. And constraint is the greatest creative tool you can possibly have,” Reynolds, 48, said during a discussion onstage at the Time100 Summit in New York attended by Business Insider.

Reynolds portrayed DC Comics superhero Hal Jordan/Green Lantern in the 2011 film “Green Lantern.” The movie also introduced the actor to his now-wife, Blake Lively, who played his love interest, Carol Ferris.

However, “Green Lantern” is largely regarded as one of the worst comic-book adaptations ever, with a 25% critics score and a 45% audience rating on review aggregator Rotten Tomatoes. “Green Lantern” earned $237 million worldwide on a reported budget of $200 million.

Reynolds has spoken about the movie’s shortcomings, telling the Los Angeles Times in 2016 that it was “fundamentally doomed from the start” because of a weak script and story.

At the Time100 Summit, Reynolds said that he saw “a lot of money” get spent on “Green Lantern,” and the project was ultimately “just spectacle.” That realization was key for Reynolds.

“Character over spectacle is the lesson that I took with me,” Reynolds said. “In retrospect, I think that really changed my point of view.”

Reynolds went on to have commercial success with his stand-alone 2016 film Deadpool, in which he played the Marvel antihero Wade Wilson/Deadpool. The movie, which Reynolds spent 11 years developing, earned an 85% critics’ score on Rotten Tomatoes and grossed $782 million worldwide.

The 2018 sequel was received with similar fanfare, landing an 84% critics’ score and grossing $785 million globally.

Reynolds most recently reprised the role for the third film, “Deadpool and Wolverine,” which costarred Hugh Jackman as Logan/Wolverine. The movie scored a 78% critics rating and a 94% audience score and exceeded $1 billion globally, becoming the second highest-grossing film of 2024.

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