Avengers: Infinity War managed to squeeze in just about every single major character from the first ten years of the Marvel Cinematic Universe, except Ant-Man and Hawkeye, of course, but their time will come in Avengers 4. Still, there’s only so much room in even such a super-sized movie, and at least one planned cameo had to be cut. We’re talking, of course, about the role of Jon Favreau’s Happy Hogan.
While chatting with EW, Infinity War co-director Joe Russo explained that there’s a deleted scene found on the film’s home video release which reveals Happy’s original role. He was to have appeared in the early sequence which follows Tony and Pepper as they stroll through the park. However, pacing issues required that it be removed from the final cut of the movie.
“Oh yes! There is a deleted scene where Jon Favreau/Happy and I make an appearance in the park. The movie was really long and we were looking for places to pace it up in the opening and unfortunately that was one of the things we had to cut. But I was willing to cut my own cameo in the movie so it shows how much we really needed to get that park scene moving. It was also really hard to cut Jon as he is such a funny performer and we loved working with him.”
The deleted scene in question sees Tony and Pepper pestered on their walk by Bert, Russo’s character, a nosy photographer who tries to snap the happy couple but is ushered away by Happy. This appears to fit in just before Doctor Strange arrives to ask for Iron Man’s help.
If he’d made it into Infinity War, this would have been Happy’s fifth appearance in the MCU. As Tony’s good friend and (former) bodyguard, he showed up in the first three Iron Man films, the first two of which were directed by Favreau himself. He later turned up in Spider-Man: Homecoming as well, effectively acting as Peter Parker’s reluctant handler.
Other deleted scenes include some extra comedy with the Guardians of the Galaxy, more of Gamora and Thanos and some further time shared with Scarlet Witch and Vision. And you can catch them all on the DVD and Blu-Ray of Avengers: Infinity War, which is now available.