Cameos are one of the easiest ways to get a big laugh or a cheer at the movie theater, as long as you pull it off right. The superhero genre is full of them, as creators know that even the smallest of easter eggs will be discovered by comic book obsessives and spread across the internet. In fact, it has gotten to the point where everyone knows to expect comic book creator Stan Lee to turn up for a one-line role in Marvel movies, as he's been doing for the last 18 years.

Now that the sub-genre has taken over the whole medium, bigger and bigger Hollywood names are lining up to get a piece of the action. I mean, last year we had Cate Blanchett play a Thor villain, and it has been rumored that Jake Gyllenhaal is going to play a Spider-man villain. It won't be long before we see Daniel Day-Lewis come out of his recent retirement to play Doctor Octopus.

For the most recognizable stars, the best way to be a part of the biggest movies of the moment without actually investing months of your time shooting, re-shooting and on endless press junkets, is to drop in for a quick cameo. One of the most obvious ones recently was the trio of actors who turned up in Thor: Ragnarok last year.

Serving as a funny gag and an easy way to remind the audience of the events of the (let's be honest, pretty bad) Thor: The Dark World, we saw an Asgardian play - with Luke Hemsworth, Sam Neill, and Matt Damon hamming it up.

One of the biggest movies to be released this year is Deadpool 2, which had its fair share of cameos. Given that its main character can break the fourth wall, talking to the audience and seeming to be fully aware he's in a superhero movie, it's easy to throw in some actor cameos for the sake of it. This superhero sequel was chocked full of them - in fact, it should be warned that the rest of this article includes spoilers.

There are plenty of surprising additions to the cast, with Brad Pitt appearing in a blink-and-you'll-miss-it role as the (mostly) invisible mutant Vanisher, an edited version from X-Men Origins: Wolverine, and Ryan Reynolds starring as himself in a post-credits gag. But there was another celebrity cameo hidden that those that saw the film completely missed.

When Cable (Josh Brolin) first arrives in the present day, he comes across two men and steals their truck. In their brief altercation, I made out that one of the men was actor Alan Tudyk, but the other looked unfamiliar. Well, as it turns out - that trucker was played by none other than Matt Damon, under a load of prosthetics. Seems like the actor can't get enough of these bite-sized roles.

According to Deadpool 2 director David Leitch, the idea came from a conversation between Damon and Reynolds, who are good friends outside of the business. Apparently, Damon was in the makeup chair for three hours, and no one on set was able to recognize him.

Speaking to Collider about the addition of Pitt to the cast for an even smaller role, Reynolds explained that he pitched the gag as "the most wasteful way to use the biggest movie star in the world," claiming that the actor was on set for "about seven minutes" - and accepted a cup of coffee as payment.

Cameos are one of the easiest ways to get a big laugh or a cheer at the movie theater, as long as you pull it off right. The superhero genre is full of them, as creators know that even the smallest of easter eggs will be discovered by comic book obsessives and spread across the internet. In fact, it has gotten to the point where everyone knows to expect comic book creator Stan Lee to turn up for a one-line role in Marvel movies, as he's been doing for the last 18 years.

Now that the sub-genre has taken over the whole medium, bigger and bigger Hollywood names are lining up to get a piece of the action. I mean, last year we had Cate Blanchett play a Thor villain, and it has been rumored that Jake Gyllenhaal is going to play a Spider-man villain. It won't be long before we see Daniel Day-Lewis come out of his recent retirement to play Doctor Octopus.

For the most recognizable stars, the best way to be a part of the biggest movies of the moment without actually investing months of your time shooting, re-shooting and on endless press junkets, is to drop in for a quick cameo. One of the most obvious ones recently was the trio of actors who turned up in Thor: Ragnarok last year.

Serving as a funny gag and an easy way to remind the audience of the events of the (let's be honest, pretty bad) Thor: The Dark World, we saw an Asgardian play - with Luke Hemsworth, Sam Neill, and Matt Damon hamming it up.

One of the biggest movies to be released this year is Deadpool 2, which had its fair share of cameos. Given that its main character can break the fourth wall, talking to the audience and seeming to be fully aware he's in a superhero movie, it's easy to throw in some actor cameos for the sake of it. This superhero sequel was chocked full of them - in fact, it should be warned that the rest of this article includes spoilers.

There are plenty of surprising additions to the cast, with Brad Pitt appearing in a blink-and-you'll-miss-it role as the (mostly) invisible mutant Vanisher, an edited version from X-Men Origins: Wolverine, and Ryan Reynolds starring as himself in a post-credits gag. But there was another celebrity cameo hidden that those that saw the film completely missed.

When Cable (Josh Brolin) first arrives in the present day, he comes across two men and steals their truck. In their brief altercation, I made out that one of the men was actor Alan Tudyk, but the other looked unfamiliar. Well, as it turns out - that trucker was played by none other than Matt Damon, under a load of prosthetics. Seems like the actor can't get enough of these bite-sized roles.

According to Deadpool 2 director David Leitch, the idea came from a conversation between Damon and Reynolds, who are good friends outside of the business. Apparently, Damon was in the makeup chair for three hours, and no one on set was able to recognize him.

Speaking to Collider about the addition of Pitt to the cast for an even smaller role, Reynolds explained that he pitched the gag as "the most wasteful way to use the biggest movie star in the world," claiming that the actor was on set for "about seven minutes" - and accepted a cup of coffee as payment.