Deadpool & Wolverine (2024)

Director: Shawn Levy

Cast: Ryan Reynolds, Hugh Jackman, Emma Corrin, Matthew Macfadyen

Have I Seen It Before: Nope. Did a quick survey of MCU films since Avengers: Endgame (2019), and I’m running at just over 50%. So the fact that I made a point to see this on opening weekend has to count for something.

Did I Like It: I’m not sure if I did love it.

I almost want there to be some calamitous reshuffling of the Marvel Cinematic Universe at this point, where there’s a promise that anything—good or bad—can happen from here on in. This film threatened it, promising a traffic jam with all of the non-MCU movies, but everything is put to essentially back to the status quo by the time we reach the post-credit tag. I was more intrigued/flabbergasted (and equal measures of both) by the announcement at Comic Con that Robert Downey Jr. will make a return paycheck—er, performance—as Victor Von Doom in the forthcoming Avengers films than anything that happens in the film.

A best, the film seems to acknowledge the errors—both forced unforced—in The Multiverse Saga, and want to poo-poo the whole practice of multiverse movies totally. Will it even be called The Multiverse Saga anymore? One has to wonder. But try as it might not to complete re-write the formula, Deadpool (Reynolds) and company seem to want to let the fanboys know that the studio is aware there’s a transition going on, and so it manages to be at least nominally weighed down by the same table-setting that soured the fun in some of the weakest entries in the series like Iron Man 2 (2010) and Avengers: Age of Ultron (2015).

But who cares about all of that? Was the movie, despite all of the fan service that it needs to accomplish—funny? Largely, yes. I was laughing throughout. Some of the comic sequences are pretty inventive—especially the opening where Deadpool puts to rest how the movie will handle Wolverine’s (Jackman) death in Logan (2017). Word play abounds. But is it a great sign—for me as a human being, or the film as an enduring comedy—that the two jokes which I laughed at the loudest and are stuck in my head a day later both deal with famous people divorce? One of those jokes even appeared to be delivered without the subject being aware—thanks to Deadpool’s easy to ADR costume—but the other one had full—if appropriately weary—participation from the part involved.

The Voices (2014)

Director: Marjane Satrapi

Cast: Ryan Reynolds, Gemma Arterton, Anna Kendrick, Jacki Weaver

Have I Seen It Before: Wasn’t even aware of it until it got on the to-be-watched list for Beyond the Cabin in the Woods.

Did I Like It: It’s probably not a great sign that I feel overwhelmingly compelled to view the film as a series of parts rather than as a whole package. If the movie doesn’t hit one as single entity, there’s something wrong in the mix.

I think the death of Lisa (Kendrick) is one of the more deeply unsettling things I’ve seen in a horror movie. It isn’t flashy or salacious. It’s slow and painful and deeply terrifying. Then Jerry (Reynolds) cuts her head off.

Reynolds himself is aquitting himself well in the film, giving a hint of the chaos he never was allowed to unleash in X-Men: Origins: Wolverine (2009)* and would eventually be granted the liberty to be the most Ryan Reynolds he could be…

And yet, I don’t love that ending. This all ends with a musical number, and in the context of Jerry’s final synapses firing, I suppose it makes sense, but from a perspective of tone alone, am I supposed to believe the basest parts of his brain just wants everybody to be happy, and is in fact jaunty and happy itself?

That all could be forgiven, and maybe even written off as a matter of mood of the reviewer at the time he watched the film. What can’t quite be shaken off is the fact that, even above the horror movie average, the plot flies apart with even the most casual of scrutiny. The amount of people who die here, simply because they took it upon themselves to look into the disappearance of another character without even mentioning it to the police almost absolves poor Jerry of some of his guilt.

*I don’t know if I’ll ever come around to watching that one again to write a review, but it probably is worth mentioning: If your title needs more than one colon, you’re in trouble.

Deadpool (2016)

Director: Tim Miller

Cast: Ryan Reynolds, Morena Baccarin, Ed Skrein, T.J. Miller

Have I Seen it Before: Oh, sure. Recently I’ve been trying to get over my physical media absolutism, if for no other reason than digital copies have been included with a lot of the discs I have bought over the years, and I’ve just been letting them languish as flyers in cases for so long. Incidentally? Anything now owned by Disney—including the Fox X-Men films, like Deadpool—will let you redeem your digital codes long after a possible expiration date is listed. Anything owned by Warner Bros. won’t let you even think about it. In fact, if you try to redeem a a GIF of David Zaslav appears on the screen and suggests you have an improper relationship with your mother.

Did I Like It: As I began this re-watch, I was honestly surprised that I haven’t watched this one since starting these reviews. But then I kind of got it. While Wade Wilson is a unique presence in comic book films, his humor works best on initial viewing, and on subsequent re-watches begins to resemble the noises—but not the material—of a Robin Williams stand up routine at best, or the ill-fated “Mr. Monopoly” bit from Ace Ventura: When Nature Calls (1995). Those might be two extremes, but the snesible middle ground may be to describe the whole affair as an attempt to jam a mid-2000s Judd Apatow comedy into the CGI-laden trappings of a superhero movie. Even seven years ago was Judd Apatow still making Judd Apatow comedies?

The film works at its best when it leans less on the merc’s mouth and more on trying to subvert expectations, especially where its awareness that it must be a cheaper version of the X-Men movies that haphazardly inspired it. Luckily, there are more than enough of those moments to make the entire film something more enjoyable than a chore.

Deadpool 2 (2018)

Director: David Leitch

Cast: Ryan Reynolds, Josh Brolin, Morena Baccarin, Zazie Beetz

Have I Seen it Before: Yep.

Did I Like It: Yes. Could have definitely been a drag, but it fires on all cylinders, and even… Well, give me a second on that thought.

Let’s start our discussion with a few questions. How many comedy sequels are just as good as the predecessor? I’ll wait. Like, maybe Bill and Ted’s Bogus Journey (1991)? Debatable. Gremlins 2: The New Batch (1990)? I’d give a resounding, even combative yes here, but would you even place that series exclusively in the realm of comedy? 

Let’s widen the lens a little bit. How many comedy sequels are even watchable? Ghostbusters 2 (1989)? Some would say no, but I think they’re wrong. Anchorman 2: The Legend Continues (2014)? Again arguable, but it’s hard not to notice the precipitous drop in quality.

For each of these possible answers, there are just as many that are absolute train wrecks. Caddyshack II (1988). Blues Brothers 2000 (1998, for some reason). The Whole Ten Yards (2004). Analyze That (2002). More Fockers than you can shake a tree at.

Okay, now let’s ask the question that seems silly on spec: How many comedy sequels are better than their original?

Yeah, I’m having a hard time coming up with anything. Which makes this follow-up all the more miraculous. While the original Deadpool (2016) was a shock and a surprise, given that mainstream culture had next to no awareness of the character beyond a pale imitation injected into the perfectly forgettable X-Men: Origins: Wolverine (2009). But here, the manic sense of fun pulled directly from the source material is not watered-down and in fact intensified.

The beating, weepy heart of Deadpool/Wade Wilson (Ryan Reynolds, the sing movie star most in touch with his id) is on full display, miraculously giving him an emotional arc while still managing to keep his edge sharp. He defends abused kids, he loves the people around him fully, and still manages to teabag Josh Brolin in the process.

If the character does end up a casualty of Disney’s acquisition of 20th Century Fox, that’d be a shame. A third movie would really be something else.