I had been genuinely curious about what Marvel Studios and Disney would do with the Deadpool character after bringing him over from Fox after the merger. I wasn’t worried about the R-rating getting dropped or a dumbed-down character, but I was genuinely nervous about how they would integrate him. Unfortunately, Marvel head Kevin Feige and film director Shawn Levy didn’t even attempt to integrate Deadpool into the MCU, per se. Still, they did create a fantastic film that serves as a tremendous send-off to the Fox-created X-Men Universe and all the memories it gave fans over the years. To that end, Deadpool & Wolverine gave me everything I wanted from my viewing experience, and it left me with a $60 bill for just a popcorn tin and souvenir cup. The following review was written through my $45 popcorn tin lens.
If you expect a grand introduction of Deadpool to the Marvel Cinematic Universe grand stage, let me put the kibosh on that now. It ain’t happening. Deadpool & Wolverine is more of a stand-alone Deadpool film than an MCU film featuring Deadpool. But that doesn’t mean there aren’t plenty of comments, allusions, and macguffins (sometimes literally) to sate the fans’ appetite for MCU content. Deadpool & Wolverine still fits the bill of a comic book film and checks the vital box of being a Deadpool film. This film was a success in every way, shape, and form.
Deadpool & Wolverine picks up in the aftermath of Deadpool 2 and features our titular character down and out, working as a used car salesman and no longer with Vanessa, who left him because Wade refused to try and be a part of something larger than himself. After being rejected by the X-Men, he tries to join the Avengers, but another rejection leaves him somewhat depressed as he gathers his closest friends for his birthday. What Wade doesn’t know is that the Time Variance Authority plans to crash his birthday because the higher-ups decided he can join the Sacred Timeline (The MCU) because his timeline has been facing destruction ever since Logan died, as Logan is the “Anchor Being,” or the being that holds everything together.
The impending doom sets Wade on a journey to find a Logan that can replace “his Logan” and save the destruction of his world. I’ll end the description of the film’s events here to avoid any spoils for those who have yet to see the movie. I’ll focus on the fight choreography, writing, and cinematography instead. Marvel Studios went out of its way to provide fans with a robust, top-notch action flick with jokes and utilizes tightly choreographed fight scenes to move the film forward. They put a lot of effort into each shot, and it shows.
If you were worried about Disney sticking their family-friendly fingers into Deadpool’s raunchy humor, don’t be. All the hilariously foul and inappropriate jokes you’d expect from a Deadpool film are there. Yet, instead of relying on the low-brow humor that Fox executives seemingly expected, it feels like the Deadpool writers had tons of room to flex their creative insults, and it shows. The humor is there, but it’s not basement-level humor. The jokes have a level of intelligence that was there in previous Deadpool films, but maybe not to this extent.
I won’t touch on the film’s casting because that ventures too much into spoiler territory. Yes, this film has plenty of cameos. No, I am not going to spoil any of them. I will say that Finn managed to take the fact that everyone knew they would have cameos and still subverted expectations, making them even more fantastic in the process. I imagine it was a nearly impossible rope to walk, and casting director Sarah Finn deserves her own ongoing day of remembrance à la National Donut Day for what she pulled off.
Deadpool & Wolverine is a fantastic end to a storied period of comic cinematic history. X-Men films were iconic films that still possess the power to bring me back to my bedroom as an 18-year-old. X-Men was one of the first two DVDs I ever owned, and I damn near broke them from watching them so often. It’s funny to think that Deadpool wasn’t even supposed to get made, but Ryan Reynolds decided to take it upon himself to share that footage to create interest, and here we are almost ten years later, with Deadpool more popular than ever.
It’s hard to create three films good enough to be their own trilogy. It’s even more complicated when every single movie has a different director. Somehow or another, Deadpool managed to do this as a character, and it makes a ton of sense. If anyone was capable of doing it, Deadpool was the guy. Deadpool & Wolverine is not a film you should miss, most critically if you’ve invested any time into the other two films. There were times when I wasn’t sure if it would land, but I left that theater excited to see what Marvel had in store for the first time in a long time. I just wasn’t excited about the price of that popcorn tin.
BSO Rating 10-of-10; Just a perfect film.
