Nordling here.
DEADPOOL seems to be made for 13-year-old boys (and quite a lot of beefcake for the girls, too), and that's a compliment. It's got dick jokes galore, lots of glossy sex, explosions, violence, decapitations, headshots, and smart-ass humor. It walks a fine line (very fine at times) between genuinely funny and insufferably glib, and far more often than not leans towards the former. DEADPOOL is one of those films that looks deceptively easy, and credit must be given to Ryan Reynolds, who actually manages to find the emotion in the character even while being witty and delivering jokes like a machine gun, to screenwriters Rhett Reese and Paul Wernick, who fit 80 pounds of jokes into a 10 pound bag, and first-time feature film director Tim Miller, who makes everything move at a brisk pace and brings a lot of visual style to the proceedings.
I'll be honest - Deadpool the character hit right at that gap when I stopped reading comics, so it's not a character I'm overly familiar with. I know who he is - Wade Wilson, the Merc With A Mouth, the only Marvel superhero who seems to understand that he's in a comic book - and like DC's Harley Quinn, he's one of the most popular costumes at most comic conventions. Deadpool has become, for many, just as iconic as Spider-Man or Batman. When Rob Liefeld and Fabian Nicieza created Deadpool, he was strictly supporting, but his personality and wit took hold of the imaginations of readers and he was brought center stage. Deadpool isn't the easiest superhero to bring to the screen - what studio would want to throw several million dollars at a character who drops more fucks than a Scorsese movie?
Fortunately, Fox seems to be in on the joke, and while DEADPOOL plays around in the X-Universe, it's actually fairly respectful of what Bryan Singer is building there. Colosseus (voiced by Stefan Kapicic) and Negasonic Teenage Warhead (Brianna Hildebrand) are our links to those films, and it's exciting to see how they bring the X-Men Cinematic Universe into play. There are other Easter eggs throughout DEADPOOL, and not just from the X-Movies. It's also a lot of fun watching Deadpool make color commentary not only on the X-MEN movies, but superhero movies as a whole.
That's what makes DEADPOOL truly worthwhile - even Marvel Studios has been guilty of worldbuilding at the expense of characters or story, and DEADPOOL calls them on it. It's a fairly simple plot - guy meets girl, guy gets cancer, guy gets superpowers to fight cancer but suddenly finds himself in a consipracy for bad guys to take over the world, guy gets revenge, guy makes jokes. But the best aspect of DEADPOOL are the stakes. It's a movie that is very self-aware of what it's doing, not unlike Deadpool himself - this is a movie for people who want to have fun. Even the opening credits are wonderfully direct and enjoyable.
And the jokes do not stop. This is one I'll have to see again simply because audience laughter drowned out a lot of them. Screenwriters Reese and Wernick take an "everything but the kitchen sink" approach to the comedy, throwing as many lines and gags at the screen that they can. Great thing is, most of them stick. Ryan Reynolds is adept at delivering them, too, and he's the heart and soul of the movie. He's obviously having a blast, and his joy is infectious. Fans of FIREFLY's Morena Baccarin will enjoy her give-and-take with Reynolds too, and there are some pretty sultry moments with them. T.J. Miller also keeps up with Reynolds' humor, and he gets one of the best lines of the movie. Ed Skrein and Gina Carano are the villains, and it's entertaining to watch Deadpool take all the bluster and self-importance right out of them. Like Spider-Man in the comics, Deadpool's humor deflates and enrages the bad guys, and it's extremely satisfying to watch Deadpool work through a room, quipping all the while, as he punches, stabs, kicks, and shoots his way through it.
The superhero genre can contain multitudes. They don't all have to be the same - you can have your cataclysmic world-shattering events right along galactic space battles, or gritty street crimefighters, or magic-wielding extra-planar wizards. And you can have movies like DEADPOOL, which is strictly about the laughs and the entertainment. DEADPOOL even comments on the state of superhero movies in its way - at one point, the villain makes a bold claim that Wade Wilson's sense of humor will not survive what happens to him, and Wilson simply scoffs. If superhero films are going to keep going, they should be willing to adapt to change, and willing to risk it by breaking from the old Joseph Campbell tropes to attempt something new. It's harder than it seems. DEADPOOL genuinely tries to be different, and not just vulgar for vulgarity's sake. It's a lot smarter than it lets on in the marketing, clever as it has been.
This is an impressive first feature from Tim Miller - DEADPOOL is thrilling, and Miller is remarkably adept in keeping all the characters into focus as the film shifts through flackbacks and perspectives, and the action sequences are punchy and hilarious. The visual gags are great too, especially during the opening sequence. We're in for quite a few superhero movies this year, and time will tell if they are successful in their ambitions. DEADPOOL has one goal in mind - it wants you to laugh, to be entertained, and to leave the theater smiling from ear to ear. DEADPOOL is wildly entertaining and worth seeing twice. Just don't bring the kids.
Nordling, out.
