It’s been a rough year or so for Marvel. Audiences are facing ‘superhero fatigue’ after the company’s unrelenting output, with many feeling that the endless stream of films and TV series has led to lower production quality and an increasingly complicated web of characters, relationships, and plots that even ardent fans have struggled to keep up with. The result has been lackluster reception to recent shows (“Secret Invasion”) and poor critical and commercial performances for recent “Ant-Man” and “Captain Marvel” sequels. And that’s before even getting into the real-world drama involving Jonathan Majors. His character, Kang the Conquerer, was poised to be the MCU’s next über-villain until he was abruptly fired last December after a domestic violence conviction.
But as in any good film, it’s always in the darkest moments, when all hope is lost, that a hero arrives to save the day. And for us, Ryan Rynold’s foul-mouthed, katana-wielding Deadpool may just be that hero.
This is the 3rd “Deadpool” movie, and the first to be officially part of the MCU (the first two were produced by 20th Century Fox before its Disney takeover). This time, we find the “Merc with a Mouth” struggling with a midlife crisis. His attempts to grow and be more than just an obnoxious antihero have failed, and he’s prepared to give up his gun-totting, sword-wielding ways in exchange for a simple life selling minivans. But just as he’s accepting that he might be destined for superhero retirement, he’s given a second chance to finally join The Avengers in a different timeline. The only problem is that his timeline – along with everyone he knows and loves – will be destroyed. Deadpool’s initial efforts to fix his timeline fail, and he is banished to The Void, a kind of extratemporal wasteland, along with a variant from Wolverine (Hugh Jackman) from a different timeline (the one in this timeline died at the end of 2017’s “Logan”).
That sounds like a lot, and it is. Somewhere in here is stuff about “anchor beings” and the “Time Variance Association” and a “Sacred Timeline”. Keen fans will probably eat this with a spoon; for me, I kept feeling like I’d wandered into a conversation halfway through. Like many Marvel films now, the filmmakers face the dilemma of trying to catch up those who missed some of the previous parts without boring the fanboys who want less talky-talky and more stabby-stabby. And like many Marvel films, they do this with a quick dump of exposition. Blink and you’ll miss it. There’s no time to wait – we have baddies to shoot and a universe to save!
I hesitate to reveal much more since there’s a lot of fun twists and Easter eggs and cameos that fans will love. We get to meet (and in some cases remeet) a lot of forgotten characters, mostly from the “X-Men” series, and there’s plenty of jokes and a couple of fun reveals. It’s a reminder of just how sprawling and unwieldy the ever-expanding Marvel universe can be. However, your milage my vary depending on your degree of investment and knowledge in early-2000’s comic book movies (we’re talking pre-MCU, deep cuts here).
The movie’s 2 hour run-time is chock-a-block with bloody fights. Characters good and bad alike are stabbed, shot, blown up and decapitated in all manner of ways. Recent Marvel films have a reputation for bland, numbing fight sequences, but director Shawn Levy finds a way to make each set pieces feel fun with quippy dialogue and upbeat 80’s / 90’s pop music. I guess setting violent battles to *NSYNC and Madonna hits makes it all fresh again.
At its core, “Deadpool & Wolverine” is a classic buddy film, and there’s an endearing chemistry between Rynolds and Jackman as they bicker, brawl, and eventually learn to get along. You can tell they really love playing these characters, and love playing them together on screen. Reynolds’ snarky-yet-charming Deadpool contrasts well with Jackman’s dark, brooding Wolverine. When the characters finally put aside their differences, realize they have a lot in common, and work together to save the universe, the character arcs feel satisfying and well-earned.
The main weakness here is the plot. For one, the Marvel canon has expanded so much that it now requires a reference book just to follow along. The solution is lots of bland exposition where characters stop and explain who they are, what they’re doing, and why they’re doing it. And these motivations aren’t always clear. For example, Paradox (played by Matthew Macfadyen) wants to use a Time Ripper to destroy Deadpool’s timeline, even though the timeline is already dying anyways. Why? Because he’s a bad guy and baddies gotta be bad, I guess.
There’s also loads of characters who you may or may not remember from movies you may or may not have seen. More than once, the camera would dramatically pan for a shocking reveal of… someone important I didn’t recognize. And if you, like me, don’t remember this character from a movie 20 years ago, don’t worry – we’ve got more exposition for that!
But “Deadpool & Wolverine” is testing a theory: If it includes all the things people dislike about the MCU, but couches it in satire, does that make it better? And the answer is… yeah, kind of. When Deadpool stops to call out the villain’s exposition, it almost feels like he’s in on the joke with you. Later, Deadpool gives a monologue where he implores, “Can we just be done? With the whole multiverse thing? It’s not great. It’s just been miss after miss after miss.” The wink-wink to the audience almost help you forget that you are also in one of those “not great” multiverse movies.
Jokes about tired plotting and lame characters don’t necessarily undo those problems, but they help mask the film’s weaknesses. Like a magic trick or a ride at Disney World, the fun in most Marvel films comes from not thinking too much about the how or why.
Overall, “Deadpool & Wolverine” is an imperfect film. But just as I can forgive Deadpool’s crude language and wanton violence, I found myself forgiving this film, too. The mix of heart, humor, and classic Ryan Rynolds’ charm saves it. If the MCU franchise was looking for a hero, this film – much like Deadpool himself – is the flawed savior that it needs.