by Cain Noble-Davies
Worth: $16.50
FilmInk rates movies out of $20 — the score indicates the amount we believe a ticket to the movie to be worth
Cast:
Ryan Reynolds, Hugh Jackman, Matthew Macfadyen, Emma Corrin, Jon Favreau, Rob Delaney, Morena Baccarin
Intro:
Whether you’re a fan of the old, the new, or just the long underpants crew in general, Deadpool & Wolverine will take you there.
Much like when Deadpool 2 was declared a “family film”, Deadpool & Wolverine also opens with a joke that only gets funnier once it sinks in just how seriously the film itself will take it.
Here, it’s with Deadpool (Ryan Rey… nah, he’s just Deadpool) digging up the corpse of Wolverine from the end of Logan. It’s a moment that plays into the audacity of messing with one of the few genuine conclusions to be found in a modern blockbuster, let alone superhero blockbuster, but it also sets up Deadpool’s attitude and that of the film around him – a tribute to the past that’s far less morbid than it initially appears.
This essentially does for Fox’s pre-MCU Marvel films what No Way Home did for the Sony Spider-Man series, tipping the hat to some old favourites in a way that goes past mere fan recognition and into real understanding of why they’re still loved to this day… Quite a bold move, considering Fox’s old catalogue has entries that even the rosiest of nostalgia goggles can’t salvage (you’d have better luck finding defenders for One More Day than for Fant4stic), but it’s done with a commendable lack of cynicism. It brings up the bones of the past, and then reveals that those bones can still absolutely wreck shit today… when put in the right hands, of course.
From the quips to the cheesy pop soundtrack to the distractingly-wonky CGI work, this is a Deadpool movie through and through, and it works for a lot of the same reasons as 2 did. It may not have the same Wham! factor as that film’s surprising amount of heart, but only because it’s to be expected by now. Deadpool is still the lovable arsehole with genuine aspirations of being a hero, taking everything from the pathos of the Joe Kelly run to the fluidity of the Corps to the disarming moments of Uncanny X-Force to show the many facets of the Merc with a Mouth.
As for Hugh Jackman returning as the iconic razor-clawed Canadian, his legendary swan song is allowed to stand on its own in the background while he slips into a different shade of berserker blues that latches onto the same emotional wavelength. Their pairing embodies the careful balancing act that makes the whole thing work – genuine heart and respect combined with a willingness to mock the hell out of just about everything. Nothing is sacred, and yet everything is sacred, because hate is wasted on what you don’t love.
And not just when it comes to past films either, as the utilisation of the multiverse here to explore both Deadpool and the larger Marvel continuity sets a standard that the MCU should have been following from the start. Old faces and legacies are given an invigorating spit shine, allowing those who got unfairly forgotten or sidelined to properly make their mark, and it even pokes at the absurdity that making these characters viable today is something that needs to be ‘cracked’. It fulfils the role that Deadpool as an ideal should play, as the jester keeping the bastards honest, and does so by having fun because of what’s around it rather than in spite of it. It basically takes the Grant Morrison ‘it all counts’ approach to established canon, acknowledging what laid the groundwork for the MCU (even the more lambasted moments) because they all led to this. Was Deadpool completely wasted in X-Men Origins: Wolverine? Yes. Would we have the real Deadpool today if that film didn’t happen? Maybe not. This is comic book history Babylon-style.
Deadpool & Wolverine is fanservice done right, sticking to the energetic action and earnest heart that made the Fox-era films work while taking that same redemption of the flawed and applying it to past stories that, both fairly and unfairly, haven’t been remembered as they should. It’s a collective gesture of goodwill that feels like both the culmination of just about every reaction to the initial Fox acquisition in 2017, and a display of convincing fondness for the characters involved that avoids the soullessness associated with this level of toybox cross-promotion filmmaking; Space Jam: A New Legacy, this is not. Whether you’re a fan of the old, the new, or just the long underpants crew in general, Deadpool & Wolverine will take you there.
