Deadpool & Wolverine (2024)
Directed by: Shawn Levy
Premise: The third Deadpool film. Wade Wilson/Deadpool (Ryan Reynolds) discovers that his reality and all the people he loves will be destroyed by the Time Variance Authority. Deadpool recruits Wolverine (Hugh Jackman) to save his world.
What Works: Deadpool & Wolverine is fundamentally a buddy action comedy and the strongest aspect of the picture is the banter between actors Ryan Reynolds and Hugh Jackman. Deadpool is annoyingly verbose and smug whereas Wolverine is somber and no nonsense and Reynolds and Jackman play off each other effectively. As in many buddies-in-action pictures, the men grate on each other but eventually form a friendship that’s emotionally satisfying. Wolverine was killed off in 2017’s Logan but the filmmakers of Deadpool & Wolverine use Marvel’s multiverse concept to bring him back and the opening credit sequence recaptures the naughty and subversive spirit of the original Deadpool film. The rest of the picture falls short of that but Deadpool & Wolverine is consistently funny with a mix of blue humor and some of the best self-referential jokes in this franchise. The filmmakers lean into the fan service and viewers who are familiar with these pictures ought to enjoy the references. This film marks the end of the 20th Century Fox era of Marvel films and Deadpool & Wolverine plays as a swan song for that quarter century of comic book pictures.
What Doesn’t: Deadpool & Wolverine often feels as though it exists to fulfill a marketing imperative rather than motivated by a need to explore characters or tell a story. The concept elucidated in its title—combining two of the most popular X-Men characters—is the entirety of the film’s reason to exist. The story feels disconnected from the previous Deadpool pictures which were centered on the character’s relationship to Vanessa (Morena Baccarin). The third film opens with the lovers separated because Deadpool has inexplicably given up superheroism. The character is supposedly on this adventure to save Vanessa and the rest of his friends but that motivation is secondary. Deadpool’s primary drive is to prove himself worthy of being a hero, a motivation that completely contradicts the antihero essence of the character especially as he was established in the previous films. Wolverine’s tragic backstory is a generic X-Men premise we’ve seen in the character’s other films, namely Logan. In addition to its fuzzy characterization, the story of Deadpool & Wolverine is baggy and overlong. The plotting is inefficient and several fight scenes don’t advance story or character. Deadpool & Wolverine also lacks the subversive edge that distinguished the first Deadpool. That film poked fun at the superhero genre, celebrity culture, and Hollywood tentpole filmmaking. The third film, far from “making enemies with Disney” as promised in some of the promotional materials, reins in what was a freewheeling and rebellious series, assimilating it into Marvel’s corporate style. That’s especially evident in the ending which comes across compromised for commercial reasons.
Disc extras: In theaters.
Bottom Line: Deadpool & Wolverine satisfies on a very basic level. It mixes action, humor, and pathos in a way that’s successfully entertaining and fans of the 20th Century Fox Marvel films ought to find this an appropriate sendoff. It’s also an uneven, overstuffed, and underdeveloped picture that lacks the subversive qualities that distinguished the original Deadpool.
Episode: #1007 (August 4, 2024)