Deadpool & Wolverine (2024)

Score: 4.5 / 5

I even went into this expecting to be annoyed.

Deadpool, fun and irreverent as it is, has never been my favorite superhero series; partly due to its cheapening of the X-Men (my favorite), and partly due to its loud and crass fanbase, I've appreciated it from a safe distance. It didn't help, either, that the previous two films were nowhere near as subversive or clever as they were touted as being. For being what he is, the films never broke the mold -- or even pushed the mold -- of what superhero films can be, relying on tired tropes in each film's final act to remind us of the feel-good victories of a bad guy with a heart of gold. It's fun for some, and that's fine. It's just not for me.

So for this character and his filmmaking team to now assimilate into Disney's MCU was promising to be, pardon, a hot fucking mess. At a time when the MCU still can't figure out where it's going, how to get there, or why -- look at their recent announcement that all but rewrites what was to be Kang as the next Big Bad -- to add such a beloved character and make it fit in the chaos of multiverses had to have been a nightmare in the writers' room. Further, to add -- like Cable before him -- an iconic X-Man was easily the most dangerous thing they could have done. Even further, for it to be the one that was surely -- surely -- finally retired from the genre, and whose character is finally, certainly, dead, was almost too much to bear.

Some of my fears indeed came true. Jumping between universes and timelines happens via the Time Variance Authority, introduced in the bizarre series Loki, and the conceptual rewriting continues to teeter on the brink of pure nonsense. Characters are "brought back" and "reintroduced" ad nauseam, reinforcing the problem of the entertainment hamster wheel: when anyone and everyone can be repeatedly resurrected, there are no stakes in the story or in the real-life productions. Nothing matters anymore. Style succeeds over substance, most easily recognizable in an overwrought soundtrack that plays, obviously and often blandly, more like a three-dimensional character than any of the actual people being dramatized. Deadpool indeed starts the film without a girlfriend (Morena Baccarin), which makes no sense after the events of the previous film, and despite continual queerbaiting "humor" Ryan Reynolds never manages to actually queer the character. The villain (Casssandra, sister of Xavier, played by Emma Corrin) is rote and dull, stretching credibility even as her aims feel nonsensical; that's a lot to say in a film filled with the nonsensical, as a rule. And the endless parade of flagged references could fill a dissertation; one hopes that the film's home release will include on-screen footnotes so we know why certain characters and phrases are apparently important to the franchise as a whole.

All that is true, and I found my spirit tiring as I tried to keep up with the material while keeping my beer down.

And yet -- 

Deadpool & Wolverine is the most delightfully entertaining movie of the summer. At least it was for me. Not since The Fall Guy have I laughed so much in a packed auditorium. Even the Void and its bland villain couldn't relax my grin as Deadpool is introduced to countless variations of himself, including a female version (Blake Lively) and a cowboy version (Matthew McConaughey). More importantly, much like the most recent Spider-Man film (or The Flash, etc.), this one effectively ties together previous branches of Marvel properties and honors them. While we can certainly hope it's the last we'll see of some of them, it is really cool to see Jennifer Garner again as Elektra, Wesley Snipes as Blade (though his apparent shade at being recast is a glaring sour note here), and even Chris Evans as Human Torch. The return of Tyler Mane as Sabretooth was a fabulous touch, too, and the inclusion of Channing Tatum as Gambit had me in actual tears (of joy, of humor, of what I've always wanted from the franchise).

All that takes backseat, naturally, to the return of Hugh Jackman as a title character. When too many Marvel properties are being tied in and referenced, he manages to keep things locked down and grounded, along with his horny partner. The entourage of Marvel cast-offs get their heyday, and it makes more sense because this Wolverine is, in fact, a variation of the one we've loved for the past two decades. This one is surlier, and of course he's wearing the famous yellow costume. The film even provides more variants for him in a singular sequence that had our audience in stitches until one Henry Cavill materialized on screen and the room exploded. His character works really well in the Mad Max-inspired world that sets the bulk of this movie, and I'd have liked more pared-down material so we could really see these characterizations shine through the otherwise messy story.

It's all very amusing, and while that's not the most ringing endorsement, I appreciate the heart and joy that goes into a movie like this. The gimmicky stakes didn't work for me, and I wish the MCU would go back to smaller-scale battles for its heroes, but that's not the point of this story or production. Indeed, I'd rather have seen a super simplified and deeply silly story here: If Deadpool got this ugly/cute dog and it got abducted or sucked into a wormhole or something and he had to find it, enlisting the help of a reluctant Wolverine variant who thinks it's a cosmos-saving scheme, and it turns out to just be saving Deadpool's ugly dog. Think John Wick style, but funny, and David Leitch has been in this series, so the connection would make sense. Silly characters doing silly things require one thing these days: lowering the stakes. Stop making it about saving the multiverse! But if we're going to go there, and clearly that's what Disney is all about these days, I can't really be mad at it. It's a hell of a good time, and all the more rewarding if you've been a longtime fan of anything Marvel-related. At this point -- and I will absolutely regret saying this -- it's almost as if caring about good storytelling and the art of filmmaking is obsolete when fan service is this heartfelt and this effective.