Movie Review: Deadpool

Glenn Matchett |

Feb 13, 2016

Before I start my review of the newest superhero offering from FOX starring Ryan Reynolds, Morena Baccarin, and T.J Miller among others, I want to let you all know about a nightmare I had.

The year was 2009, FOX was hoping to capitalize on their mega successful X-Men movies and wanted to do spin offs for some characters. They started with Wolverine and decided to include some other mutants fans had wanted to see that would then possibly get their own subsequent spin offs.

Some of these mutants included Gambit, Silverfox and yes, Deadpool. The part of Deadpool in the film went to Ryan Reynolds, an actor who was a huge comics fan and stated he’d been dreaming of playing the role for years.

Introduced in the films first access scene, Reynolds acted appropriately bad ass and funny, settling many fans fears that FOX wouldn’t be able to properly adapt Deadpool to a movie. Then in the closing action scene of the movie they had someone else play the role that was the same in name only and sealed his mouth shut.

Yes, they sealed the mouth of a character who was famous for talking and turned him into a generic, dull video game end boss.

When I awoke in a cold sweat, I realized this wasn’t a dream, this was the fate that befell one of Marvel’s most popular characters. The worst part was due to the critical and fan reception to X-Men Origins: Wolverine and Deadpool’s character in particular, the spin off film was canceled.

Then a number of years ago some test footage was ‘leaked’. This ‘leak’ led to a call for FOX to renew the Deadpool solo film and do the character some justice. Flash forward to 2016 and its here, the Deadpool movie the fans have been waiting for since 2009 and Ryan Reynolds has been working on for 12 years to put together.

So does it end up being another nightmare or does FOX finally make it up to the Merc With The Mouth and then some? People out there that might be even remotely concerned about mistakes of the past being retread should realize instead what we have gotten is Deadpool.

Not only is it one of the best Marvel movies and possibly even the best non-Marvel Studios efforts but one of the closest to the comic material films ever. Clearly treading like they were walking through an area full of mines, FOX clearly went to some effort to make sure this movie was as close to a live action Deadpool comic you might ever see.

From the movies opening credits, the laughs begin and they hardly let up. The movie hits you with a fast paced, action comedy that is genuinely brilliant. It perfectly conveys why comic fans across the world love Deadpool and why he was put him on a big screen for all the world to see.

It’s all there, violence, swearing, fourth wall breaking and the studio/actor/cast not being afraid to poke fun and/or insult themselves for often hilarious effect.

Acting his tight ass in red spandex off, Reynolds leads a cast that all seem to be having a blast. Everyone puts in a high quality performance from the people you’re supposed to like and laugh at to the people you’re supposed to hate. Apart from Reynolds, I believe the scenes involving Leslie Uggams as Joe Kelly creation, Blind Al are great. She isn’t in the movie a lot but her lines and delivery are brilliant and she has a lot of comedic chemistry with Reynolds.

However, the film isn’t all played for laughs. Much like the surprisingly dark moments in the classic Deadpool runs found in Joe Kelly’s work and the more recent Duggam run, there is a dark undertone to the film at times. Instead of being a jarring change in tone though, the film manages to segue in and out of these effortlessly and makes you care greatly about a character who is lude, crude, and kills people for yucks. It is these dark moments that further emphasize the funny moments in the film and give the film more of a deeper feel than comedy’s that are in the same vein. It makes Deadpool stand out as more than just a bunch of laughs which it certainly has in abundance.

If I were to criticize anything is that as usual the trailer gave a lot away. The trailer covers the first 30-40 minutes in fast forward. Of course there are moments in there that weren’t included but I feel that the trailer could have shown a lot less to make some of the more awesome moments in that time frame have more impact. I was glad to see them on the big screen of course but I feel that FOX could have learned a lesson here from The Force Awakens in their promotion (apart from the special Deadpool videos dealing with everything from Australia day to testicular cancer which have been genius!). I’m actually not wanting to mention too much more specifics about the movie because you should go in knowing next to nothing for maximum effect.

That being said I would…

*knock, knock*

Just a second sorry.

No…

Noo…..

AGRHRHRHRHRH

Hi folks! It’s your pal Deadpool here! I personally have no clue where that Irish fellow in the dressing gown went but I can assure you that he is most definitely NOT missing any of his limbs.

So where were we? Oh yeah! My movie! Well it’s great! Movie of the year I’d say easily. Who cares about movies starring Ben Afflec fighting with some Tudor guy anyway? We’ve also got those people pretending to be DC characters in that movie that I can’t even remember the name of plus Captain America fighting Sherlock Holmes.

Do we need these movies? Of course not! They’re all stupid and boring! Unlike my movie which features guns, swearing, comedy and me getting to feel the boobs of the chick from Firefly (niiiiice)

In short, go see my movie and don’t say anything bad about it. Otherwise I might pay a visit to you too. I have to help FOX pay off their debts from that movie starring that guy from Creed that looked like something I wiped after a trip from the bathroom, the pressure is on.

Oh and seriously, bring kids at your own risk. If you do, get them to bring unicorns, please, k, thx

Glenn in his screams of pain kept saying 9/10 by the way. I don’t know what that means. I assume it’s some Irish thing, now if you’ll excuse me, I’m going to find this guy’s kilt and tour the con circuit.

See you soon.

Love, Deadpool