“Deadpool and Wolverine” (2024), the sequel to “Deadpool 2” (2018) follows Wade Wilson, or Deadpool (Ryan Reynolds), as he recruits a new Logan, also known as the Wolverine (Hugh Jackman) from an alternate universe to help him save his own. This film serves as the 34th entry into the Marvel Cinematic Universe and explores the multiverse and the Time Variance Authority first seen in “Loki” (2021).
Screenwriters Ryan Reynolds, Rhett Reese, Paul Wernick, Zeb Wells and Shawn Levy make no qualms about letting you know that this film is primarily fan service – filled with fairly pointless action scenes between Deadpool and Wolverine (considering they both regenerate), a dozen cameos and Deadpool’s characteristic R-rated humor.
Normally, I’d say this was a bad thing. What’s the point of having two characters fight each other over and over again if neither can really die? But that’s the beauty of the superhero genre – when done well, even the silliest sequences feel exhilarating and that’s exactly what happens with this film. Ashley Beck’s fight choreography is inventive and playful, working hand-in-hand with a hilarious screenplay and churning out visual gags left and right. The fight scenes achieve a remarkable feat keeping the audience on the edge of the seat with fantastic editing and an absolutely amazing soundtrack, especially for a film that spends a serious chunk of its runtime on action sequences.
“Deadpool and Wolverine” is the past two entries in the Deadpool franchise on “a certain recreational and illegal drug” with even more violence, more cursing and complete plot craziness that somehow ends up creating the best superhero film I’ve seen from Marvel in a while. While the film still uses the multiverse setup to get Wolverine back in the game, it does so in a hilariously self-aware way with a cameo-filled montage that reminded a rather cynical me of all the things about the multiverse that made it so exciting.
Director Shawn Levy’s narrative is confident in its writing and pacing, letting the emotional scenes breathe without crazy editing — an unfortunate rarity in the superhero genre. It is ironic that a film from the same production house about a character known for using humor as a defense mechanism really slows down and lets you truly feel the emotion while others (cough MCU phase 4, cough) use humor to undercut the gravity of the situation.
The film greatly benefits from the addition of a brooding, not very talkative Wolverine and the amusing dynamic that this bestie duo create. This is an artistic film (read in a posh English accent) open to multiple interpretations — is it a buddy comedy about two bros destroying stuff with their cool manly superpowers but also feeling emotions because real bros share sensitive emotional stuff with their bros (how many times can I use bros in a sentence?)? Or is it a passionately intense enemies-to-lovers romance mounted on a crazy budget where they start off wanting to murder each other (very seductively, of course) but end up dropping the idea after getting lost in each other’s beautiful eyes?
Overall, “Deadpool and Wolverine” is ridiculously entertaining and funny and a surprisingly emotional goodbye to the Fox X-Men series of films that many of us grew up with. Highly recommended to everyone, including the multiverse grinches like yours truly.
