Deadpool & Wolverine (2024) Dir: Shawn Levy
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I'll be honest, I didn't really care about watching this film. For me, the so-called 'Marvel fatigue' has been very real. It was only because this was streaming that I could be bothered to check it out. Like the MCU, director Shawn Levy has been very hit or miss, so I decided to keep my expectations fairly low.
Something I noticed very early on was just how dodgy some of the CGI was, particularly during the many action sequences. Some of it genuinely looked horrendous, and once I noticed it the first time, I couldn't stop noticing it. It's a shame, and a strange one, that a film of such magnitude can have such a shortcoming.
You can tell that Levy and Co. were given liberties with the language they could use, because my goodness, it felt like half the dialogue was swearing. Some of it worked and felt natural, but there were times where it came across like the writers had gone out of their way to include excess cursing. I get that it's 'Deadpool', but it took away from some of the dialogue.
I will stress, despite my above criticisms, that I did actually enjoy a fair amount of this film. Sure, the villains were very forgettable and lacked threat - a consistent Marvel issue, but the comedy was at least pretty solid across the board - although the fourth wall breaks got a bit much, and the soundtrack was excellent throughout.
The narrative was nothing special, but it served its purpose of being an entertaining spectacle which had more than enough room for the various cameos that Marvel wanted. It was shallow in its purpose, but then, in the film's defence, I never really got the impression that it was trying to be anything else.
Ryan Reynolds might play the same guy in every film, but he did at least do it fairly well. His natural charisma and confidence came through in spades, and his smooth delivery of jokes has always been pretty effective at producing laughs. I like Reynolds in this role, and, in fairness, I think I'd enjoy this performance more if he showed more range in other roles.
Hugh Jackman was pretty enjoyable in his return to one of his more iconic and popular roles. It was nice to see him get to embrace the more comedic side of his character in this film - his on-screen chemistry with Reynolds was pretty good to see. Whether or not it was worth returning, I'm not so sure, but his acting certainly wasn't bad.
The duo of Emma Corrin and Matthew Macfadyen play a couple of very mediocre and forgettable antagonists, who never really feel like significant threats to the film's protagonists. Their acting is fine, but certainly nothing special - they were never going to be the main attractions.
There were, obviously, a lot of surprise appearances, returns, and brief cameos, throughout the film. The best of these were provided by Dafne Keen, Jon Favreau, Morena Baccarin and Rob Delaney. I'd like to have seen more of both Keen and Delaney in particular, but I'm glad they at least got to make an appearance.
Along with other returning characters, there were even more cameos, only some of them really worth dropping names for; Leslie Uggams, Jennifer Garner, Chris Evans, Wesley Snipes, Channing Tatum, Henry Cavill, Aaron Stanford, Tyler Mane, Karan Soni, Brianna Hildebrand, as well as the likes of Blake Lively, Nathan Fillion, and Matthew McConaughey, albeit only through their voices.
Overall, this was an okay superhero film, but, as I suspected, it wasn't anything more than a casual popcorn flick. It seemed pretty clear to me that this film's only real purpose was to make money and provide as much fan service as possible, but it did at least do that on a passable and fairly entertaining way.
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