ArthouseSchmarthouse’s review published on Letterboxd:
6
Disney+
Cinematic junk food: comforting, pleasurable in the moment, but ultimately a bit unsatisfying. In this regard, DEADPOOL & WOLVERINE's closest cousin is SPIDER-MAN: NO WAY HOME; similarly to NO WAY HOME, after the initial surge of affection wears off nobody will remember much about this film in two years' time. And, oddly, "affection" is very much the by-word here: looking past the route one plotting, the weird tonal pivoting between self-aware parody and deeply serious melodrama, the obscenely lazy-- and near constant-- needle drops, the gory R-rated violence (look out for that OLDBOY homage, film nerds!) and the eye-rolling bro humour, there is a huge amount of genuine affection for superhero movies-- especially the more underrated ones (or the ones that were never made at all). This makes some (not all but some) of the seemingly neverending cavalcade of cameos surprisingly emotional ones, giving certain actors an unexpected shot at closure in a similar way to Garfield and Maguire in NO WAY HOME. I was also surprised to find, in what is otherwise a very unreverential film, that LOGAN was treated with such genuine reverancw and respect (as it should be). That this is a major theme of the film is backed up by what happens over the end credits, which I actually found more stirring and emotional than anything in the film itself.
Other points. The film is very funny-- I laughed a lot, had a pretty good time, even though I will forgot 95% of what happened in about a week. The plot is a load of hot nonsense, and Reynolds' schtick is getting verryyyyy old. It was such a shame that the film essentially discards all of the characters who were built up over the past two films, instead giving them glorified cameos and using them as Deadpool's motivation. Why are half the battle scenes in this movie totally pointless from a narrative point of view? Actually, let's go further: why does it feel like Reynolds and co just asked a focus group of 15 year old boys what they wanted to see in the movie and just shoehorned all of that shit in, regardless of whether it works or not? Matthew MacFaddyn is wonderful, more of him in everything please. Corrin gives a good stab at imbuing her one-note, underwritten villain character depth but she is fighting a losing battle. But the MVP is of course Jackman who... well, its Hugh Jackman. Playing fucking Wolverine. And he's doing the full drunk-ass, regretful, frequently violent version of Wolverine that he does so well. That alone is worth the price of admission, and to be honest I would have much preferred if this film was "Wolverine and Deadpool" rather than the other way round.
In closing: I enjoyed watching it. You would have to be pretty stone hearted not to find it amusing and affecting on at least some level (especially if you grew up watching the movies that it celebrates). But I don't think I need to see any more of these movies.
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