North Texas Daily

Nicholas Friedman | Editor-In-Chief

@NMFreed

In a world where heroes like Iron Man, Ant-Man and Green Arrow are household names, it’s about time Deadpool got his day in the sun, especially after his abysmal appearance in 2009’s “X-Men Origins: Wolverine.”

Enter “Deadpool,” an R-rated, blood-packed romp for revenge in which Wade Wilson (Ryan Reynolds) uses his weird regenerative mutant powers to take down the guy that turned him into what looks like an “avocado had sex with an older avocado.”

And the story is little more than that. Wilson meets and falls in love with Vanessa (Morena Baccarin) and things are going great until he’s diagnosed with late-stage cancer. A creepy guy shows up at his friend Weasel’s (TJ Miller) bar and invites him to undergo an experimental treatment, which turns him into the aforementioned avocado.

Despite Deadpool being very, very hard to look at, Reynolds makes up for it with some top form humor. For those in the know about Deadpool, his comic counterpart is known for talking smack and being self-aware. This is all ever-present here, with references to the blunderous “Green Lantern” film and a stunning running gag involving a certain Australian actor.

We also get the pleasure of great supporting characters in the form of X-Men Colossus and Negasonic Teenage Warhead (Brianna Hildebrand). Colossus (Stefan Kapičić) plays an angel-on-the-shoulder type guy who really just wants everyone to sit around the campfire and talk things out. On the other hand, Negasonic is a faux-emo chick who doesn’t take crap from anyone and defies every trope out there, often stealing the scenes she’s in.

The villains are awfully bland, but we’re really just here to see them get taken down. The movie plays it safe in this regard and has a pretty sweet-looking final set piece.

But above all, the action is superb. The film goes out of its way to capture just how badass Deadpool actually is. And though we should always avoid using the term badass, it’s hard not to here. This class clown trigger-happy Spider-Man lookalike does crazy backflips, pulls off triple headshots and still has time to make very inappropriate sexual references. But the film never steps over the corny line.

That means no dank memes or superimposed cat pictures. Sorry guys.

“Deadpool” is more than just a festival of cussing, sex scenes and quips. It’s an important paradigm shift for the superhero movie industry. We’ve got Marvel making movies on-par most of the time, with the occasional dip (looking at you, “Iron Man 3”) and DC still trying to kickstart its own cinematic universe.

And with the only other notable R-rated comic book films being “300,” “Watchmen and “Sin City” (and “Kick-Ass,” but let’s forget that one for a second), it’s a breath of fresh air to see something legitimately funny in the mix.

So the last thing one would expect would be Fox, producers of the solid “X-Men” film franchise and the vomit-inducing Fantastic Four films, to create a by-the-books, hell of a good time in “Deadpool.” And it really is for adults, though it’s tailor-made for the social media generation. So please, don’t take children to this film.

Pro tip: Stay after the credits. But it’s not like we had to tell you that anyway.

Featured Image: Still from Deadpool | 20th Century Fox