Sequels, what would we do without them? The majority of the time we could probably live without them in all honesty. Occasionally we get absolute diamonds such as Empire Strikes Back, Godfather part II, Terminator 2: Judgement Day, The Wrath of Khan, Aliens and of course the follow up to that legendary film; Weekend at Bernie’s.
Add to that list Deadpool 2. Excitement levels for this film were on a par with Infinity War, and to have them released within three weeks of each other was a great thing not just for comic book fans but for movie fans also. Nobody could have predicted the success of Deadpool [2016] even in light of the online clamour once Ryan Reynolds had released the original test footage (only after FOX had cancelled the project by the way) That film eventually made $783million worldwide and of course a sequel was ordered by the studio straight away.
Jump forward two years and we get that sequel. As promised during the end credit scene in Deadpool (the one inspired by Ferris Bueller’s Day Off) we are given our first taste of Cable in FOX’s X-Universe. If you’re not familiar with the character I’ll give you a little history. Also known as Nathan Summers he is the son of Scott Summers (Cyclops) and Madelyne Pryor (a clone of Jean Grey). He has telekinetic and telepathic abilities. As an infant he is captured by Apocalypse and infected with a techno-organic virus, the virus slowly turns organic tissue into metal, hence his metal arm. He is taken to the 39th century were a cure is available. He then returns to the normal timeline has grown man and future mutant saviour to fight a clone of himself called Stryfe. That’ll do for now otherwise I’ll end up giving a 5 year lecture on the history of the X-men.
Cable is of course played by Josh Brolin of Thanos fame. As if his performance of one legendary Marvel character wasn’t enough, he goes and absolutely smashes Cable as well. Looks like he’ll be going up against himself quite a lot during awards season next year. Cable’s motives in this film aren’t too dissimilar to that of the motives of the Terminator franchise. Can’t say anymore without giving away the entire plot but it does revolve around a young mutant called Russell. From that, we then have Deadpool obviously trying to stop Cable from achieving his goals.
And that’s where the fun starts. Straight off we are treated to 5 minutes of film that confirm why the film was rated R in the states. Violence and blood are common course while you’re still getting comfortable in your seats. There’s a fantastic twist in the story very, very early on which nobody truthfully knew would happen. This puts DP on his own path and sets up a nice story arc for our titular character going forward. Ryan Reynolds was born to play Deadpool and his input into the character’s development for the big screen cannot be ignored. Yes, with sequels everything is always bigger and Deadpool 2 does succumb to this in parts but thanks to Reynolds he has been able to keep the human side of Deadpool grounded whilst everything around him is quite literally going to shit.
Comedy elements (the whole god damn film more or less) are superb, when I wasn’t gasping in awe of the action, I was laughing my balls off. I love the fact that at times both Deadpool outings are not afraid to take the piss out of themselves. In Deadpool we have the 4th wall breaks and Deadpool 2 takes aim at some of the running jokes from the first. This iteration of Wade Wilson feels like he is dragged straight from the comics more so than the ‘real worldy’ feel that we were given originally.
Let’s talk a little about X-Force, Wade’s new super team. From the trailers we get to see the introduction of Domino (plays a larger role than the rest), Shatterstar, Bedlam and of course, Pete. Who is Pete? He’s just a guy that saw the ad of course. There’s a couple more characters inducted in to X-Force but you’ll hopefully see them yourself soon enough. One of the characters is played by the special guest cameo that has been mentioned recently. X-Force don’t play that much of a role in this outing but their inclusion is actually pretty, pretty good. Talking of trailers, a lot of the stuff we’ve seen in the build up to the release has actually been left on the cutting room floor. This seems to be quite the norm of late.
To take this review full circle I need to discuss the interplay between Deadpool and Cable. Quite simply, Cable doesn’t take any grief of Deadpool and gives as good as he gets, he has some good come backs of his own. The relationship between the two of them is directly lifted from the pages from which they born, enemies, team mates, friends, enemies (again) etc etc. I thought Cable would have been a hard character to introduce in to this universe, especially based on the brief history of the character I gave you earlier. However, they give you enough of an understanding for his being in the film without needing to know the minutia of his existence. Following on with relationships, Deadpool has grown a lot closer to Colossus and Negasonic Teenage Warhead. They now trust him and he now trusts and needs them.
A very solid sequel has been produced here and it also sets up and leaves you wanting more films and spin offs, which I’m sure we’ll get. At point of writing, Deadpool 2 is already ahead of Infinity War in box office takings after the same amount time. Not bad considering that IW is open to a larger age range of people. However, with the release of Solo: A Star Wars Story dropping this weekend we might see a dip in those takings. I’d say over time it will sit alongside those sequels mentioned at the start but it will never, ever be greater than Weekend at Bernie’s 2, haha!!!!
Oh and stick around for the mid credit scene, hilarity ensues.
Bens Nerd Words 