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Yesterday (as I write this) I went to see Deadpool and Wolverine (2024) in the theater with my teenage grandson. We had a blast.

Oh, if you haven’t seen the movie yet and want to be surprised, I do not promise a Spoiler free review.

The following is in a flashback while Wade is fighting

With his relationship with Vanessa (Morena Baccarin) on the rocks, Wade (Ryan Reynolds) attempts to join the Avengers around 2018 and interviews with “Happy” Hogan (Jon Favreau) not getting as far as “the big guy” (implying Tony Stark). Hogan turns him down because Wade is motivated by his own needs rather than the needs of others.

In the present day, we see him as a used car salesman alongside his endlessly optimistic “wingman” Peter (Rob Delaney). Wade sucks at that, too but it’s all he has. Wade still lives with Blind Al (Leslie Uggams) and taking his friend home, Peter lures Wade into his surprise birthday party (the guy’s a Merc and would be incredibly difficult to surprise).

Vanessa is seeing someone else but has come to the party along with Al, Dopinder (Karan Soni), Negasonic (Brianna Hildebrand), her partner Yukio (Shioli Kutsuna), Colossus (Stefan Kapicic), Buck (Randal Reeder) and those few other souls who are all Wade has left in his world. He makes a wish after blowing out his birthday candle and that’s when things get interesting. He gets his wish to be significant; to matter.

Agents of the Time Variance Authority or TVA (from the Loki Disney+ show which I’ve never seen) kidnap him and bring him to a TVA supervisor Mr. Paradox (Matthew MacFadyen) who makes Wade an offer. He can move into the “sacred timeline” and join the Avengers. In fact, he’d better, because his timeline is expiring after the death of the prime or anchor being Logan (see Logan (2017)). Normally this takes decades or centuries, but Paradox is impatient and has created a Time Ripper machine to do it in a matter of hours.

Wade can’t stand the thought of that and rather than accept Paradox’s offer, uses one of the transport devices to go to Logan’s gravesite hoping his corpse has regenerated. It hasn’t and a bunch of TVA agents pursue him, becoming cannon fodder for Deadpool’s insane violence.

To save his world, Wade travels the multiverse looking for alternate Wolverines. They all beat him to a pulp (including “Cavillrine” played by Henry “Man of Steel” Cavill) except one and that’s the one he takes back to the TVA. Paradox isn’t having any of it and banishes them to the Void, a non-place where unwanted and unneeded “garbage beings” and thrown to either serve Cassandra Nova (Emma Corrin) or to become food for a creature named Alioth.

They fight off Nova’s minions with the aid of former Fantastic Four member Johnny Storm, the Human Torch (Chris Evans who originally played the role long before becoming Captain America). They’re taken to Nova’s base where Johnny is killed and somehow Wade and Logan escape.

There are a number of fight scenes between these two along with listening to the both of them brood about how crappy their lives are and how much they have failed. Unconscious from one such battle, a grown up Laura/X-23 (played by Dafne Keen who also had the role in Logan) drives them to the outland where they meet other survivors.

I should say they’ve already met “Nicepool” (also played by Reynolds) a sickeningly sweet version of Wade who wears armor and has the ugliest dog in the world “Dogpool” or “Mary Puppins” (Peggy the Dog) who Wade loves and wants to take from Nicepool.

We encounter Elektra (Jennifer Garner who played the role in the 2003 movie “Daredevil”), Blade (Wesley Snipes who played the character in the 1990s franchise), and Gambit (Channing Tatum who was slated for this own movie before it was scrapped). Amazingly, they all agree to go on a suicide mission to assault Nova’s lair so Wolverine and Deadpool can have a shot at being sent to their own worlds to save them.

Long story short, after the two save her life, she agrees, but that leaves the rest of the team behind to die in a futile battle against a large number of villains making cameos from other Marvel and Sony movies.

Learning of the Time Ripper, Nova decides she wants to destroy the multiverse (long overdue) and rule the only thing left, the Void. She goes through the portal after Wade and Logan, probes Paradox’s mind very uncomfortably, and takes control of the Ripper.

Since Paradox is doing all this without permission, TVA head B-15 (Wunmi Mosaku, also from Loki) becomes aware of the machine’s unauthorized usage, but since the plot calls for Wade and Logan to save the say, she and her agents arrive too late.

Our heroic pair have to face the “Deadpool squad” which includes a very shapely Ladypool (played by Reynolds’ wife Blake Lively), Kidpool and Babypool (played respectively by their children Inez and Olin Reynolds), Headpool (voiced by Nathan Fillion), Cowboypool (voiced by Matthew McConaughey), and a bunch of other pools.

While we find out later that Deadpool really didn’t cause the Torch’s death, he most certainly sets Nicepool up for a very painful, lengthy, and bloody destruction as the only “Pool” who doesn’t regenerate. There’s a very good battle between Wolverine, Deadpool, and the other Pools but just when victory seems assured, the Pools all start to regenerate.

Enter Peter in his Deadpool suit. All Deadpools have a “Peter” and they revere him, stopping the battle.

Problem: Paradox says they can still stop Nova who is using the machine to destroy the timelines starting with theirs, but they have to bridge the matter and antimatter power sources which would permanently annihilate either one of them.

Wait! If Nova destroys the timeline where she and the machine exist first, won’t they be destroyed too ending her plans?

Anyway…

The two argue over who is to make the “ultimate sacrifice.” Wade pulls a fast one and makes the choice but he’s going to be too late to save his universe. Logan breaks in and together they create the bridge, very dramatically and very slowly being destroyed, along with Nova, by an extremely lengthy matter/antimatter explosion which should have vaporized half the city.

Then and only then do B-15 and her minions arrive. Paradox is talking his way out of his guilt when Wade and Logan show up alive. Yes, one of them would have been annihilated but not so much two. That’s bullshit, but the plot required them to live.

B-15 grudgingly allows Logan to stay in this timeline and is really taken by how good Peter looks in the Deadpool suit.

All is well. Logan’s about to walk off but ends up being invited to Wade’s party. Wade’s talked B-15 into saving the other outcasts in the Void so Laura and Elektra also become guests. Blade isn’t there and according to the trivia I read, in the after credits scene, on one monitor, we supposedly see Gambit return to his own universe.

The thing is, since Colossus is at the party, there are X-Men in Wade’s universe, so Gambit and Wolverine have a shot at joining them (assuming they don’t have counterparts here). It’s all very confusing.

What makes the movie so much fun are the little jibes, inside jokes, and Easter eggs. I got the old ones (the Fantastic Four “flying bathtub”) and my grandson knew who Cassandra Nova was. He hadn’t seen the Logan, Daredevil, or Blade movies so I had to catch him up on a few things.

I’d heard about the controversy over the movie’s gay jokes but I didn’t really pick up on them. After all, Deadpool is always talking so it’s hard to keep up with everything in a single showing. That, and I’m not constantly on the lookout for being “offended.”

If you want other perspectives on this, try OUT Magazine and Vox.

[Addendum: I know what the critics are going for. In the comics, Deadpool (and I guess Wolverine, but this is news to me) are both pansexual or at least sexually flexible and these “fans” wanted to see a real relationship, including sex, between Wade and Logan. But movies aren’t like comic books (I can’t believe I have to explain this). While comics can appeal to a smaller and even niche audience, to make money worldwide, films have to cast the widest possible net. A gay relationship between Logan and Wade wouldn’t play in China or any Muslim nation, so you’re cutting into profits. Also, a lot of movies recently which have force fed inclusion and representation down the throats of the audience have done poorly, so maybe for once, Marvel and 20th Century Fox wanted something both critically and financially successful. End of rant].

I should say that I didn’t find anything particularly offensive. Yes, lots of cussing, violence, blood, boozing (Disney didn’t allow the use of cocaine or other drugs to be shown in the movie) because it’s a “rated R” movie, but nothing I thought didn’t belong in a Deadpool story.

This film rapidly developed the well-deserved reputation as an over-the-top success which is why I wanted to see it on the big screen. There are so few good movies out there anymore that the ones which shine in such a rare light must be cherished.

Actually, one character I’d like to see come back to the “Deadpool-verse” is Angel Dust played in the first movie by Gina Carano. That’s probably not going to happen if, for no other reason, than Gina has a pending lawsuit against Disney (and a judge told Disney that the court would NOT throw out the suit…you go, Gina).

Angel pretty much vanished at the end of the movie after being knocked out by Colossus (or was it Negasonic?), so I think she’s due for a comeback. Since Ryan Reynolds likes to make fun even of the hands that feed him, I hope he lobbies Disney and Marvel for Gina to reprise her role. It would be terrific.

I loved this movie. It’s not perfect, but it makes almost anything else produced in the past ten years or so look limp and pale by comparison.

It you haven’t seen it, go see it. If you’ve seen it, see it again.

Have fun.