Possibly a little too full on, but still a fun and amusing ride

Rating: 7/10 (10 March 2016)

STAR RATING: ***** Saturday Night **** Friday Night *** Friday Morning ** Sunday Night * Monday Morning
Former mercenary Wade Wilson (Ryan Reynolds) now ekes out a living as a sort of odd job man for hire when people need the frighteners laid on. Things perk up when he meets Vanessa (Morena Baccarin), the love of his life, and they look set to live the rest of their lives together-until he is hit with late stage cancer in several of his most vital organs. All seems lost, until he is approached by a mysterious agency that says they can cure him, as well as giving him superhuman abilities. It's all just a cruel front, though, so the villainous Ajax (Ed Skrein) can use him to experiment on. Left hideously disfigured, Wade re-invents himself as Deadpool, the ultimate wise-ass, wise-cracking, indestructible tough guy superhero there is.
The whole superhero franchise is placed on such a pedestal these days, like the ultimate symbol of high art against which others must compete, so it was begging for something to come along that stripped it of its pomposity, and play out as more of a parody. Deadpool, if it does nothing else right, hits this mark perfectly, from the flashy opening title sequences where insults are replaced by way of crediting the producers and stars of the film, to Reynolds's relentlessly dry, wise-cracking delivery. On this front at least, it works.
The reverse story-telling style was something that had taken a little break for a while, but director Tim Miller gives it a second-coming here, a little over-bearing on what is such a short and simplistic tale. The sarcastic humour is what gives it its distinctive charm, but the hand that feeds it becomes its chalice, by at times feeling a little too in your face and full on, even in interludes when a more sombre tone would have fitted.
The inclusion of two X-Men characters as comic relief serves to highlight the leap between two CGI creations, and a guy bedecked in a homemade suit, and further highlights how Deadpool stands alone in the crazy Marvel universe. But stand alone he does, and, while at times this feels a little overdone, it's still a funky, funny adaptation of one of Marvel's trickier characters. ***