Movies

Peter Suderman | 7.26.2024 10:45 AM

If nothing else, it's perfectly telling that Deadpool & Wolverine takes place in a liminal space called the Void. The latest franchise assault from the Marvel Cinematic Universe (MCU)—and, mercifully, the only formal entry this year—is an empty exercise in winking self-promotion, like a made-for-YouTube fan film that somehow ended up on the big screen. It's a vapid, frantic movie about how Marvel's wildly successful comic book movie universe has lost its ability to authentically connect—that itself has no capacity to authentically connect.

Consider the old screenwriter's maxim: "Raise the stakes." The underlying idea is that a good story should reveal what a character cares about most in the world, and then put whatever that is in jeopardy. This heightens the drama and draws in viewers. Viewers care about the characters because the characters care about something important to them.

Deadpool, one of the film's two titular characters, does not care about anything in the film. Oh sure: In theory, he pretends that his quest is to save a group of close friends who we see for a few minutes at the beginning of the movie. Their timeline—their branch of the multiverse—is........

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