In Deadpool, heroism gets a bad rap. “You’re my hero!” a teenage girl tells the loutish mercenary Wade Wilson (Ryan Reynolds) in an early flashback, to which Wilson ripostes, “That I ain’t.” After undergoing a mutation that turns him into the costumed Deadpool, Wilson weighs the pros of being a superhero—getting your own movie, for one—against the big con: “They’re all lame-ass teacher’s pets.” Over a shot of Wilson spearing one of his enemies, his cheeky voice-over belabors the point: “I may be super, but I’m no hero.”
First, the antihero may lack conventional morality, but he must have some personal code of conduct, as loose or eccentric as his scruples may be. (The cult cable series Dexter centered on a serial killer who snuffed only fellow serial killers.) In The Godfather, Michael’s moral code—which he shares with his beloved father, Vito—is to protect his family at all costs. Michael abandons this code in The Godfather: Part II when he orders a hit on his brother Fredo, and becomes the villain of his own story. Michael swings back to antihero status in The Godfather: Part III by showing remorse for that act, but the Godfather movies prove there’s a line that even the dodgiest antihero can’t cross without becoming a full-fledged villain.
Reynolds made his debut as Deadpool in the 2009 release X-Men Origins: Wolverine, though in that instance the character was appreciably more villainous, his mouth sewn shut and his demeanor consistently pissed. In Deadpool he’s a more ambiguous figure—a witty bundle of nuances and contradictions, spouting sardonic zingers and mile-a-minute pop-culture references. He also speaks the language of the Marvel fanboy and -girl, breaking the fourth wall to guide both diehards and newcomers through the Marvel Universe. As the latest in a long line of cinematic antiheroes, Deadpool toes the line of goodness more than the movie’s vulgar ads and red-band trailer might suggest. He may flirt with villainy, but he never fully embraces it. He’ll probably never be a hero in the traditional sense, but that doesn’t matter; his fans like him just the way he is. v
Directed by Tim Miller
