Deadpool

So Marvel strike first in the 2016 comic book race with Deadpool (we could have seven new superhero movies by the end of the year) and pre-release hype and a brilliant piece of marketing strategy has left cinema-goers foaming at the mouth with excitement for this one.

Props to Marvel here for trying to change the game. The market is over-saturated with costumed crusaders and this, along with last year's brilliant Ant-Man, is trying to change the formula and keep people's interest.

As you will already know; Deadpool is a more adult anti-hero; sweary, violent and fourth-wall breakingly post-modern. He talks about other superhero films, he references and parodies pop-culture in general and this is all often laugh-out loud funny.

His X-Men quips, in particular, are brilliant and comic book fans are going to leave the cinema with large grins slapped on their chops. All this adult material though, is let down by a seen-it-all-before formulaic superhero plot: bad guy 'creates' Deadpool's power (much like Wolverine) then kidnaps his girl. Sure, it's a lot simpler than the bloated Avengers franchise and this enables Marvel to fully flesh out the character and allow the jokes space to breathe but take the gags out and you're left with a film which could arguably sit last in the interest stakes.

Deadpool is part of the X-Men universe but there's no sense of that series' plot line or political interest. The R-rated, graphic novel-esque gratuity could have placed this with adult comic films like Watchmen or Sin City but it sits all too easily with Marvel's pre-Avengers output.

Having said that, this is a brilliant slice of entertainment; zippy, funny and with a fantastic new (ish) character for Marvel to play with. Question is will they use him again? Surely it would be too daring to place Wade in a X-Men film and any sequel could break existing timelines with that very successful and critically-approved franchise. The fact that only two, bit-part X-Men feature here (a fact hilariously acknowledged in the movie) suggests this as well and even the post-credit sequence features no teaser. As such it looks like Deadpool could be a one-off which makes it a bit of a miracle it was even made at all and worthy of celebration. Marvel's lesser characters enables these more daring films and this is another triumph for the studio.

Not as good as it could be but a slice of originality at the perfect time.

4 stars ****