"hugely enjoyable and a welcome change of tone and humour from Fox & Marvel’s previous instalments"

Let me start by saying, if you are easily offended please take that into consideration before you watch this film, now that’s out of the way.. As the first comic book movie of the year Deadpool was always going to have a lot to live up to... The casual movie goer might vaguely remember his character from X-Men Origins: Wolverine (2009), however if that is the case it will be largely unfavourable, since they made the somewhat nonsensical decision to stitch the characters mouth shut and thereby removing the “Merc with a Mouth”‘s greatest feature.

Thankfully Fox listened to fan base and made the wise decision of respecting the source material with Deadpool’s solo movie, from early “leaked” test footage we could see this was going to be a much different tone and it is well deserving of its more mature rating. The film also has had one of the most memorable viral marketing campaigns in recent memory, being all over social media and YouTube for the past 3-4 months.

What is also immediately apparent is exactly how meta this movie is, with reference after reference made to pop culture and the rest of the X-Men universe, it works well, being relevant enough to appeal to any from the casual fan to the elite comic book nerd, in the context it works brilliantly seeing as Deadpool is known for breaking the 4th wall constantly throughout any of his stories. Ryan Reynolds seemingly has become one with the character, and seems to be every bit the smart mouthed lunatic we expected.

The supporting cast members are superb as well, T.J. Miller as Weasel works brilliantly off of ‘pools dark humour and Ed Skrein as the villainous Ajax (referenced as the token British bad guy in the opening credits) suits the tone and tempo of the movie. I couldn’t not mention Morena Baccarin who plays Deadpool’s girlfriend Vanessa, this role could of been extremely one dimensional however it's a credit to her acting ability that she makes it 100% believable.

As I touched on earlier with the rating being 15 in the UK & R in the US, it just goes to show how different this is to what we’ve seen before; the language is strong throughout as expected in keeping with the source material, however the biggest notable difference is the addition of blood and quasi-nudity. Whilst I’m aiming to keep this review spoiler free this leads to a scene in a strip club with what has to be one of the best cameo’s you’ll see.

The soundtrack also doesn’t disappoint either and just as it did with Guardians of the Galaxy, at least one or two of the tracks have the ear worm quality and will be on your playlist for months to come. Plus there is something beautiful about seeing utter carnage played out to a classic love song.

Perhaps my only gripe with the film itself is that the main plot is very much a little forgettable, much of the story jumps between Deadpool’s origin and setting up the reason why he’s going after Ajax at the start, Colossus & Negasonic Teenage Warhead (yes I’m serious that’s the actual characters name) add a touch more comic relief and tie the movie firmly into the X-Men shared universe but are not a huge part of the overall story. Let me state I loved this film and would recommend it to be seen by everyone but this is one point that did stick out on first viewing.

To summarise the film is hugely enjoyable and a welcome change of tone and humour from Fox & Marvel’s previous instalments. This is not only a strong start to a Deadpool franchise, which will hopefully lead to a full X-Force spin off (that has been talked about for years), but a great start to 2016’s slate of comic book movies. Whilst the film isn’t perfect it sets the bar high and DC’s Batman Vs Superman: Dawn of Justice already has a lot to beat! It’s most definitely a great time to be a comic book fan.