Marvel's Deadpool opinions

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Doesn’t that describe pretty much the entire comic book industry from 1996 onward?
 
I agree that comics have lost a bunch of their popularity, but two things come to mind: aren’t the movies driving up interest in the comics? I wouldn’t be surprised if the comics industry has boomed since the movies started coming out.
The last time I read up on it, just the opposite was happening. The big problem is that the stereotypical fans from 10-20 years ago (awkward, socially stunted, sex-obsessed 12-year-old boys) are now the ones creating the comics. As much as you might like Iron Man, Wolverine or whoever on the big screen, when you open the comics and find that the main goal of the books now are to include as many self-aware, faux-cool one-liners as possible, and the portrayal of the female characters is, in general, far more puerile, sexist and misogynistic then they’ve ever been, even if you still buy a book you’re not going to come back for seconds.

I’m sure some would object to my characterization of the industry, and while there may be some exceptions, spend an hour in a comic shop flipping through the most popular books then get back to me. I was arguing this point with a group of hardcore fans online a couple years ago. Long after the argument subsided I came back and told them about an idea I had for a new book. I made it as over-the-top sexist and misogynistic as I possibly could (part of one of the hero’s shtick was that he was an avowed woman-beater, while each of the female’s powers were at least partially sex-based). As despicable as the villains were in the book (and they were truly sickening), the heroes in many ways were worse. I figured they’d get that it was just a big satirical comeback to the arguments they’d made months earlier. Wrong. They loved it! The one guy spent the next few months pestering me to submit my idea to one of the comic companies. Even when I told him that I had only been trying to make a point, he said he didn’t believe me and wanted me to pursue it. That group of guys validated every bad opinion I’ve had about comics for the last 20 years.
 
I saw the movie (unfortunately) and I have to agree the whole “he knows he’s in a superhero movie” was funny for like the first 10 minutes but then got old for me. Of course, that humor was at least cleverish, unlike the 549 masturbation and penis jokes made throughout the film. (which everyone in my theater always laughed the hardest at. Because hearing a grown man talk about jerking off is hilarious apparently. :rolleyes:)

Seriously though, the amount of graphic violence, sex, nudity, and language in this movie was just ridiculous. I can usually push through if it’s got a good enough story, but there was absolutely nothing redeemable in the film. Like…nothing. I should have looked it up before I went. My fault I guess.
 
I saw the movie (unfortunately) and I have to agree the whole “he knows he’s in a superhero movie” was funny for like the first 10 minutes but then got old for me. Of course, that humor was at least cleverish, unlike the 549 masturbation and penis jokes made throughout the film. (which everyone in my theater always laughed the hardest at. Because hearing a grown man talk about jerking off is hilarious apparently. :rolleyes:)

Seriously though, the amount of graphic violence, sex, nudity, and language in this movie was just ridiculous. I can usually push through if it’s got a good enough story, but there was absolutely nothing redeemable in the film. Like…nothing. I should have looked it up before I went. My fault I guess.
That is the thing. Anyone else knew from about a year ago that this movie was Rated R. Heck the actor pushed for it to be R. it would have been a huge disservice for it to have been anything other than R. I’m pumped and have heard nothing but great things about it from friends online.
 
The last time I read up on it, just the opposite was happening. The big problem is that the stereotypical fans from 10-20 years ago (awkward, socially stunted, sex-obsessed 12-year-old boys) are now the ones creating the comics. As much as you might like Iron Man, Wolverine or whoever on the big screen, when you open the comics and find that the main goal of the books now are to include as many self-aware, faux-cool one-liners as possible, and the portrayal of the female characters is, in general, far more puerile, sexist and misogynistic then they’ve ever been, even if you still buy a book you’re not going to come back for seconds.
Wow, that seems very well-reasoned and comes as a surprise to me.

One possible piece of counter-evidence: at comichron, there are several graphs of estimated comic sales which indicate that comic sales are booming. Here is how one graph shows the data:

2001 - $260-285 million
2002 - $300-330 million
2003 - $350-400 million
2004 - $420-480 million
2005 - $475-550 million
2006 - $575-640 million
2007 - $660-700 million
2008 - $680-710 million
2008 - $680-710 million
2009 - $650-700 million
2010 - $660-690 million
2011 - $690 million
2012 - $735 million
2013 - $780 million
2014 - $835 million

source

To me, this makes it look like the movies have been a big boost since they started coming with ever-increasing frequency after X-Men in 2000, but I’m probably missing something.
 
Paper comic books are just advertising media. They are also artifacts that may or may not increase in value. That, sadly, is the only thing going on with comics today. In my view, they lack heart, heroes aren’t heroic, anti-heroes are pushed as cool, but trust me, these trends do not come from the artists and writers. Trends are determined by the owners/operators. That’s all.

Comic books were originally meant to be read and re-read and when done with, even thrown out. Then, they became commodities, and that also helped suck the joy and real use of comic books out and into another world. Price guides, comics boarded and bagged but never read, and slabbed comics that get official grading by the CGC so you can (possibly) sell them for more than Guide prices.

Comic strip great, Will Eisner, said he saw comic books almost die out twice before the internet. They were meant to be fun, thrilling, unusual, a trip to another world. And that thrill and wonder is mostly gone. The artistic greats are mostly gone, their work being sold at auction right now.

Marvel Comics went bankrupt (Chapter 11) in 1996. Yeah, I was there, watching teenagers with stacks of comics standing in line. I mentioned to one that he was quite a collector. He replied, “Oh, I don’t read these. I just buy 'em, bag 'em and six months from now, I’ll get 20 bucks a piece.” The problem is, a lot of people were doing that, including store owners stashing copies away for the same reason. By the late 90s, thousands of comic book stores closed in the US. The gold foil version, the silver foil version (magnificent print craft by the way) and the color cover version all contained the same comic book. You were enticed to buy the same comic 3 times. For what?

With the possible exception of one artist, there are no artists working in comics today. They are stylists. Anatomy? Whatever. Machinery? Just cobble together a bunch of shapes. “I’ve gotta crank out as many pages as I can to make money.”

And unearned credit on covers. I am sick of seeing of seeing Tom - Bill - Blaaaaazeee on comic book covers. A comic book cover should be like a movie poster, not promo for people who have yet to earn a fan following.

Comics died in the 1970s for the most part. The last comic book series I followed died in 1985. That was it. Keep your stylists. Marvel is getting ready for Civil War II. And I don’t want to see Captain America: Civil War mostly because of that.

One do it your selfer tried it his way, and I could later get issues 1 thru 20 of a comic book I could never get to like for 20 bucks at a comic con. I’ve stopped going to those too.

Ed
 
That is the thing. Anyone else knew from about a year agot that this movie was Rated R. Heck the actor pushed for it to be R. it would have been a huge disservice for it to have been anything other than R. I’m pumped and have heard nothing but great things about it from friends online.
Oh, I knew it was Rated R going in, but some of my favorite movies are also Rated R, so the rating wasn’t an immediate red flag for me. I was expecting some things, but I wasn’t expecting all of…that. I figured it was just going to be a darker superhero film than they could do with a PG-13 rating.

I’m not sure how not showing people having kinky sex, fully naked strippers, and dismemberment would have been a disservice to it, but maybe I’m just not familiar enough with the comics. I fully admit I should have done more research before tagging along with the group that invited me though. Would have spared me the pain. Lesson learned I guess.
 
Oh, I knew it was Rated R going in, but some of my favorite movies are also Rated R, so the rating wasn’t an immediate red flag for me. I was expecting some things, but I wasn’t expecting all of…that. I figured it was just going to be a darker superhero film than they could do with a PG-13 rating.

I’m not sure how not showing people having kinky sex, fully naked strippers, and dismemberment would have been a disservice to it, but maybe I’m just not familiar enough with the comics. I fully admit I should have done more research before tagging along with the group that invited me though. Would have spared me the pain. Lesson learned I guess.
Fair enough. 🙂
 
I have seen parts from the comics so I am not surprised by the way the movie is. I plan on going to see it when I can.
 
Based on all the available information and the trailer, this is glorified violence with sex and some nudity and profanity.

Any Catholics reading this: Being an adult does not mean what you were told about right and wrong is gone. Sin is sin. Wrong is wrong. And “not for kids” denies this perverse trash film for what it is.

We are supposed to rejoice in wholesome things.

Ed
Have you seen the comics? I have and its why I am not surprised with the movies. Then again that kind of stuff does not bother me much.
 
It made a lot of money this weekend, so someone must be going to see it.
 
It made a lot of money this weekend, so someone must be going to see it.
It’s the biggest ever opening weekend for 20th Century Fox, for an R-rated film, and for the month of February.

I’m still not going to see it. 😛
 
I saw the trailers for it, it looks OK, but I imagine its similar to all the other superhero movies, like Xmen, Fantastic 4, etc, LOTS of CGI without much story…eyecandy in other words.

Has anyone noticed Ryan Reynolds is pretty much the same type of character no matter what role he is playing, he has that sort of dry sense of humor, sarcastic, cracking jokes at the wrong times, etc. Someone also said the same thing about George Clooney, its hard to tell where the actor ends and the character begins. I think they get to a point, they are playing themselves and the writers ‘sculpt’ the role/ character around them.

I do like Reynolds though, some other movies, he has cracked me up with his humor.
 
Wow, that seems very well-reasoned and comes as a surprise to me.

One possible piece of counter-evidence: at comichron, there are several graphs of estimated comic sales which indicate that comic sales are booming. Here is how one graph shows the data:

2001 - $260-285 million
2002 - $300-330 million
2003 - $350-400 million
2004 - $420-480 million
2005 - $475-550 million
2006 - $575-640 million
2007 - $660-700 million
2008 - $680-710 million
2008 - $680-710 million
2009 - $650-700 million
2010 - $660-690 million
2011 - $690 million
2012 - $735 million
2013 - $780 million
2014 - $835 million

source

To me, this makes it look like the movies have been a big boost since they started coming with ever-increasing frequency after X-Men in 2000, but I’m probably missing something.
That’s a real surprise to me. The articles I read dealt with circulation numbers for the big two and made it sound as though they were in terrible shape. Looking at this page, you can get some perspective on where some of the doom and gloom in the articles I read came from. In '96 monthly orders to comic shops was up near 12 million. Now they barely top 6 million. So despite the dollar amounts the actual number of books being sold is 40-45% less than what it was 20 years ago. I’d be curious to see hard numbers from the 80s. I read something, I think by Jim Shooter, which stated that the hottest titles today sell about the same number of copies per month that the bottom-tier Marvel titles sold back in the mid-80s. In other words, Batman and Wolverine are bringing about as many monthly readers as US1 and Crystar: The Crystal Warrior. If accurate, that’s beyond pitiful.
 
Comic strip great, Will Eisner, said he saw comic books almost die out twice before the internet. They were meant to be fun, thrilling, unusual, a trip to another world. And that thrill and wonder is mostly gone. The artistic greats are mostly gone, their work being sold at auction right now.

Marvel Comics went bankrupt (Chapter 11) in 1996. **Yeah, I was there, watching teenagers with stacks of comics standing in line. I mentioned to one that he was quite a collector. He replied, “Oh, I don’t read these. I just buy 'em, bag 'em and six months from now, I’ll get 20 bucks a piece.” **The problem is, a lot of people were doing that, including store owners stashing copies away for the same reason. By the late 90s, thousands of comic book stores closed in the US. The gold foil version, the silver foil version (magnificent print craft by the way) and the color cover version all contained the same comic book. You were enticed to buy the same comic 3 times. For what?
I remember that vividly, especially going into stores and seeing the books that were really hot when I was still collecting gathering dust in the dime boxes (for those not in the know, a “dime box” is where comic shops used to put their worst books, the stuff that had no hope of selling at regular price, for 10 cents each, sometimes 12 for a dollar, etc.). It was shocking to watch one of my favorite store’s back issue collection gradually morph into their dime box selection. The biggest casualty at first was Image. Except for some of the earliest issues, especially Spawn, you could find dozens of copies of every single issue. Boatloads of other indy titles followed, then they started dumping all the 90s and 00s Marvels and DCs, especially all those variant covers. They eventually had two rows of tables of nothing but dime boxes, at least a dozen boxes per row, plus just as many stacked two high underneath the tables (I’m guessing 72-110 boxes total). At the peak of the glut, their dime boxes were overflowing with hundreds of great Marvel titles from the 70s. Absolutely nothing was selling! I’d go in and buy entire runs of some of the greatest storylines to ever see print, stuff that would have cost me $5-50 per book ten years early, for less than a dime each (he gave me a discount). In the late 90s/early 00s, we had over a dozen comic shops in a pretty small area. Now I think we have three.

I’ll stop into one of the local comic shops every 2-3 months or so. I never buy anything. Like you said, that thrill and wonder is gone. Even the familiar characters aren’t familiar anymore. Almost all of them seem to be slight variants on the same theme. Plus, the people creating the books have no idea how to draw in new readers. With very few exceptions, the few books I’ve read in the last decade or so have been pretty simple-minded vehicles for juvenile innuendo, gratuitous violence and anatomically improbably pin-up art.
 
There’s a fine line between creativity and independence. 90% of any worthwhile media is research, skill and hard work. You need a director, an editor and artists and writers who understood their craft. As Jack Kirby said, “My job was to sell comic books.” Sure, they enjoyed what they did but that was balanced with family and life in general. They took the good with the bad. They knew what life was about. Their sensibilities were gentle. Kirby saw war but said he didn’t draw real violence. Everything was larger than life. There was a bit of the creators in every story.

As time passed, they moved on, but the new breed that came into their own in the 1970s, had different goals, personal goals. They weren’t interested in putting 10 or 20 or more years into comics. I was in an art room at a comic con alone with Barry Smith who had become Barry Windsor-Smith. He started his own studio. He was joining a band. The studio didn’t get very far. He became caught up in a rudderless ship. Comic book great and illustrator supreme, Jim Steranko, was great and he knew it. In the 1970s, he left Marvel and started Supergraphics. He published tabloids that morphed as he tried to become a publisher: Comixscene, Mediascene, Mediascene Prevue, and the magazine Prevue. A friend summed it up: “He never saw a movie he didn’t like.” His talents were mostly wasted. He did book covers, some work with Hollywood and painted covers for The Shadow. His book of pencil drawings for the covers, titled Unseen Shadows, showed his skills had not diminished one bit. The last I saw him, he showed me the first page for a Catwoman back-up story for one of the Batman books. I reached out for it, and he calmly said, “No. Let me hold it.” It was all there, it all worked. The layout, the camera angle, the shadows - all masterfully, and fully alive. I was pulled in. It was like watching a brief movie scene. It was amazing.

A few others would dabble. Some went independent and formed Image. I recently read a piece from one of the original founders. He was perturbed that Hollywood hadn’t taken more notice of their work. That other, no-name, one or two issue comics were being optioned almost monthly. Sadly, a lot of people don’t know Hollywood. It was like a scene from a movie. A few inexperienced guys are taken in by a promise for a - to them - big paycheck, not realizing they had just exchanged all rights for a movie that would not likely see the light of day. They’d never see much more because they had signed away all merchandising rights or Hollywood sort of decided not to pay you a cut for DVD sales if you were one of the thousands of other deals where an actual movie got made.

Hey. People did what they wanted. But they could have done a lot more to entertain others. In another case, a studio decided to go all experimental. No more guys in tights. As the money and sales dried up, someone said, “Let’s do superhero books.” The money started to roll in. It’s not like they didn’t have talent but they forgot they were selling a product and to stay in business, you needed to know what people really liked.

Now, comics are managed by people who are into issue advocacy.

Thanks for reading,
Ed
 
As time passed, they moved on, but the new breed that came into their own in the 1970s, had different goals, personal goals.
I think part of the problem is that the creators, or at least their egos, became more important than the comics. As soon as fans went from buying “the latest issue of the X-Men” to buying “the latest book by John Byrne,” the seeds of the current creative miasma were sown. The self-importance of a lot of these artists/writers has ruined the actual creativity of the books. Regardless of what someone like Byrne may say, a hastily drawn head on a white background is nowhere near as good or as satisfying as the sort of Kirby-inspired, intricately drawn and inked splash pages that he and Terry Austin used to produce. He hasn’t gotten better; he’s gotten lazy.

The Image guys are the epitome of what went wrong in comics. They were all superstars and they knew it (or at least believed it). Storytelling and deadlines be damned, they were going to put out whatever they wanted, whenever they wanted, and they knew they’d make millions because people were far more interested in TODD MCFARLANE!!! © than they were in Spawn. They got by on their names, their reputations and, worst of all, their Levi’s 501 Blues commercials. Why on earth do you have to worry about actual storytelling, composition and anatomy when you can squiggle in extra lines and plagiarize people who actually know what they’re doing and still sell a million copies each month?

The people who grew up idolizing McFarlane, Jim Lee, Erik Larsen and–God help us all–Rob Liefeld are the ones making the comics now. They learned their craft by aping people who didn’t have a clue in the first place. I’m all in favor of scrapping the whole industry and letting Jim Shooter rebuild it.
 
Firstly, I am not going to give the movie a bad review for being a Deadpool movie. Some critics may not like the movie because of its crass humor, gore, and sexual content, but this is what Deadpool is. I’m not going to say it’s a bad movie because it is exactly what a Deadpool movie should be. I don’t say apple trees are bad because they aren’t banana trees.

For this reason, I think the movie is a very good movie, for what it is, which is a Deadpool movie. Similarly, I think a burglar is a good burglar if he leaves no trace of his entry. I may not agree with his actions, but he lives up to the standard of what a burglar should be.

This is how I see the Deadpool movie. It is everything a Deadpool movie should be: immature, crass, violent, sexually explicit, and satirical. Deadpool, as seen in the movie, is a sociopathic antihero. Naturally, the movie is extremely self-centered. The plot of the movie amounts to this: a mercenary who, in the process of gaining super-human powers, has his face destroyed. Now, in an attempt to restore his former beauty in order to hook up with his girlfriend again, he goes on a killing rampage to find the man who ruined his appearance through torturous acts.

Obviously the story sounds shallow, and it is. But this is the point of Deadpool. He is a gimmicky character. The reason people enjoy him so much is because he breaks the fourth wall, he addresses the audience personally. He’s self-aware of the fact that he lives in a comic book world. This is where the movie really shines. It is funny to see a comic book character point out the common tropes and cliches of every superhero story as they occur in his own movie. There are even times where Deadpool realizes that he is merely a character being played by Ryan Reynolds.

In addition to the satire, the movie has some really funny moments. Deadpool doesn’t take anything truly serious. He’s the exact opposite of what a typical Marvel hero is. This is the source of a lot of the movie’s humor, the fact that Deadpool seems to approach every situation with frivolity, while all other Marvel heroes would act usually with bravery or anger. So essentially the movie is an elaborate, high-budget, R-rated satire of Marvel movies.

This R rating is rightfully earned too, with over-the-top violence, nudity, and a huge amount of profanity. While this is what the Deadpool character is all about, I found it repulsive at times. His relationship with his girlfriend is summed up in a montage of sex scenes, showing the audience that these two must obviously be a true couple because they have been having kinky sex over the course of two years. And yes, I know this is Deadpool at his finest, but that doesn’t mean I can’t disagree with the moral behavior of the character himself.

Overall the movie is a mixed bag. I break it up as so:

Action 8/10
*The action is well-choreographed with many creative scenes. Though there is gore, it isn’t to a horror movie degree, and you get the sense that all the henchmen Deadpool kills are just lifeless video game puppets. *

Story 4/10
The story is, as I said, shallow. It is a typical origin story, with a bad guy, a love-interest, and a series of obstacles. Though the reason why Deadpool is such an interesting character is due to his witty, crass, and self-aware attitude, and not the story, it would have been nice to have an engaging plot that made you care about where the movie was going instead of having you wait for the next joke or action scene.

Humor
7.5/10
There are a lot of disgusting jokes in this movie. Some strike you as plain immature, or just a way to get a cheap laugh through obscene shock value. However, the satirical moments, coupled with the breaking of the fourth wall, and the paradoxical fact that Deadpool is a Marvel character acting contrary to all the norms of a Marvel character, makes the humor bearable and at times extremely enjoyable.

Moral value
3/10
Deadpool is a sociopath. The character himself shows no sign of moral progress throughout the movie. The only glimpses of an upright form of morality are from Colossus, one of Deadpool’s companions. Overall though, his morality is only there to represent the typical rectitude of Marvel heroes, making it easier for Deadpool to prod at this trope of superhero morality as well.

Final score
5.6/10


Questions:

Is it worth seeing?
Probably not. Maybe if you are a die-hard Marvel fan; it’s understandable if you are a Deadpool fan. At best, it probably will make an okay rental for any Marvel fan.

How old should you be to see this movie?
Respect the R rating. Don’t let children into this movie at all.

Any Christian themes?
Yeah right.
Do you get anything from this movie?*
It has enjoyable action scenes and a good dose of satire.

How bad is the nudity?
There isn’t a ton of nudity. There is partial nudity in the beginning with a montage of sex scenes and then some full nudity briefly seen at a strip club. But for me, any portrayal of women and sex in a debased way is hideous.

Is there a Stan Lee cameo?
Yes, but unfortunately his cameo in this film is not as charming as the others.

Should you stay for a post-credit scene?
Yes there is one and it’s pretty funny
 
Firstly, I am not going to give the movie a bad review for being a Deadpool movie. Some critics may not like the movie because of its crass humor, gore, and sexual content, but this is what Deadpool is. I’m not going to say it’s a bad movie because it is exactly what a Deadpool movie should be. I don’t say apple trees are bad because they aren’t banana trees.

For this reason, I think the movie is a very good movie, for what it is, which is a Deadpool movie. Similarly, I think a burglar is a good burglar if he leaves no trace of his entry. I may not agree with his actions, but he lives up to the standard of what a burglar should be.
That’s fair. I had absolutely no familiarity with Deadpool going in so I was pretty caught off guard. If I knew that’s what the character was all about I probably would have skipped it. Not my thing.

Good review by the way.
 
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