Ryan Reynolds and Hugh Jackman playing their iconic superhero roles in a single film? Yeah, this was going to either try to skate by on just that alone, or be a lot of fun ‒ thankfully, it was the latter!

Don't get me wrong, there are some moments I think could have been improved. The opening fight sequence is such a good idea but completely spoiled by the intercut dancing, which just feeling like a weirdly jarring and poorly edited later addition. Had they actually built this into the fight choreography at all it could have been the most iconic music sequences since Guardians of the Galaxy, but instead it just sours an otherwise epic bit using Logan's metal bones as weapons 🤷‍♀️ Elsewhere, I don't feel like they did enough to really explain how Wade's relationship had so completely broken down; nor was Wolverine's backstory actually all that tragic; the whole Happy Hogan cameo felt forced and unnecessary (plus reopens the can of worms of how/why they've made the MCU Earth-616, or how Wade travelled to an alternate Earth); and there were a couple of gags that didn't quite land or were obvious yet missed. For instance, how wasn't there some line about the 20th Century Fox logo along the lines of "oh, so that's what Disney did to you?" or "still happy with that merger, then?", or something? They acknowledge it, and it's a great visual gag which works so well with the meta commentary, but missed opportunity. Ditto when they have their big final showdown and burst through Antman corpse, wheels flaming, in that minivan that Wade's been ripping on for the whole film: how was there no mention of how that must be the most epic that car has ever looked? 😅

These small grievances aside, once the film had hit its stride and done the whole "record scratch, let's rewind" moment, I had a great time. Jackman is fantastic and some of the jokes around him were on point! The "accurate height" Wolverine? Patch Wolverine? And they (largely) nailed that suit; Alison and I disagree on how well or not the hood worked, but the rest of it looked great, and I highly respect the effort. Yet, perhaps Jackman's inclusion wasn't even the best addition to the universe. It was nice to see some returning characters (though no Cable? No Domino? No Russell? 🤔), but it wasn't until the whole "oh this is a meta-commentary on the Fox-Disney merger" really kicked into gear that things dialled up a notch. I loved that we got Jennifer Garner, Wesley Snipes, and Dafne Keen back to reprise their prior roles, with Channing Tatum's pitch perfect Gambit being the absolute cherry on top ‒ this was the only cameo spoiled for me prior to the film, and I'm kinda glad it was, given that I'd completely forgotten about how he'd been cast into a cancelled Origins project to play Gambit, which made a lot more sense of his inclusion. Oh, and of course the phenomenal fake-out with Chris Evans: 👩‍🍳😘

Plotwise, sure it's a little light on the ground, mainly fuel for the cameos and meta-commentary/jokes about Marvel, Disney, and Fox, but I thought they used the TVA well and basically wrote a film that allows for these alternate, prior film universes to be woven into the MCU as much or as little as they want. It's a neat touch from a business perspective, and when it's done with this much fan service, it was kinda great. It also definitely felt more like an MCU film than the prior Deadpool duo, but didn't give up any of their charm or character. The result is fun, ever interesting, and with that core chemistry between real-life friends Reynolds and Jackman, hugely enjoyably throughout. It's a film that keeps building and bettering itself, and I loved it.