July, 1776. The world watches as a young, rebellious nation ushers in a new era of liberty. The world thinks "Wow. They can say what they want, think what they want, do what they want." 237 years later, that nation of such promise has yet to make a Deadpool movie.
Now, I'm being unfair. Movies weren't around until the late 1800's and Deadpool not until the late 1900's, so the only people we can really be mad at are ourselves and the super mean president who I KNOW has a time machine that he won't let me use.
“Ooh! He’s calling again. Act serious guys, or he’s gonna know.”
Many of you, like me, are disgruntled by this lack of Mouthy Merc Movies. We Deadpool fans are a mix of frustrated and hopeful, eager and upset. Most of all, though, we're impatient. "Make the damn movie!" we cry at the internet on our phones, frightening the other people in the restroom. But maybe, just maybe, we're going about this all wrong. Maybe all this time, from the motion picture being invented to Deadpool being invented to the Deadpool movie being stuck in development hell, maybe it's been a good thing.
See, with time comes quality. Think about it, why were most people worried about the Spider-Man reboot? Because we didn't think there had been enough time. Now, that project didn't turn out badly at all, but it's an exception rather than a rule. Besides, The Amazing Spider-Man had years of superhero-movie mistakes to learn from, predominantly from the third Sam Raimi Spider-Man film. How many more mistakes will the Deadpool film know to avoid?
This one. They’ll know to avoid this one.
That wasn't rhetorical. The answer is a lot. After doing a little bit of research and drinking a much larger little bit of Jack Daniels, here are the avoidable mistakes that seem most obvious and most relevant to a Regeneratin' Degenerate film.
1.) MAKING A HERO INVINCIBLE - Since he's essentially unkillable, Deadpool would be a suspense writer's nightmare. Why would the audience be worried when a protagonist is never in real danger? Think about famous "danger" scenes in movies. He'd easily and hilariously survive the shower scene from Psycho. Had it been him in the bike with E.T., he would have been fine, magical flying powers or not. If Indiana Jones' boulder ran over Deadpool, he'd make a clever remark and get back up.
“Boulder? I barely even know her!” Why has Disney not hired me?
HOW TO AVOID THE MISTAKE - Deadpool may be invincible, but the people he cares about definitely are not. The Deadpool film needs to have a character that can be killed and, more importantly, that Deadpool doesn't want to be killed. Will it be Bob, Agent of H.Y.D.R.A., that Deadpool needs to save? Blind Al? Perhaps a love interest? In any case, we're not going to worry about Deadpool's safety, so there needs to be someone we can worry about.
2.) MAKING THE HERO'S JOURNEY TOO EASY – One of the best and most endearing traits of Deadpool is his honest desire to be a good guy, refuted by the fact that he really isn’t. Keep in mind, Wade Wilson kills people for money so he can buy Mexican food. But he tries to be better and we root for him. We love him for it. Hollywood, however, tends to want to make its heroes too easy to like. It’s not really their fault, audiences seem to want to see explosions and slow-motion gunshots rather than a protagonist’s inner demons. It is possible that Deadpool’s strive for something better could get lost in computer-animated machine-gun rounds.
Then again, sometimes the CGI bullets are the deepest part of the film.
HOW TO AVOID THE MISTAKE – The audience must be given a villain with whom to empathize. See, the most common (laziest) way to make a protagonist likeable when he does unlikeable things is by making the antagonist even less likeable. “He’s a hitman, sure, but he only kills really mean mob guys,” we blatantly accept about most if not all Jason Statham movies. If Deadpool wants to avoid that, the best way to do it is by giving him a reason to feel guilt about killing that bad guy. Maybe the villain has a family, or tragically believes (ala William Stryker from X-Men) that what he’s doing is right. We should hate the villain, yes, but we shouldn’t lose Deadpool’s struggle just for a gratifying kill scene.
3.) MAKING A COMEDIC HERO A JOKE – This is one of the biggest worries for a Deadpool film and, really, it’s our fault. Potential Deadpool screenwriters are getting messages like “Deadpool needs to make chimichangas in the movie!” “There better be a Bea Arthur reference!” and “Tom Hanks would be a great Hit Monkey!” all from fans like us. Because of this and the fact that Deadpool is a very funny character, there’s a serious danger of making a compilation of one-liners rather than a movie about Deadpool.
Above: A very serious, complex character.
HOW TO AVOID THE MISTAKE – Listen up, screenwriters. Put the story before the jokes. See, the funny bits we all love about Deadpool, pop culture references included, are all Deadpool’s characteristics, rather than his actual character. Deadpool isn’t fart jokes and cat references, he’s a conflicted, basically immortal killer. Even the most well-known Deadpool characteristic isn’t necessary to his character. That’s right, it would be better to have a well-written movie without Deadpool breaking the fourth wall than a mediocre Deadpool movie in which the fourth wall breaking is forced.
I’m not saying it shouldn’t be there, just that it should only be in it if it’s appropriate and heightens the story, as it does in the comic so well.
Please don’t hurt me.
I’d love for this to be a discussion. Are these really the mistakes that Deadpool is in the most danger of making? Has it really been good that there’s been so much time of not making Deadpool? Have you decoded the Illuminati message hidden in this article?
Also, thanks to Robert McKee for writing Story, the best screenwriting book that exists. Most of my points in this article are just repeats of his, but with Deadpool words.