Quick Thoughts on Once Upon a Deadpool

Once Upon a Deadpool Review

Wait for a second… didn’t Deadpool 2 just come out earlier this year?

How in the name of Stan Lee did they crank out another one so quickly?

What this trailer doesn’t quite tell you is that this is a recut version of Deadpool 2. A recut version that includes a few new scenes and the removal of the content that garnered the movie an “R” rating. Yes, this is a PG-13 version of Deadpool 2 and that’s about it.

Does it work? Can you have a watered-down version of Deadpool and still have a Deadpool movie?

That is an interesting question and one I want to answer.

Let me be open and honest here. I have never thought that Deadpool HAD to be rated “R”. The comics he comes from are typically not the equivalent of an R Rating. There may have been a few comic series or stories allowed to be as graphic as the films are… but it really isn’t a core NEED of the character, despite what vocal fans may have you believe.

I fully believe that you can make a successful, funny, entertaining Deadpool movie and have it rated PG-13. In fact, I’m going to go one step further and say that allowing the character to inhabit a medium where he is allowed to do and say whatever he wants without censorship actually makes him LESS entertaining.

Despite this opinion, I did enjoy the two Deadpool films we got with my preference leaning toward Deadpool 2.

Deadpool works despite the censorship, Deadpool THRIVES in the face of censorship, where the writers and artists get to find clever ways to skirt the edges of the censoring fence and still tell the story they want to tell. With a 4th-wall-breaking character like Wade Wilson, they can even make fun of the fact that censorship is taking place.

Once Upon a Deadpool Movie Review

That’s what I liked about Once Upon a Deadpool. The added scenes were made in this vein, and I think they work tremendously.

What didn’t quite work was the amount of editing they had to do to change the rating of the existing film. The action scenes became confusing. They weren’t designed to be cut the way they were and it is obvious.

The plot remained the same. They really didn’t need to do much more than remove some blood and gore, cut out the “fucks” and some of the more “adult” conversations.

They filled in that missing time with a fun device in which it is revealed that Fred Savage has been kidnapped and restrained in a nearly perfect recreation of the set from the 1987 film the Princess Bride.

 

Deadpool wants to read Fred a family-friendly version of Deadpool 2 and record his reactions.

I think it works and it kept me highly entertained whenever the breaks happened. I loved that they took to task some of the plot complaints from Deadpool 2 and made fun of the fact that Cable isn’t really explained at all. Fred rambling through a super nerdy list of Cable’s attributes and DP’s dismissal of them made me literally laugh out loud.

Overall, this is an interesting exercise. I think it shows that Deadpool can work in a PG-13 realm if it is designed to be that way, instead of cut down to it from an R rating. Will Disney take the franchise this way in the future? I guess we will find out. Either way, I don’t think that there is anything to worry about.

Deadpool and Fred Savage

 

About Dug (Wugmanmax) 241 Articles
(AKA – Wug, Dug, Foug) Hailing from the Twin Cities, Wugmanmax is an avid toy collector, graphic designer, video producer, firefighter, and podcast co-host.

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