[spb_text_block pb_margin_bottom="no" pb_border_bottom="no" width="1/1" el_position="first last"] DEADPOOL: Breaking The Rules By Jacob Krueger [/spb_text_block] [divider type="standard" text="Go to top" full_width="no" width="1/1" el_position="first last"] [blank_spacer height="30px" width="1/1" el_position="first last"] [spb_text_block pb_margin_bottom="no" pb_border_bottom="no" width="1/1" el_position="first last"] There’s just so much we can learn as writers from Deadpool, and not just because the film manages to do that rarest of feats: to be an intelligent, creatively successful superhero movie, but also because Deadpool manages to both follow the rules of superhero movies and break them in really exciting ways. The first rule of superhero movies that every single person knows is that your super hero is supposed to be a super good guy. Superman: yeah, he’s a good guy. Spiderman: sweet kid, good guy. Batman: a little dark, good guy. Thor: a very good guy. The Incredible Hulk may have a problem with anger, but deep down he’s a really good guy. And Ironman may have a bit of an ego problem, but at the end of the day he’s a good guy, too. The world of superheroes is populated by good guys facing down pure evil villains. And what’s wonderful about Deadpool is that its main character gives the big ole’ finger to the entire notion of the superhero as the perfect good guy character. And, in doing so, Deadpool hopefully puts the last nail in the coffin of the whole Save the Cat formula: this notion that if the audience is going to love your main character he/she needs to be saving kitty cats out of trees and doing nice things for people. That’s not to say that Deadpool is a bad guy. He’s a flawed guy a violent guy, a shallow guy, an annoyingly verbose guy with a hell of a lot of attitude. He’s also a guy driven by love, but not driven by the love of the perfect girl next store. He’s driven for the love of a prostitute who’s just as messed up as he is. Deadpool starts the movie as a super badass, work-for-hire hitman. He may have a heart of gold but definitely lives on the darker side of things. He comes from a really messed up childhood. He’s petty, and selfish, and mostly self-interested, and not too deep. He does have a little bit of a soft spot: he’s not an evil guy. His first assignment is protecting a girl who’s being stalked. But he’s certainly not the prototypical hero we’re used to seeing. When we watch the origin stories of superheroes, we’re generally watching an A to Z story. The story of a character who changes from being the dopey, put-upon, powerless, low-self-esteem dude who changes into the hero with complete power. Of course that’s a compensation fantasy for a lot of people. A lot of us feel like we’re weak, or not as strong as we wish we could be. That we can’t stand up for ourselves in the way we wish we could. That we can’t quite be the heroes that we’d like to imagine ourselves as being. So this is not the compensation fantasy story we’re used to seeing in superhero movies of the weak kid made good. It’s not the coming of age story of the guy who finally grows up. It’s not the story of the wealthy child whose parents die at a young age and now he must become the Batman. This is a different kind of story. And that doesn’t mean that the character doesn’t go through a huge change, because he certainly does. He goes through a change in relation to his own ego and his own vanity. Ultimately Deadpool’s journey is to get over his obsession with his looks, so he can finally be with the girl that he loves. Deadpool’s not fighting to save the world. Deadpool’s not fighting to prevent the evil Ajax from filling the universe with superhuman mercenaries. Deadpool doesn’t give a shit about all that. Deadpool only cares about getting his face back so he can get his girl back. This is not exactly the noble selfless enterprise we’re used to seeing in superhero movies.