Seen the movie yet? Awesome isn’t it? So awesome, that it has been demolishing box office records left right and centre. It made more in The Wolverine than that movie did in its entire run (more on that movie in a bit), it now has the biggest ever opening box office in Russia, already trampling over The Force Awakens, it is on track to be the most financially successful of Fox’s X-Men movies (especially given it’s small by blockbuster standards $58 million budget). Well, its success has been noted, as a whole bunch of studios have announced that they are working on hard R-rated comic adaptations too, news that makes me interested, but I really hope that there's a lot more to them, and the thinking behind them than purely the rating.
The thing about any time there’s a massive success is that people will often look for the secret of its success in all the wrong places. This can range from ridiculously poorly thought out think pieces of the sort that James Gunn has deservedly mocked, to of course the studios (both the ones behind the success and others) trying to capture the lightning in a bottle a second time. After seeing Deadpool’s success, everyone seems to be fixated on the R rating* as the magic thing that caused it, which means they’re hard at work on stuff like an R-Rated X-Force movie (which does have potential), and a new, harder take on Spawn (oh Gods no!). Now, can anyone spot the big fallacy going on here? Here’s a hint; remember The Crow? Watchmen? The Punisher? The Punisher? The Punisher War Zone? Dredd? Yeah, that’s right, R-Rated comic movies are not a new thing! That’s not the magic bullet!
Let’s look at one of those more closely to Deadpool, and do a compare/contrast. I love Dredd! It’s not an absolutely frame perfect recreation of the comics, but it’s a damn good capturing of the tone, style and point of them. It’s a solid story well told, a very smart way of introducing audiences to a comic book character without doing an origin story again, and it delivers on action, character beats, and stuff that can be done on film that a comic would find it a lot harder to pull off. Now while it did great business in the UK, it flopped in the US, denying us a chance of a sequel, despite the R-rating. Why? Well that’s easy; they didn’t bloody market it! There wasn’t nearly enough of an effort to sell it as there should have been. Judge Dredd is not that well known a character in the States, with those that know him do so far more for the Stallone version, so the name alone is not enough to get bums- sorry, butts in seats over there. But no, the trailers and such (what there were) didn’t communicate enough about Dredd as a character.
Now compare that to Deadpool. Sure he has a really solid comic fandom, but he was nowhere near a massive household name… until the campaign started. Hell, the road to getting the movie through production began with viral marketing, with the “leak” of the test footage. Since then, almost every step of the way Ryan Reynolds has been in character, keeping the hype train going. Look how many videos I’ve been linking to over the course of this, they made sure Deadpool was everywhere. What’s more, all this marketing put front and centre the core of the film, the main character, and his humour. It conveyed the tone of things perfectly, it told audiences all the right messages. After a campaign like this, which is in many ways still going on, no wonder this has been a hit, because it’s gotten everyone interested and engaged.
But of course, the matter of what they were selling is important too. Going back to The Wolverine, I actually really liked that movie. It got away from the whole “Mutants as a stand in for oppressed/discriminated minorities” thing of every damn X-Men movie, it had a very different visual look, used the comics source material well, and has Hugh’s best performance in ages. Yet it didn’t set the box office on fire. Again, easy answer; because it was yet another Wolverine movie, and the advertising didn’t really convince most that it would be anything beyond that. (Plus again, the last Wolverine movie didn’t exactly get the hype machine going). Even with all the plus points I’ve said, there has been too much Wolverine for some.
Now Deadpool is a character that audiences haven’t seen before- ah, before you say anything, tell me honestly, would you say that the…. thing that turns up for the climax of X-Men Origins is really Wade Wilson? Definitely not, so the real him on screen is definitely something new, and with the field of superhero blockbusters, you really do need to keep things fresh, with even the established franchises focusing on their newer elements. Good example of that; note how much more positive the hype about Batman v. Superman got when we got glimpses of Wonder Woman in action. So that’s another reason why Deadpool has been such a big hit; it’s plain and simple different, and lets everyone know that.
There are of course a tonne more reasons for Deadpool’s success, including a solid, funny script, good tone, and generally strong filmmaking. But the main point I wanted to bring across is that there is no single thing that makes a success a success, it’s not magic. Too often in these analyses, only the surface level material is looked at. I don’t pretend to be immune to that, I’ve barely scratched the surface, the difference is I admit it. Now with all of these studios jumping on the R-Rating, they have to remember that you have to earn it, don’t just chase it artificially. I’m not against the idea of more R-Rated comics fare in theory, it’s just a question of how it’s used. For example, with the X-Men franchise, something that features properly the alien race The Brood and the sheer body horror potential there, that could be something really different if done right, I’d dig that!
The real lesson they should take from all this though is be different, and let everyone know how. Diversify, chase new demographics, consider what parts of the comic material they have the rights to would appeal to what market. And don’t be afraid to try a risk like Deadpool was. To show the thinking I’m talking about, I’ll be leaving the last word to film critic Kim Newman…
The lesson of Deadpool is that Something Different works. So make a daffy G-rated Squirrel Girl movie aimed at tweens. Not Deadpool again.— Kim Newman (@AnnoDracula) February 16, 2016
I’d pay for that!
UPDATE: Since I wrote the above, but before I finished editing this, it's been announced that Batman v. Superman: Dawn of Justice (we're really still going with that title, huh?) will have a special R-Rated cut on its home video release. Now the question here is, will it be R-Rated for stuff that was genuinely planned from the word go, but wouldn't make it past the MPAA, or is it new stuff for that release? Either way, is it really a director's cut, or that thing horror and rude comedy movies have been doing for a while of just sticking back in some deleted scenes for an "unrated" cut? Hmm, the timing of this has me suspicious...
*British readers not too au fait with the MPAA’s method of ratings films, the R-Rating means that no-one under seventeen can go to see it unless accompanied by an adult. Which means that yes, that means kids can technically be taken to see stuff like Deadpool, if they have a (somewhat irresponsible in most cases) parental figure with them. American movie ratings are kind of broken.
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