Disney and Marvel Studios‘ “Deadpool & Wolverine” clawed up a massive $96 million from 4,210 locations across Friday and preview screenings. That’s far and away the biggest domestic opening day of the year — ahead of the $62 million that “Inside Out 2” nabbed in June. Not only that, it’s also the largest ever for an R-rated feature and the sixth-highest of all time, not adjusted for inflation.
That’s an epic win for the merc with the mouth and a big bounce back for Marvel Studios, which is coming off of its worst domestic performance ever with “The Marvels” last fall. The records will continue to fall this weekend as the Ryan Reynolds–Hugh Jackman buddy comedy heads toward one of the biggest domestic debuts of all time.
It’s not complicated. Make good movies. If you can make two or three good movies a year, then make them. If making more movies means that the quality suffers, dial it back until the movies are good again.
The Post-Endgame movies have been middling to bad. I liked them more than most people did, but I recognize the flaws they have each had. Some were better than reviews would indicate, but none of them were without significant flaws. I actually think the D+ shows have been better than the movies (with some exceptions), but they were able to take more risks and do different things with better character arcs.
I think there are also two distinct groups of critics who have enjoyed the failures of Marvel more than they ever enjoyed comic book movies. First, you have the critics who don’t like comic book movies and hate-watch so they can be the critic to finally declare their demise. Second, you have bigots who complain about movies being “woke.” It’s easy to dismiss the latter, because they’re just hateful people undeserving of attention. It’s harder to defend mediocre movies against critics who are biased against superhero movies, because they’re not wrong when they complain about the quality of the movies. Quantumania did look unfinished, and even Paul Rudd Charm couldn’t fix that. Eternals was an overcrowded mess with the underpinnings of a decent tv series. Love and Thunder did wander into parody. The Marvels was anticlimactic and needed a better villain. Multiverse of Madness was probably my least favorite, but I think it should also have been a limited series. Wakanda Forever had to be done to honor Chadwick Boseman, but I’m hopeful Shuri passes the torch quickly and Namor comes back as a complicated anti-hero.
Shang Chi was a good movie except for the final dragon fight. Black Widow was also pretty good. No Way Home was basically fanservice for comic book movie enthusiasts, so if you didn’t like it, it just wasn’t made for you. GotG3 was probably the best of the bunch.
Audiences also want to lump in the trash from Sony and DC, but those are not MCU movies. Marvel hasn’t made the worst comic book movies of the last decade, and they are the only studio making some really good ones.
On balance, it’s a better batting average than most movie studios. The biggest mistake that Marvel made was trying to cram too many movies and shows into the calendar. I’m hopeful that Deadpool and Wolverine signals the beginning of some fresh stories and characters to fill out the space between crossover events.