This has been a big record-breaking week for superhero movies! First Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice breaks the (not so great) record for biggest box office drop in one week, and now Deadpool is the highest grossing X-Men film of all time.
According to Box Office Mojo, Deadpool has earned $754.5 million globally as of this weekend. The second highest grossing X-Men film, X-Men: Days of Future Past, clocks out at $747.9 million. This is just one of the many records Deadpool has broken since it's release earlier this year. It’s funny to think of Deadpool as an X-Men film. It’s very vaguely defined where in the X-Men universe it takes place, so it feels very disjointed from all the other films. If it weren’t for the presence of Colossus and Negasonic Teenage Warhead (which is very fun to type), you wouldn’t even think Deadpool was connected to Marvels mutants. There’s also the big difference in its visual style and tone. Obviously, its rating contributes to that, and it makes me wonder how crazy it's going to feel when the Merc with a mouth does eventually crossover with the X-Men. Will he still break the fourth wall?
If you had told me even a year ago that Deadpool would the number one R-rated film in the world, I probably would have laughed in you face. I thought that the movie would be good, but I don’t think anyone imagined that audiences would take to it so well. Deadpool is a pretty bonkers comic book character and it’s amazing to think that he’s now a household name. I can only imagine how surprised/ecstatic Fox, director Tim Miller, and Ryan Reynolds must feel. This movie was trapped in development hell and is clearly a labor of love for those involved. Plus, it was made real cheap (at least for superhero movie standards). For it to be such a success must feel pretty good. Deadpool and superhero movies, in general, have come a long way says the days of X-Men Origins: Wolverine.
Hopefully, the absolute success of this movie pushes studios to make more R-rated action films. The Terminator franchise used to be R-rated and that was still marketed towards children, complete with action figures.
Deadpool arrives on DVD and Blu-ray on May 10 and will unfortunately not be released on VHS and Laser Disc.
