Deadpool's moniker "Merc with a Mouth" is there for a reason - he talks a lot, even to his viewers. That is silly, unconventional, breaking the fourth wall and well, typical Deadpool.
If you ask the writing duo who penned Marvel's Deadpool movie (directed by Tim Miller) that should always be the case. Screenwriters Rhett Rheese and Paul Wernick believes the success of the first movie is because it embodied its anti-hero protagonist's personality.
"What's nice is Deadpool exists in his own universe. He's part of the larger X-Men universe, but in a way he isn't," Wernick said. "He interacts with that world but he is in the present. We don't deal with the '60s or the '70s or the future. It's here and now. More than anything, I think he's going to have his fun with what they do in the other franchise," he added.
This unconventionality is what gave the writers creative freedom to explore Deadpool's universe. They did not need to bother with any timeline or plot "continuity" like other Marvel and DC movies.
Speaking to Hollywood Reporter, Rheese said: "I think sometimes the movies get a little overstuffed trying to set up future movies and it almost feels burdensome or obligatory, where you are weaving in four or five different plots that really aren't in service of the current movie, but are to set up audience anticipation or logic for what's coming. We really are trying our best to avoid that. There is something to the movie that is just worried about itself for the moment."
Rheese added that the Marvel Cinematic Universe has "a very specific, genius tone that was set in Iron Man and has lived well beyond that into the other movies." The game goes for DC, which according to Rheese has "this dark, gritty tone."
"And I think what we stumbled into was a new tone, and I haven't seen Logan, so it's tough to say if they have it, but I think we hope to have our own universe that is defined less by characters and timelines and things like that and more by tone," Rheese added.
A sequel, Deadpool 2, is currently in the works. The duo is happy they can continue to break the rules of superhero screenwriting.
"Deadpool is a movie that did break all the rules. And I think we're going to continue to break those rules. That involves knowing that he's in a movie, talking to the audience, breaking that fourth wall, a characteristic that they established so brilliantly in the comics way back when."
Deadpool 2 will be directed by David Leitch of John Wick fame. There is no release date yet.
