Every 2016 Comic Book Movie Ranked Worst To Best

Deadpool is something of a contradiction: it is a truly memorable film that isn't actually all that good if you remove a single element from it. The villains are fairly bland and pretty cliched, the side-kick mutants involved are low-grade and disposably entertaining and the plot is curiously without fireworks. But it's just lucky for Fox that the other element is Ryan Reynolds intoxicating performance as Deadpool.

This was the film he has needed to make since he f*cked up every one of his other comic book movie outings - ironically aside from his performance as Wade Wilson, which helped get him this gig. So far, he'd been a toxic presence in RIPD, Blade Trinity and Green Lantern, and he was surely running out of opportunities.

But Reynolds' particular brand of Van Wilder charisma - perfectly meshing charm with snark - proved to be the ideal foundation for Deadpool's idiosyncratic personality. Both are obnoxious, both are instantly likeable despite everything, and the rest was a performance that was far and a way superior to its frame.