Deadpool & Wolverine spoilers follow.
Ahead of Wade Wilson's return to the big screen, various promos suggested that Deadpool & Wolverine was going to save the MCU, that the Merc with a Mouth is in fact "Marvel Jesus".
All the data suggests that this might actually turn out to be true, financially speaking – but Wade also embodies Jesus in a surprisingly chaste, nigh-on celibate way, despite what the marketing might have you believe.
Based off the posters alone, you might assume that Deadpool and Wolverine are in fact extremely gay for each other. Or at least, Deadpool is extremely gay for Wolverine.
The very first poster put the pair's masks together in a broken heart necklace with the caption "Come together", followed by another where Deadpool caressed Wolverine's claws in a riff on material from 2017's Logan.
Then there's the Wolverine popcorn bucket which Deadpool also caressed in a promo where hot liquid butter oozed and drizzled all over the giant opening where his mouth should be.
It was giving OnlyFans in Marvel form – a "Multiverse of Man-Juice", if you will – but there's a problem.
Both Wade and Logan are canonically queer and sexually fluid in the comics – no matter how much bigots might argue otherwise – but allusions to that in the marketing just amounted to a joke. And it was a tedious, homophobic one at that.
That wasn't the intention (we hope) but that's still how it came across anyway, the marketing equivalent of pointing at male affection and sniggering the words, "lol gay". It's extremely '90s, this notion that men loving other men is a punchline, regardless of the intentions behind it.
This isn't the first time Marvel or Disney have failed in this regard. Time and time again, they've hyped up queer characters without actually devoting time or energy to them on screen.
It's like a riddle of old: What do a lesbian cyclops cop (Onward), an awkward director cameo (Avengers: Endgame), and a blink-and-you'll-miss-it kiss in a galaxy far, far away (Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker) all have in common?
They each represent a so-called first for Disney and queer representation, yet Strange World and Phastos from Eternals aside, most of these big moments are just that, a "moment", or even worse, they're described as queer in interviews yet aren't depicted as such in the movies themselves. Think Thor's Valkyrie, or Aneka and Ayo in Black Panther: Wakanda Forever.
But could Deadpool & Wolverine be different? Has Disney actually managed to follow through on all that homoerotic marketing?
You don't need to be Madame Web to foresee the answer to that one, although there is a tad more nuance going on here than you might expect from the company that gave us a Wolverine fleshlight.
It all starts predictably enough with the usual jokes – Deadpool dancing to *NSYNC, Deadpool rubbing the bone he's shoved into a soldier's groin like he's giving it a handjob. But then the TVA show up outside his door and suddenly, Wade's getting ready for a gangbang, despite not being, "The world's most natural bottom". His words, not ours.
Pegging jokes are par for the course in this franchise, but who would have guessed bottoming itself would ever arch its way into a Marvel movie? Or that Deadpool would later crush on Thor to the point that he even wakes up dreaming about those golden locks and unwieldy Hemsworth biceps?
The way Deadpool lusted after Colossus in the previous movie can still be brushed off as him simply f**king with the man instead of actually trying to f**k him. This time around though, moments like this combine to form a slightly more defined version of Wade's pansexuality that's played for laughs, yes, but laughs with us a bit more than at us.
Things get more complicated, though, when Logan fastballs his way into the mix.
After auditioning a number of Wolverines (who are all too fun to spoil here), Deadpool finally settles on the "worst one" of all, but not before the bartender asks them if they're "gonna f**k or fight". Maybe he saw the posters too.
But alas, it's not meant to be. Despite Logan enjoying a polyamorous throuple with Jean and Cyclops in the comics – and yes, that's the original Logan, not an alternate version – this movie is far more interested in the pair fighting than f**king.
That's not due to a lack of interest on Deadpool's part though. When a magnet presses their unconscious bodies together, face-to-face, Logan remarks "not all" of Deadpool was asleep before he regained consciousness. Yep, Wade's boner touched Logan and that's now canon, much to the delight of a thousand fanfic authors worldwide.
What's most surprising though is how the movie (kind of) follows through on this and (sort of) gives them a night of passion.
The moment in question comes a bit later on when Wolverine suddenly suspects that Deadpool has tricked him into helping out on his quest. A gory, R-rated fight ensues where our heroes repeatedly penetrate each other with pointy claws and katanas. That's par for the course, but then something quite unique happens.
As the fight progresses, a near-endless one thanks to both of their healing factors, the camera pulls out of the car that's now rocking back and forth while day turns to night. If you'd missed all the violent stabbing beforehand, you'd probably assume that the pair were gently poking each other in a different way instead, because this transition is blatantly coded to make you think of sex.
Why else would a car shake like that with two men grunting inside at night?
We then cut to Wade and Logan sleeping next to each other the next morning, clearly exhausted by all these shenanigans. To ram the gay subtext home further, the song 'You're The One That I Want' from Grease plays over the top. But it's all subtext still, which begs the question: why include it at all?
That's not to say Deadpool and Wolverine need to go the whole hog and make the beast with two backs on screen (although we wouldn't complain, of course). But in scenes like this – or when Wade holds hands with a shirtless Logan to save everyone at the end – it's still playing into this notion that they're kind of gay, but also not.
OK, Deadpool is definitely into Wolverine's grizzly abs, but it's all handled in a very roundabout way that tentatively hints at queerness with the occasional line or gag without ever really committing to anything.
It's better than the "lol, gay" marketing would have you believe, but when the gayest thing in your movie is actually a Madonna needle drop, it's hardly worth celebrating.
That's particularly disappointing given how Deadpool 2 was the first mainstream superhero movie to include an LGBTQ+ romance (all the way back in 2018). Six years on, Negasonic Teenage Warhead and her girlfriend Yukio are heavily sidelined in this movie aside from a couple of throwaway lines at the beginning and end.
Instead of improving on their relationship, moving beyond lip service to include the same kind of kissing or even handholding that Wade enjoyed with Vanessa, Deadpool & Wolverine removes these lovebirds almost completely. You wouldn't even know they're queer if you hadn't seen the previous movie.
Unfortunately, the same could be said for Deadpool himself, even now.
For a character who's anything but subtle, it's still rather damning that bigots who feel threatened by queerness could write off Deadpool's gayest moments as a joke befitting of such a "quirky" character. Admittedly, it's harder to do that this time around, which could sort of be considered progress, kind of, sort of, we guess...
We're at a point now when Deadpool movies can openly mock the MCU and its dying multiverse plan – "the gays told us, but we didn't listen" – yet they still don't have the balls to go that extra mile and make Wade unquestionably queer beyond any shadow of a doubt.
Sure, "Marvel Jesus" might have saved the MCU, or at least forestalled its demise, but hesitating to be bold in areas where it really matters is a mistake of biblical proportions. That's always going to be true regardless of how much money Deadpool & Wolverine ends up making at the box office.
For more on Deadpool & Wolverine, check out:
• Deadpool & Wolverine cameos explained
• When is Deadpool & Wolverine on Disney+?
• Deadpool & Wolverine post-credits scene explained
• Who played Lady Deadpool?
• Deadpool & Wolverine ending explained
Deadpool & Wolverine is out now in cinemas.
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After teaching in England and South Korea, David turned to writing in Germany, where he covered everything from superhero movies to the Berlin Film Festival.
In 2019, David moved to London to join Digital Spy, where he could indulge his love of comics, horror and LGBTQ+ storytelling as Deputy TV Editor, and later, as Acting TV Editor.
David has spoken on numerous LGBTQ+ panels to discuss queer representation and in 2020, he created the Rainbow Crew interview series, which celebrates LGBTQ+ talent on both sides of the camera via video content and longform reads.
Beyond that, David has interviewed all your faves, including Henry Cavill, Pedro Pascal, Olivia Colman, Patrick Stewart, Ncuti Gatwa, Jamie Dornan, Regina King, and more — not to mention countless Drag Race legends.
As a freelance entertainment journalist, David has bylines across a range of publications including Empire Online, Radio Times, INTO, Highsnobiety, Den of Geek, The Digital Fix and Sight & Sound.
