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The recent Deadpool movie was great fun. Or at least, parts of it were. At its best, it was subversive, funny, anarchic and free from all the baggage of the superhero film genre. At its worst, of course, it was just another of those superhero films, right down to the origin story, the CGI, the soap opera, the hero’s journey and the love story.[1] In many ways, of course, Deadpool is a very standard Hollywood hero.
He’s a hypocrite and a bully, he shouts people down, he gets his own way like an oversized child and he has his cake and eats it. In a sense, then, the film does this too. It takes the mickey out of itself and the genre but then falls back on those self same clichés when the satire runs out of steam. Using irony to cover the holes in your product is not new of course – The Simpsons has made good use of that scam for decades now. Yet, as they say, irony ends up consuming itself, and Deadpool simply uses sarcasm to sweeten the same-old, rather than poison it.
Worst of all, however, Deadpool ends up, by accident or design, an inferior remake of a far better film. Long before Sam Raimi did a very bad thing and created the modern super hero movie with all its over-amplified bombast and mugging, he made one brilliant, strangely neglected little film called… Darkman.[2]
Released in 1990, it has much the same plot as Deadpool. A talented individual is scarred horribly by an evil criminal, but gains superpowers and mental quirks from the deal. They use these and their existing skills to slowly hunt down their foes and avenge their loss in as brutal a way as possible. Meanwhile, they struggle to reconcile their disfigurement with their true love, who is abducted by the bad guys, and so there must be a final showdown in a suitably dangerous setting.[3] The End.
There are some differences, of course. Darkman (as played by Liam ‘I have skills’ Neeson[4]) is a scientist, and his special talent is synthesising skin which he can use to disguise himself. His superpowers are an immunity to pain plus amazing strength and ferocity. Deadpool’s skillsbase is mainly centred around killing people and his powers are based around regeneration. (No wonder he has issues over Wolverine!) But these are cosmetic, if you’ll forgive the pun. The real gulf lies in the honesty of both films, and Darkman is a lot more honest than Deadpool.
Why is this? Because Darkman is about the real cost of transformation. Liam Neeson prepared for his role by researching how (non-fictional) people deal with disfigurement, and it shows in his performance that is often monstrous but always, always sympathetic. And Sam Raimi, a director who knows how to mix splatter with comedy, also shows off his talent for personal tragedy and horror. There is no real happy ending for Darkman, unless you count the bad guys getting their just desserts and the love interest being saved. The protagonist realises he has not just transformed physically but mentally too. He has become vicious, ruthless and emotionally unstable, in part because of his terrible injuries and in part due to his being cast out from society.
Darkman’s real super power then, in a sense, is his recognition that he can’t go back to his old life. He knows he’s now a monster of sorts and that he can’t inflict this on the woman he loves. So back he goes to his secret lair, full of half-wrecked computers and skin printers, to live the rest of his days alone and hiding under one mask or another. (On the upside, he gets to look like Bruce Campbell.)
Obviously, none of this is ‘realistic’ but it is emotionally honest. There is no tidy Hollywood ending here, and it is this that tops off an already great film and gives it real power. While the film is, ultimately, gleeful dark fantasy, it does contain one essential truth. Bad things happen to people and there is no going back from that. There is no reset button.
Deadpool, though, has no such moral barometer. There is no real price to be paid by the main character, no real pathos or heartbreak.[5] The moment the film finally collapses into its own hypocrisy is the happy ending. Deadpool keeps his special powers, breaks the fourth wall non-stop and still gets the girl who tells him she’ll sit on his face despite his deformity. Even his anxieties over his condition are dismissed – as if it’s just Deadpool being silly rather than having to deal with a real issue. This sends the wrong message; people’s looks do count, whether we like it or not, and disability can and does ruin lives.
Now, you might say at this point that it is ‘just a movie’, that great cop-out reply. But that is to ignore how pop culture reflects and reaffirms the ways in which we view the world. Darkman takes these issues head on. Deadpool treats them as a casual plot device. For all its swear words and subversion, it is just another modern superhero movie after all, where a winner just keeps on winning, give or take some pitfalls on the way.[6] Darkman, by contrast, seems a much more heroic figure perhaps because he is allowed to be tragic and so, ultimately, human.
[1] It would be churlish to point out that Green Lantern, Ryan Reynold’s other super hero vehicle (let us draw a veil over his other version of Deadpool), had exactly the same formula but flopped spectacularly. Then again, just about every superhero film uses that formula too, so there you go.
[2] Towards the end of writing this feature, I heard that the actor Larry Drake, who did a wonderful job playing Darkman’s adversary Durant, had died at age 66. This is dedicated to his memory.
[3] Strictly speaking, Darkman’s finale takes place high up on a building site, while Deadpool’s showdown takes place at a salvage facility taking apart what appears to once have been a SHIELD Helicarrier. Still, it’s interesting that they both happen in places where things are in the process of being made or unmade given the films’ shared themes and Deadpool’s own deconstruction of the genre.
[4] Wade/Deadpool does make a reference to Neeson and the Taken series of movies at one point, but the script doesn’t seem to make the obvious connection between Deadpool and Darkman.
[5] Raimi also got this right in the Spiderman films, though, as said, they were cursed with the over-hyped ‘spectacle’ that pretty much defines the genre to this day.
[6] It’s worth noting that whereas Darkman is an underdog who has to rely on his wits and cunning, Deadpool is so over-advantaged he can forget a bag of guns and still turn up at a gun fight looking confident, with or without two X-Men flanking him.
About Alexander Hay
For his sins, Alexander Hay works as a lecturer, teaching ethics to the unethical. He has also written extensively as a music journalist. He personally has no problems with decadent tyranny, but only if he is in charge of it.
