By all indications “Deadpool & Wolverine” looks to be the massive moneymaking blockbuster the laboring Marvel Cinematic Universe desperately needs. After a run of big budget flops in theaters and on streaming, Kevin Feige and Disney have looked to a movie that caters to the easiest targets. And from the looks of things their not-so-risky “gamble” is about to pay huge dividends.

“Deadpool & Wolverine” is a movie filled to the brim with fan service which it uses, along with an assortment of gimmicks, to draw in a variety of fans. There are those who love Ryan Reynolds’ schtick. They get plenty of it here. There are others who are giddy for more R-rated superhero movies. This one works REALLY hard to earn its R rating. And of course there is the ultimate act of fan service – paying Hugh Jackman a boatload of money to return as Wolverine. But that only scratches the surface of this movie’s pandering for reactions.

I’m not knocking anyone who is drawn to those things. But for me, Reynolds’ routine can be exhausting and a little of it goes a long way. And I don’t think I’ve ever rooted for a movie to have a specific rating (whatever fits the film). But since its beginning, many have embraced the Deadpool series for its R rating as much as anything else. As for Wolverine, Jackman’s character arc reached a perfect conclusion in 2017’s “Logan”. Yet the MCU creatives play the cheap multiverse card to bring him back (and more importantly, to sell more tickets).

Then there’s Deadpool. I’ll always prefer the early version of the character that existed before Marvel Comics started using the crutch of “mature content” to sell his books. The movies have leaned heavily into the ultra-silly and endlessly foul-mouthed version and it’s no different in “Deadpool & Wolverine”. New director Shawn Levy (who recently worked with Reynolds on “Free Guy” and “The Adam Project”) teams up with a total of five (!!!) screenwriters. What they give us is a series of Deadpool skits, stitched together by yet another bad MCU story.

From the very beginning the filmmakers go for the nostalgia jugular, hitting us with endless waves of meta gags, surprise appearances, and absurd needle-drops. There are countless callbacks to Fox’s Marvel era. And of course it spends a ton of time lampooning superheroes, superhero movies, and pretty much anything else that comes to mind. In essence it’s the same Deadpool movie formula, only cranked up to 11 and now with MCU baggage to lug around.

Yes, Deadpool is now part of the MCU, grafted in through yet another multiverse convenience. I have no idea how such an exaggerated and self-aware character will fit with the other Marvel films. But since “Avengers: Endgame”, I’m not sure the MCU heads have put much thought into things like continuity or cohesion. And as this movie proves, there’s not much interest in plot either.

Good storytelling was never a strength of the first two Deadpool movies. But there was a semi-intimacy between Wade Wilson and his friends that at least kept their stories focused. “Deadpool & Wolverine” is hampered by one of the laziest scripts I’ve seen in a superhero movie. So much of the story feels patched together. Things routinely happen with no real explanation, and the quintet of writers seem perfectly content with skating by on comic mayhem and the buddy chemistry between Reynolds and Jackman.

After a silly but funny opening credits scene, Levy waste no time throwing us into Marvel’s multiverse, almost immediately bogging the movie down with vaguely defined and uninteresting mumbo-jumbo about the Sacred Timeline, plot contrivances such as “anchor beings” and a contraption called the “Time Ripper”, and so on. It’s almost as if there are two movies fighting for time – an obsessively bloody and vulgar Deadpool rehash and another messy MCU post-“Endgame” misfire.

While celebrating his birthday with his friends, Wade Wilson (Reynolds) is apprehended by the Time Variance Authority (TVA) who take him to their leader, Mr. Paradox (Matthew Macfadyen). Paradox informs Wade that his timeline is rapidly deteriorating. Why is it deteriorating you ask? Because the timeline’s “anchor being” has died and apparently timelines die as a result (don’t ask any questions because the movie doesn’t offer many answers). It turns out that the “anchor being” who died from Wade’s timeline was Logan aka Wolverine.

Desperate to save his friends, Wade swipes a gadget that lets him travel the multiverse. His plan: find and retrieve a suitable replacement Logan from another timeline and bring him back to his world. He settles for a grizzled drunken Wolverine (Jackman) and returns to the TVA only to discover that he has broken a few rules. As a result, Paradox (who has nefarious yet paper-thin plans of his own) banishes them to a place called the Void. Once there, Wade and Logan fight, we get some cameos, they fight again, we get more cameos, and so on.

This time around, Reynolds pushes his wisecracking semi-sociopathic anti-hero farther, mechanically churning out one-liners and on-the-nose profanity in nearly every breath. Jackman falls in line. Chiseled, moody, and forced to drop f-bombs on cue, he brings a certain grit and gravitas the movie needs. It’s too bad he spends so much time being the straight man to the scene-gorging Reynolds. Even worse, it’s tough to see the supporting cast from the previous Deadpool films relegated to the sidelines – replaced by attention-getting cameos and new less interesting characters.

We do get one particularly fun surprise appearance, a couple of good though nonsensical action sequences, and occasionally a joke will hit its mark. But much of it starts to feel like recycled material. Meanwhile the story is clearly a secondary concern. We get no menacing villains, absolutely no suspense, scenes of boring exposition that don’t say much, and plot holes that are impossible to miss for anyone slightly looking. It eventually leaves “Deadpool & Wolverine” resembling a fan service cash grab from a cinematic universe in desperate need of a big box office hit. Well, it looks like Disney has one.

VERDICT – 2 STARS