The sarcastic, witty Marvel character, Deadpool, which first appeared in 1991, took on the silver screen Valentine’s weekend twenty five years later. Compared to other Marvel movies, Deadpool had relatively limited funds, but still managed to more than double its budget in box office revenue in just the opening weekend and become the second highest grossing R-rated film of all time.
From getting production started to generating interest and filling the theaters upon its release, Deadpool fans have played a key role in the movie adaptation every step of the way. Although development of the film began in 2004, it was pressure from the fans in 2014, both online and through letters to 20th Century Fox, that finally led to the green light for its production. The main character, Wade Wilson/Deadpool is also played by a Deadpool fan, Ryan Reynolds.
“Deadpool doesn’t really take himself seriously at all, and in this era of comic-book superhero saturation, it’s a lot of fun to be playing a character that’s doing something wholly different from the rest,” Reynolds said in an interview with the Los Angeles Times.
The success of a film with so many fourth wall breaks and a sarcastic main character that continuously mocks his own ‘superhero movie’, is evident of a new trend for content creators to be much more directly influenced by their audience. Deadpool may be one of the greatest examples of a fanbase’s involvement in such a mainstream movie production ever, and the success of it may be indicative of a shift towards more satirical and audience involvement in popular movies.