The highest-grossing R-rated film in box office history, ‘Deadpool & Wolverine’ sees Hugh Jackman and Ryan Reynolds teaming up for a send-off to a bygone era of comic book films – and the songs that soundtracked them.

In 2017’s Logan, a grizzled and world-weary Wolverine / Logan (Hugh Jackman) reckons with his own mortality as his mentor, Professor Charles Xavier (Sir Patrick Stewart) is addled with a psychic dementia that inadvertently murdered the rest of the X-Men years prior.

Drinking himself blind and slowly succumbing to the poisonous Adamantium coating his skeleton, Wolverine is content to squirrel away chauffeur cash for a retreat to the ocean- until he learns he has a daughter, Laura (Dafne Keane). A clone designated as X-23, Laura was abused and trained as a weapon by the Essex Corporation; they have an army of lab-tested mutant child soldiers and a full-sized, home-grown Wolverine clone with no conscience and eyes that say “kill.” Begrudgingly, Logan embarks on a road trip with Charles and Laura to save the refugee Essex children. Initially a reluctant father figure, Logan learns to love Laura and eventually sacrifices himself to save the next generation of mutants. Laura sobs, holding his hand as he dies, and calls the Wolverine “daddy” for the first and only time. She buries him and marks the grave with an X, giving the character – and Jackman – a sendoff worthy of nearly 20 years of films. Johnny Cash’s “The Man Comes Around” plays.

In 2024’s Deadpool & Wolverine, Deadpool exhumes Logan’s metal skeleton and rends it bone-by-bone to massacre a horde of faceless time police. The carnage is set to NSYNC’s “Bye Bye Bye.” Deadpool & Wolverine was an almost surefire financial hit the moment Jackman inked the line to return to his star making role. This week, it is set to cross 1 billion dollars in global returns. The trickier task, it seemed, was to narratively justify the return of the Wolverine character after a poignant retirement. As it turns out, the soundtrack does a surprising amount of the heavy lifting – though it cannot be understate that Jackman, Reynolds, and company all pour their hearts into earnest performances amidst the spectacle.

PSHugh – Jackman, with Van Helsing hair extensions, is handed a copy of 'X2: Wolverine’s Revenge' for the Playstation 2 (possibly the most ‘2004’ sentence imaginable) © Aidan Moyer — PSHugh – Jackman, with Van Helsing hair extensions, is handed a copy of ‘X2: Wolverine’s Revenge’ for the Playstation 2 (possibly the most ‘2004’ sentence imaginable) © Aidan Moyer

“Bye Bye Bye” actually makes its second appearance in an X-Movie here; back in 2004, as Logan and three young mutants escape a siege on the X-Mansion, it is briefly heard on the radio of Cyclops’ Mazda RX-8. Wincing, Logan shuts it off immediately. This speaks to the undercurrent of shame over pop sensibilities that permeated early 2000s superhero films. From Jack Kirby’s original black-and-yellow uniforms to the multicolor menagerie of the Dave Cockrum ’70s reboot, the comic book X-Men have always been brash and gaudy, facing larger-than-life aliens alongside the humans who hate and fear them.

Against the Matrix-tinged backdrop of Y2K and the introduction of “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell,” the movie mutants are allegorical for the queer community at the turn of the century and opt instead to wear all black leather uniforms with only muted color accents. There was a rumored ban of comic books on set, and in the wake of Joel Schumacher’s Batman & Robin bombing, any bright palettes were out of the question. There was overt queer subtext – Iceman’s parents plead “have you tried not being a mutant?” – but costumes, powers, and plots were to remain grounded, muted, “cool.”

C’mon back, Bub: Hugh Jackman strikes a beckoning pose evocative of Frank Miller and Joe Rubenstein’s cover to 'Wolverine #1' (1982); Miller possibly based the artwork on a Frank Sinatra album cover, 'Come Dance With Me!' © Aidan Moyer — C’mon back, Bub: Hugh Jackman strikes a beckoning pose evocative of Frank Miller and Joe Rubenstein’s cover to ‘Wolverine #1’ (1982); Miller possibly based the artwork on a Frank Sinatra album cover, ‘Come Dance With Me!’ © Aidan Moyer

Deadpool traverses the multiverse to find the right Wolverine to save the world.

In quick succession, we see the John Buscema designed Patch (Wolverine with an eyepatch), Joe Madureira’s Age of Apocalypse Wolverine (in a glam-rock jumpsuit), Marc Silverstri’s X-Crucified Wolverine (uncanny X-Men 251), and a costumed version that Deadpool explicitly refers to as “classic John Byrne Brown!” Hughie Lewis’ “The Power of Love” plays in the background. This could not be a further cry from the first film, which features the following exchange regarding the X-Men’s uniforms: Wolverine: “You actually go outside in these things?” Cyclops: “What would you prefer, yellow spandex?”

It would have been easy for Deadpool & Wolverine to be ashamed of the gaffes in Fox’s X-Men films. A large chunk of the narrative is set in a wasteland with a giant “20th Century Fox” logo backdrop. Yet there is a reverence here – a respect for the world that paved the way for billion-dollar films in which Wolverine could proudly rock a yellow cowl. Deadpool and Wolverine team up to the sound of fellow Canuck Avril Lavigne’s “I’m With You”; we hear the Goo Goo Doll’s “Iris” as a ragtag team of forgotten heroes assembles – “when everything’s made to be broken, I just want you to know who I am.”

And finally, after two decades of “never the twain shall meet,” Hugh Jackman’s second career as a stellar song-and-dance man is acknowledged in a superhero film, with a brief snippet of “The Greatest Show” on a car radio and a threat to “sing the second act of the music man without warming up!” Madonna even granted a rare license for “Like a Prayer,” which appears in the film’s climax to hilariously overblown ’80s effect.

Deadpool & Wolverine... and co. © Aidan Moyer — Deadpool & Wolverine… and co. © Aidan Moyer

Deadpool & Wolverine is a stop on an island of misfit toys.

Franchises that never quite took off, or tapered off decades ago, are given a swan song here – in this case, Green Day’s “Good Riddance (Time of Your Life).” Behind the scenes footage of the X-Men, Fantastic Four, and Daredevil casts goofing off in costume, laughing hysterically, reveling in the absurdity of this fiction and its absurdity – this alone is worth the price of admission. It’s an incredibly earnest moment and the payoff to “Bye Bye Bye” in the opening scene – this is the coda to a series of films that, for all its faults, legitimized the comic book blockbuster as a bona fide phenomenon.

Whether clad in black from head to toe or rocking fluorescent yellow (or John Byrne Brown), these characters and the actors who played them were and will remain icons. The sonic time capsules which underscore that iconicity are just as indelible. Between Deadpool & Wolverine and this year’s beloved revival of the ’90s X-Men cartoon – and its equally beloved theme tune – the mutants are back with a vengeance.

— —