Brian Cox says Hollywood is 'beginning to implode' because of films like “Deadpool & Wolverine”: 'Losing the plot'
The actor said that Hollywood is in "a very bad way" because of the "grandiose element" of "Marvel, DC and all of that."
Brian Cox is the latest star to make their case for why superhero films are negatively impacting Hollywood.
The actor — who starred as William Stryker in 2003’s X2: X-Men United — shared his thoughts on why he believes Marvel and DC are at least partially to blame for the implosion of the film industry during a panel at the Edinburgh International Film Festival on Saturday.
“What’s happened is that television is doing what cinema used to do,” Cox explained, per the Hollywood Reporter. “I think cinema is in a very bad way. I think it’s lost its place because of, partly, the grandiose element between Marvel, DC and all of that. And I think it’s beginning to implode, actually. You’re kind of losing the plot.”
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The Succession star cited Ryan Reynolds and Hugh Jackman’s Deadpool & Wolverine as an example of this phenomenon, arguing that superhero films earn “a lot of money” and make "everybody happy,” but that the work eventually “becomes diluted afterwards.”
Cox continued, “It’s just become a party time for certain actors to do this stuff. When you know that Hugh Jackman can do a bit more, Ryan Reynolds… but it’s because they go down that road and it’s box office. They make a lot of money. You can’t knock it.”
He also fully acknowledged that he’s “done those kind of" projects in the past too, going so far as to joke that he often “forgets” that his character Stryker was the one who created Wolverine in the very first place.
“Deadpool meets the guy… Wolverine, who I created, but I’ve forgotten,” he teased. “Actually, when those films are on, there’s always a bit of me [as Stryker] and they never pay me any money.”
Cox’s remarks come after Deadpool & Wolverine recently dethroned Joker to become the highest-grossing R-rated film of all time, earning $1.086 billion at the worldwide box office. Speaking with Entertainment Weekly, director Shawn Levy called the record-breaking reaction to the film “really affirming” amid the constant talk of superhero fatigue among audiences.
“And, look, every time someone has asked me, ‘What about superhero fatigue?’ I've held to this conviction that people just want to be surprised,” Levy said. “They want something unexpected and new, and I feel like we certainly devoted ourselves to delivering that. So the way it's been embraced, and especially that audience score, this is what I work for. I work for audience satisfaction.”
With his comments, Cox joins a growing number of creatives who have called out the MCU and DCEU for the effect they’ve had on cinema over the years. The list includes Quentin Tarantino and Martin Scorsese, the latter of whom famously deemed the superhero films “not cinema” back in 2019.
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