Characters who frequently break the fourth wall

Breaking the fourth wall is kind of Deadpool’s thing. In fact, it’s become so much his thing that it has become a bit much. Ever since Ryan Reynolds was able to cajole a hard-R franchise for himself as Deadpool after the failings of “X-Men Origins: Wolverine,” the fast-talking mercenary has been referencing his status as a movie character, one played by Reynolds, as much as possible. It makes Deadpool stand out in the Marvel world, but it can also make him exhausting.

Phoebe Waller-Bridge made a name for herself in “Fleabag,” even though her character, like most of the characters in the show, never really gets an actual name. The lasting image of Fleabag (the character), is her looking over her shoulder at the camera, to the audience, and giving a bit of a knowing look. She talks to the audience and provides running commentary. Not merely a fourth-wall-breaking framing device, it all actually pays off incredibly at the end of the series’ run.

Breaking the fourth wall is actually fairly common in the world of Looney Tunes, but there are two characters from that world that do it the most: Daffy Duck, and the once-and-future face of the franchise, Bugs Bunny. The anarchic rabbit will take a break from chowing down on carrots and messing with gun-toting hotheads to talk to the audience. Bugs is often aware he is in a cartoon, or in a film, and will comment on that on occasion.

Interestingly, Zack seemed to lose the ability to break the fourth wall. Early on “Saved by the Bell,” Zack infamously could freeze time, like literally in the world of the show time would stop and he could do what he pleased. When Zack was enjoying a “time out,” he would turn to the audience and talk to us. Nobody else did that in “Saved by the Bell,” so this was explicitly something Zack could do. Eventually, though, the time-outs would diminish in number and effectively stop.

“Moonlighting” always had the electric chemistry of Bruce Wilis as David Addison and Cybil Shepherd as Maddie Hayes. Pretty quickly into the show’s run the team behind the private eye procedural also began breaking the fourth wall in a major way. On occasional asides, David or Maddie acknowledges being a TV character. In one episode, the framing device is a kid asking his mom to watch the new episode of “Moonlighting.” The second-season finale literally involves the set being struck while the plot is still unfolding. Bold stuff for 1980s TV, and it makes “Moonlighting” pop to this day.

Austin Powers is, for our money, the most shagadelic character there is. In something of a parody of early James Bond movies, Mike Myers played the swinging ‘60s superspy who finds himself in the ‘90s chasing down Dr. Evil. The breaking of the fourth wall really starts in the second movie when he (and Basil Exposition) turn to the audience and tell them not to worry about time travel logic. By the time of “Goldmember,” the third movie, the fourth wall had a hole punched in it.

Disney got Robin Williams to voice Genie in “Aladdin” by letting him do his thing, which is to say riff and improvise (and sometimes do a questionable accent or use a joke he stole). Naturally, a riff-happy genie that basically has Williams’ personality is not afraid to break the fourth wall. The other thing Williams wanted if he took the role was to not have his name and likeness used in advertising. Disney did not live up to that promise, and even though Disney tried to calm the ardor with a $1 million Picasso painting, Williams refused to come back for “Return of Jafar.”

Steve who? You know, Steve! We’re talking about Steve from “Blue’s Clues,” whose real name was Steve Burns. The beloved show for young children did what a lot of shows of that sort does. Steve would talk directly to the audience, encouraging them to talk back to the TV to “help” him with questions he had. There were even kids’ voices piped in answering Steve’s questions to further cajole kids to be engaged and talk along.

Well, we could have probably gone with any character from “Family Guy,” but Peter (and probably Stewie) break the fourth wall the most. “Family Guy” has no interest in keeping an internal logic and will do anything for a joke. Peter will break the fourth wall on occasion because the writing staff had a joke or two to do.

Ferris Bueller does some narrating, but there is obviously one moment here that got Ferris on this list. During the end credits of “Ferris Bueller’s Day Off,” Matthew Broderick as Ferris pops back up on screen. Speaking directly to the audience, he tells them that the movie is over and to get out of the theater. That’s a level of breaking the fourth wall not every character does.

In “Teen Titans,” things were played fairly straightforwardly. Breaking the fourth wall wasn’t really a thing. Then, “Teen Titans Go!” happened. This Cartoon Network show is a full-on comedy, and it has no interest in being reverent to the DC superhero team. “Teen Titans Go!” is sheer anarchy, and that includes breaking the fourth wall. There are whole episodes about the creative team for the show trying to produce an episode, sometimes with the help of the Teen Titans. It’s totally ridiculous but a lot of fun.

For his directorial debut, famed screenwriter Shane Black cast Robert Downey Jr. as the lead of “Kiss Kiss Bang Bang.” This was 2005, before Downey was cast as Tony Stark and saw his career fully take off again after years of personal demons. Black’s screenplay for his movie is quite meta, and features Downey’s Harry Lockhart breaking the fourth wall early and often. He literally asks the film to be rewound at one point. Now, Black does it a bit too much, but this isn’t about how much we enjoy the breaking of the fourth wall, but how much it happens.

“Wayne’s World” remains the most-successful “Saturday Night Live” movie. “Wayne’s World 2” is probably second best, honestly. Mike Myers makes a second appearance, this time as Wayne. Wayne talks directly to the audience a lot of the time, but both movies also break the fourth wall and acknowledge that they are movies on multiple occasions. Both films have multiple endings at the behest of Wayne (and also Garth) for good measure.

No, not the actor, but the character of the same name he played on “The Fresh Prince of Bel-Air.” Will would talk to the camera, narration and exposition style, but the breaking of the fourth wall went beyond that. There were acknowledgments of “Fresh Prince” being a TV show. The most memorable example of this was surely in the fifth-season premiere when Will is kidnapped by NBC executives and returned to Bel-Air to continue the show.

“The Monkees” is sheer chaos. Crafted as a made-for-TV equivalent to the Beatles, in addition to their music the Monkees also had an off-the-wall sitcom. The show was received well enough to win an Outstanding Comedy Series Emmy. Truly, “The Monkees” is wall-to-wall jokes and everything is thrown against the wall. With anything game, breaking of the fourth wall was common.

Well, the premise of “The Muppet Show” is that the Muppets are putting on a show in their theater, but that’s not what we’re talking about. Think about “The Muppet Movie,” for example. They literally read the script for the movie during the movie. In the various films and TV shows breaking the fourth wall remained a common part of the comedic stylings of the Muppets’ world.

Who are Monty Python if not the human equivalent of the Muppets? On the show, sketches would end abruptly with one, or more, of the cast members talking to the audience. “Monty Python and the Holy Grail” has the “It’s only a model” joke, but also ends with the cast being arrested and the film being stopped. Monty Python really enjoyed using the breaking of the fourth wall to bring things to a conclusion.

Famously, Gene Wilder only agreed to work with “Young Frankenstein” if Brooks was not in the movie. He said something in the tenor of “I don’t want this to be the kind of movie where you pop up in a suit of armor and say hi to the audience.” It was a fair concern, because Brooks loved to break the fourth wall, and dozens of his characters have done it. In “Spaceballs” they watch the movie “Spaceballs.” “Blazing Saddles” ends with running off the set and fighting on the Warner Bros. lot. Brooks was an “anything for a joke” director. Even “Young Frankenstein” breaks the fourth wall once or twice. You can only keep Brooks’ sensibilities in check so much.