Out Of DiGiorno's 4 Deadpool & Wolverine Pizzas There Is One Clear Villain

"It's not delivery, it's DiGiorno." This might be the only thing you remember about DiGiorno. I'll admit that outside of this tagline and bready crusts, I didn't think DiGiorno had much more to offer. But its latest limited-time pizzas, released to promote the upcoming "Deadpool & Wolverine" movie, may just prove me wrong.

While DiGiorno is known for its rising crust, in recent years the brand has done its best to branch out and expand its repertoire. Just last year, DiGiorno released new Classic Crust pizzas that are thin and crispy, and a quick look on the brand's website shows it also offers croissant, stuffed, crispy pan, and other crust varieties.

In addition to the crust experimentation, DiGiorno has expanded its lineup by collaborating with Marvel to release four limited-time pizzas based on the heroes of the upcoming movie "Deadpool & Wolverine." The Wade Special, Gimme Chimi, Spicy Wolvie Pie, and Maximum Pep will all be available starting today, June 17. All four pizzas cook at 425 degrees Fahrenheit for 16 minutes and feature a Classic Crust. I tasted them all to see which ones were worth seeking out for pizza-loving Deadpool fans. While I enjoyed most of them, in this comic book-inspired pizza release there was one clear villain. 

I know about as much about Wolverine as I previously knew about the DiGiorno brand, but I do imagine the comic book character as a carnivore. A pizza with pepperoni, chorizo, and bacon seems fitting.

You really can't go wrong with a classic meat lover's pie, either. The different meats combined with the mozzarella cheese and perfectly cooked crispy crust make for a comforting and satisfying slice. The only qualm I have is that the chorizo is by no means spicy. Not all chorizo is or needs to be spicy, but when choosing to advertise the pizza as the Spicy Wolvie Pie, you have to deliver (pun intended) the spice.

There is a light aftertaste sort of like red pepper flakes when eating this pizza, but I would not call it truly spicy. It seems more like DiGiorno wants to entice spice lovers without completely excluding those with a low threshold for heat.

Call me basic, but there's a reason for the phrase "tried and true" and the Maximum Pep pizza exemplifies that. The hefty scattering of both slices and diced pieces of pepperoni ensures that you know exactly what you're eating — a pepperoni pizza.

DiGiorno may have wanted to step outside the box and show its range with this temporary pizza lineup, but I'm grateful the brand kept at least one classic flavor in the mix. There aren't very many ways to describe the Maximum Pep other than "a tasty pepperoni pizza." And that's all it needs to be.

The only con for a pizza with all this pepperoni is that it is a bit weighed down by the toppings. The crust is a little weak, struggling to hold up the cheese and two different cuts of pepperoni, but the pie is a success in the end since the pepperoni gives it excellent flavor.

Before any Hawaiian pizza fans come for my neck, allow me to say that I have no issue with pineapple on pizza. In fact, I love a good pineapple and ham combo. What I do not appreciate is pineapple having a lackluster partner, and that is the case for the Wade Special.

The pineapple slices do their job by serving up sweetness in each bite, but the olives on this pie do not give the counterbalance of saltiness that ham usually does. Actually, the black olives are almost so flavorless I would forget they were on the pizza if I wasn't looking right at them. I will give DiGiorno points for the fact that the juiciness of the pineapple chunks doesn't make the pizza crust soggy.

Overall, the Wade Special could use some improvement but is still an enjoyable supermarket frozen pizza. Deadpool is far from perfect so it makes his sense that pizza taste wouldn't be perfect either.

DiGiorno (yes I am addressing the brand directly): I would like to know who on your recipe development team feels that a heaping dose of cumin gives a dish Mexican flavor. The "spicy cumin sauce" on this chimichanga-inspired pizza isn't spicy at all; it just tastes like cumin.

I will concede that by no means is a chimichanga a traditional Mexican dish. A chimichanga falls into the category of Americanized Mexican cuisine, but even chimichanga fans would agree the cumin on this pizza is overwhelming. While breathing in this pungent seasoning, you're also hit with some mild pico de gallo taste. On its own, pico de gallo is a delicious salsa, but doused in cumin and mixed with cheddar and mozzarella, it just does not work. All the elements of this pizza taste like they want to run screaming from each other. Do not "Gimme Chimi" ever again.

Aside from the confusingly bad Gimme Chimi, this lineup of limited-time pizza offerings held its own. DiGiorno sets a high bar for itself with its slogan, suggesting that its at-home frozen products are equal to restaurant-quality pizzas. I wouldn't quite go that far, but the brand makes better-tasting frozen pizzas than many others on the market. Unlike the heroes of the movie, the "Deadpool & Wolverine" pizzas mostly stayed out of trouble — the main issues occurred when the toppings got too inventive.

Three out of four pizzas in this lineup were enjoyable and two (the Spicy Wolvie and especially the Maximum Pep) were varieties I would be happy to buy on a regular basis from the grocery store. If DiGiorno is using this Deadpool and Wolverine collaboration as any sort of subtle product test, I would hope it makes some tweaks to the Wade Special, cranks up the heat in the Spicy Wolvie, scraps the Gimme Chimi, and takes the Maximum Pep to maximum market sales.