The new DC Universe, under the leadership of James Gunn, begins this week with the animated series The Creature Commandos, a team made up of monster-style characters to go on missions that need a different type of team. For some, this team might just be a Suicide Squad clone with monsters, but this team has a legacy in DC Comics for over forty years. First appearing in 1980, it took many of the characters that matched the Universal Monsters for the most part with a Gorgon but set in World War II. They later connected with G.I. Robot and became the core team. It’s a concept that has been brought back with the most recent version during The New 52 era, with the team being led by Grant Morrison’s reimagined Frankenstein and The Bride. Clearly, the many different versions must’ve been a favorite of Gunn; he’s taken the concept and remixed it a bit to start off this new version of the TV/Movie version of the Universe. Here’s connected it to what he’s done previously, with the show taking place not long after Peacemaker season one and having Rick Flagg Sr., voiced by Frank Grillo, lead this team of non-human prisoners to go over to Europe and protect a small nation being attacked by the Wonder Woman foe and sorceress Circe.
The team here consists of The Bride, voiced by Indira Varma, a woman who is very cynical as a way of protecting their heart and feelings because of how she’s experienced the world since being created so long ago. She has a very different relationship here than comic readers might be used to, but she’s a clear favorite and is, for all intents and purposes, the main character of the series. Doctor Phosphorus, voiced by Alan Tudyk, is by far the most evil character on this team, and his sarcastic banter works well with The Bride’s cynicism. He has a great design in the show, with his emotionless skull face heightening the dry humor in his comments. Tudyk also voices another character, which is a nice surprise in the series. Sean Gunn voices G.I. Robot and Weasel, with Robot being an android created during WWII to kill Nazis; he’s a bit out of place outside of that conflict as his directive quickly didn’t fit in a world after the war. G.I. Robot is regularly confused about what’s happening and is an early heart grabber in the story. Weasel, very much like how he was in The Suicide Squad film, gets to have some exploration of his story, which is a great reinvention of the character from its comic book roots. One of the show’s clear successes is in this character.
Zoë Chao voices Nina Mazursky, a merwoman of sorts, who is the most innocent member of the group. She is basically the kid in the team, the one that shouldn’t be here, and gives the team a character to openly talk about how crazy and violent all of this is. She sometimes feels like the Gorgon character from the older comics, who also never felt right to be a soldier but had to anyway. Then we have David Harbour voicing Eric Frankenstein or just Frankenstein. This character is very much different than the Morrison version that inspires it, yet he fits it within this story and, I guess, in this world now. This isn’t the character who speaks mostly by quoting Paradise Lost while taking out other monsters like an undead Arnold Schwarzenegger action movie character here, and he’s an overly romantic and violent toxic stalker. Full of jealousy and emotions closer to the actual Frankenstein than what films, most shows, and even comics have made him, he’s a random element to the whole story and something a threat to The Bride like that of Nemesis is to Jill Valentine in Resident Evil 3. Always there, constantly chasing, never letting go of his mission to get his Bride.
The story has some exciting twists and turns as the Commandos get taken on a bit of a ride, but each episode continues with the main story matched by focusing on the backstory of each team member. This never feels slow as we get to understand each character better while still moving the overall narrative forward. Unlike how things were done during the DCEU, this has more of a feeling of DC comic. Well, let me be more specific; it reminds me of a Vertigo comic where the guard rails are taken off, and things are allowed to be more mature yet still feel like it’s in the DC Universe and that it matters. Much like Animal Man, Swamp Thing, and other titles, these backstories add tragicness to each “monster” and help to inform why they are the way they are. The story feels different enough yet fresh and inviting, even for someone like me who might have like five different versions of characters constantly in their head. You end up really caring for each of the team members here. Now, for the A.R.G.U.S. people, not as much as you kind of already know them. You have Viola Davis as Amanda Waller and Steve Agee as John Economos; they feel the same as you’ve seen them. Flagg Sr. doesn’t get a lot of backstory, but as he’s most likely going to be in more things, I think we’ll get more later, as his role here is to be the group’s straight man.
The animation has some very good action set pieces with some good fight pacing and action pacing overall. It is a bit gory with limbs being cut off and the even worse happening, so if that’s not your bag, sit out the show. The use of big, solid blacks in the character designs makes the characters very easy to make out during the big scenes with many moving characters on the screen. The design also makes it look different than the more recent DC animated projects that have been out in the last few years. The show is very colorful and bright, which works well with the show’s action-comedy tone. At the same time, the show will be unfairly compared to Guardians of the Galaxy and The Suicide Squad; that’s a bit unfair when you have people coming together into a team. I don’t know if they are a family like the Guardians or a tight-knit group like Squad or even the Peacemaker group. What it does do is something DC has a history of doing, taking an overlooked character and making a new gem out of it, and I think it does that here with The Bride. This is a show that you don’t need to know anything other than just start this and get in on the start of things. DC’s Creature Commandos is an exciting, fun, heartfelt, hilarious animated series and a wonderful start to a new DC.
Score: B+
