Ep. 55 - Deathstroke: Knights & Dragons - Spoiler Hot Review w/ writer J.M. DeMatteis

Never in a million years did I think that Deathstroke would get his own animated series, or film. But as of late we have been enamored with the bad guy, Joaquin Phoenix's Joker, Thanos, Donald Trump...j/k 

Join Kristina, Saba, and Frank as they dig into this animated thrill ride about DC's most deadly and skilled super assassin, Deathstroke. This film is an adaptation of the CW Seed series of the same name. And for the first time ever on one of our Spoiler Hot Reviews, Frank sits down the films writer, and esteemed and beloved Eisner Award winning comic book writer, J.M. DeMatteis.

So, don't miss this one! 

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Transcript

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SPEAKER_02 0:00

Hello everyone. Welcome back to another episode of Meanwhile Back on the Podcast. I'm Frank McGuire.

SPEAKER_04 0:05

I'm Christina Dudamas. I'm Sabamir.

SPEAKER_02 0:07

We've got a great episode lined up for you guys today. But before we jump into that, I just want to thank all of you for being here and spending your time with us. Now, whether you're a longtime listener or this is your first time tuning in, we appreciate you guys all the same. But for those of you that are listening to us for the first time, let me tell you a little bit about who we are and what the show is about. We are a fandom culture, speculative fiction-loving collective who rarely see eye to eye, but unanimously we all champion open, nuanced, and thoughtful conversation when discussing our favorite made-up shit. And week to week, uh, we're going to share our brand of raw, hard-hitting commentary, news, film, and game reviews from all of your most beloved corners of fandom. Now, on today's episode, we got a spoiler-hot review of Deathstroke Knights and Dragons, one of the newest feature-length animated offerings from DC and Warner Brothers. The film was adapted from the CWC animated series of the same name and written by one of DC Animation's most prolific creatives, JM Demateus, who I had the pleasure of sitting down with to talk about the film. And you'll hear that interview at the end of this uh spoiler hot review. So be sure to stay tuned for that. He had a lot of things to say about his work on this film, and uh, you guys don't want to miss that. Saba, why don't you give us a little synopsis of the film?

SPEAKER_00 1:33

Sure, Frank. Um, so mercenary and master assassin, Slade Wilson, leads two different lives. One as a relentless killer, known as Deathstroke, and the other one as a dedicated family man. But of course, like all things do, those worlds will collide. Uh, forced together by the vicious terror group known as Hive. It is the killer in Slade who must fight to save his loved ones, as well as the what remains of himself. With his soul torn apart and his young son held captive, Deathstroke will have to atone for the sins of his past to fuel the battles of his future.

SPEAKER_02 2:05

Well done. Well done. Nice, nice, nice. Sounds like uh sounds like uh good movie, uh, you know, as far as the synopsis goes, but we'll uh you know we'll get farther into what we thought of the film as we move through this review. So let's go around the table. I want to get everybody's initial thoughts after watching this movie. And how many times did you guys watch it?

SPEAKER_00 2:27

I just watched it once. There's a reason for that though. I started watching it. My little niece was sleeping over and she was in bed, and I was gonna start watching it, and then she's like, Can I watch it too? And I was like, No, she's like, and I was like, I don't think it's a kid's movie. And she looked at me and she's like, It's a cartoon. And I was like, Oh yeah, but not really. So I didn't really let her see much of it at all, actually, which is really good because like it's pretty quick. Yeah, because it gets into it real quick, and I guess we'll talk about that. But I ended up watching a little bit of that night of it that night, but I ha I I started again for this episode because I really wanted to get into it and did the f the full thing through again.

SPEAKER_02 3:10

Awesome. So, Christina, what were your initial thoughts on the film? What was your initial takeaway?

SPEAKER_04 3:15

Um, I liked it. I thought the pacing was pretty good. I liked most of the characters' development. Yeah, I I kind of enjoyed it. I thought the reviews were a bit harsh. I kind of read some reviews after the fact, and I was just like, oh, okay, well, I kind of I kind of liked it more than other people, I guess.

SPEAKER_02 3:34

So Yeah, you know, I'm starting to think that people who have the power to review are just being dicks for the sake of being dicks now. I I don't know. Maybe it's just me, but I just feel like people are forgetting what movies and and story are really for. And I don't know, but that's just my take. Saba, what were your thoughts? What was your initial takeaway from the film?

SPEAKER_00 3:58

I was like, wow, like it w got, you know, rated all R real quick for this movie in terms of like, you know, even stuff we've seen in DC animation before. So it it it's definitely something that you know, it's not a movie that you kind of watch in in the background or something. It's like takes your attention right away, especially just from the the opening. And we'll get into different characters that we like and stuff, but I really do like the like the opening sequence and sort of the conversations that happened really sort of set the tone very quickly of what kind of man Played Wilson is.

SPEAKER_02 4:32

Yes, yes. Um yeah, no, I feel the same way you guys do. I did enjoy the film. Uh the pacing was pretty breakneck at the beginning for sure, and it was definitely juxtapositioned with another scene that kind of set a completely different tone, like Sabo was saying. But I liked it, and I really thought that this this it had a very had a very interesting stylized look to it. There was a lot of little little nuances in the animation style too. I don't know if you guys picked up on this, but you guys know I'm a fan of that old school half-tone look. And that how th those half-tone dots were used in all kinds of different places within the animation structure, and you you almost had to like keep your eye out for it, but it would pop up every once in a while. And I thought that it was really well uh produced, and again, the art style was very captivating and really pulled the eye in. And this, you know, I really like the story. I love what Jean-Marc Demateus was able to do with Deathstroke as a character. That was one of my big takeaways from the movie. So yeah, no, I uh you know, I think it's something that is definitely worth discussing. And uh I, you know, I hope people give this film an you know a real chance. I think they should, you know, I think everybody should check it out before I thought all the characters had like a good amount of depth.

SPEAKER_04 5:50

And in terms of the animation too, I like the sh the use of shading and and like shadows and that kind of stuff too. So that was kind of cool.

SPEAKER_02 5:57

Yeah, so let's get into the story. So, you know, the synopsis pretty much kind of summarizes everything. You know, Slade is leading this double life, his his his wife and son do not know that he's this, you know, mercenary, like super assassin. And even his wife doesn't know that he has the powers that he has because she's under the impression that the army's experiment failed on him. But he knows, like he found out later on post-experiment, that his he actually got powers from it, and he decided to use those powers to become this mercenary, Deathstroke. And he has to, you know, his family more or less pays for the sins of the father, you know. The you know, the sins are visited upon his wife and his son. And this hive group comes out of nowhere and wants Deathstroke to work for them, and they kidnap Joseph, and this this this story kind of ensues from that point. And we see a couple time jumps in it too. So what do you gu how'd you guys feel about the story?

SPEAKER_00 7:01

I will say the beginning, and as I mentioned, like that opening scene, you know, where Slade is talking to Addy, his wife Adeline Kane, who was like another prolific character, but you know, it it sets the scale very it sets it it sets it up really quickly where it's like, you know, you've cheated on me before, so that's kind of discussed. And then the whole like idea of her not knowing, that was the one thing. I wondered how much of that was like willful ignorance on her end. Because there's that thing like woman's intuition or just intuition if you know like this character in the comics or anything at all, for her not to suspect, you know, oh I'm doing business and not even like asking more questions or digging deep, you know, that was something that like I was wondering throughout the movie because as we see this character progress, we know this is a character that was very capable, is not a damsel in distress, so I always I found that angle kind of interesting as well. But that beginning, yeah, it it kind of really gets you in touch with scale. He and he shows it very quickly where he's like he's about when he like you know is there to like kill this guy who's the leader of the revolu like this revolution, and he was like, Well, I killed the president's bad because he's doing all these bad things, you better not do the same. So it's like, okay, so you killed like the bad guy, but you also killed like all these other people. And for him to not think there was going to be repercussion or that someone wouldn't trace him back is might like is naive on his part as well, at least.

SPEAKER_02 8:25

Yeah, no, I you know, I like that you brought up that that kind of counterbalance point that that the writers put into the story where you know he's sent in to kill this, kill this corrupt general, and then there's this other general where Slade decided to turn on him because he was less of a good person than the general that he was sent to kill. It really kind of you know added added a lot of gray to the moral makeup of this character, right? And it really kind of made you think and really gave it a lot of depth too.

SPEAKER_04 9:01

Like, and he does get called out for that. He gets called out for not being as good as he thinks he is.

SPEAKER_02 9:08

Yeah, yeah. No, he does. He gets called out by the jackal and he gets called out by his family, and he's fucking delusional, pure like he's basically delusional of who he really is. You know, we hear him refer to himself as a knight, you know, a number of times, and that he's fighting dragons. He is the dragon. That's the problem, is he is the dragon. But but you know, it's just you know, it's a sense of just disillusionment. You know, it tells you how disillusioned the main character really is. But the method that the writers used to uh essentially humanize Clade in juxtaposition with some of the other characters, especially the Jackal, uh, was intriguing. It was it was definitely thought-provoking the way that they did that. And it really kind of again, you know, you know, I think that these characters had a pretty good amount of depth to them. I don't think that they were these two-dimensional characters, and it's kind of ironic because we're talking about an animated, an animated program. So, or or sorry, an animated film. So, but but yeah, no. Any other thoughts on the uh the story?

SPEAKER_04 10:13

Yeah, so uh just in response to Saba's comment about how Adeline was maybe willfully ignorant, I think she really did want the idea of the family. She wanted to be retired from their life in the military. So I think part of that was willful blindness. But then as soon as Jackal came to her home and beat her up, like she knew that everything was a lie. Like she knew that and she she didn't even he Slade tries to lie to her more, and she doesn't even give him a chance to lie to her more. She says, I know you're lying, like, what are you trying to do here? Like, I'm not stupid. And also, I think they could be good liars because they were military, so I think they both would have the capability to hide their true whereabouts and what they're really doing.

SPEAKER_02 10:59

Yeah, their true intent. Yeah, no, that's definitely within their skill set. Like, as far as deception, that is definitely within their skill set for sure.

SPEAKER_00 11:06

And she like slapped him like crazy. I was like, girl, look at you guys.

SPEAKER_04 11:10

Oh, backhanded them with her with her arm that like wasn't broken.

SPEAKER_00 11:14

Like while all her other limbs were and then he goes to help her and she's like, No, I'm fine. I'm fine. I love that actually. And it really just and even moving forward towards in the story, you really see that like essence of her. Like honestly, she's a really standout character for me in this um movie for sure. And then m I'm kind of talking about the story, the the scene that kind of got to me the most, which always kind of gets to me, is you know, the scene where he has to like, you know, choose to save his son or not. And he's like obviously he's like, I'm not going to like listen to you and then like I'm not gonna like go along with whatever just because of like just because you tell me to, just because you have Joseph, like he thinks he can save him, and that's just that scene of Joseph in his arms and like the like and he's like saying like you're not gonna die and that that's always like very heart wrenching. I would say that's a very humanizing moment for him. Because that's like the weight of his actions have directly caused this.

SPEAKER_02 12:09

Yeah, the sins of the father being visited upon his children. Yeah, that's that's that's that that's basically the main through line without the you know throughout this entire story. And then you definitely get this vibe of like this dysfunctional, totally fucked up family throughout the entire story. Like it's literally like just a fucked up family. And then we learn that the jackal is a fucked up family, or the jackal has a fucked up family too, because the you know, the woman that died in that in that face-off with Slade, that was his daughter.

SPEAKER_04 12:42

So like again, a daughter he didn't know that he had because he had an affair with someone when he was on one of his missions, yeah.

SPEAKER_02 12:50

And even the jackal has a fucked up family because the woman that he sent in, like in that first kind of showdown with Slade, or uh, you know, before Slade has that moment that Saba just talked about where he goes to save Joseph and you know he ends up getting his throat cut. He had to fight off Bronze Tiger and that other woman. I don't know who that woman was and even identify her. I don't recognize her from any DC franchise or property, so I don't have a name for her, but that turned out to be Jackal's daughter. So he's sending his daughter in to try and kill a trained assassin. So, you know, he's definitely not father of the fucking year. Yeah, I know.

SPEAKER_00 13:27

And we kind of see even after, like, I do think like Addie sending her son away after that. I think what m you know, to go to school in I think was like Sweden or something. Like what he needed was, you know, to have a like mother there, like a family member.

SPEAKER_04 13:43

But I think it is very like military like I was gonna say her that must have been her military mindset being like, okay, let me get him as far away from us as possible because that's gonna lessen the chances of him being found, I guess, by someone.

SPEAKER_02 13:58

Yeah, that's probably partly part part of the motivation behind it. And and and I love at the end how you kind of can use the Rose character and almost balance or or or kind of parallel the two relationship dynamics with Jericho. You know, Rose has this relationship with Jericho that is kind of what seems to be rooted in love, but there is definitely an underlying current of manipulation underneath it. And then you look at Slade and you look at Adeline, and you know, they're you know, they love Jericho, but they weren't there for Jericho. And one of the reasons that Jericho is even with Rose and with Hive is because of the lack of attention or the lack of support or the lack of whatever just not being there for Jericho. That's one of the reasons why he's even with Hive. So it's kind of interesting how they balanced those relationship dynamics between those characters.

SPEAKER_04 14:56

I have to say, I love when Adeline kind of tricks Slade. That was really fun.

SPEAKER_02 15:00

Oh, with the kiss, the kiss.

SPEAKER_04 15:02

He thought the kiss was real and then it turned out to be an implant. That was amazing. Yeah, no, for sure. There was an another oh, another moment I really liked was when he told her, Oh, okay, we get to team up, but you know, I I prefer you as my partner because I've seen you naked or something like that. Yeah, it makes sense. And instead of like giggling or something, like some kind of weird response, she's just like, fuck off, and she jumps out of the plane. I love that.

SPEAKER_02 15:27

See, I know, okay, so you know, Deathstroke is a great character, right? Like, and he's he's mostly known to people through other people's content or through other people's stories or other mythos, you know. He was he was basically the big bad when the Teen Titans were first introduced. And he definitely crossed over into the Batman world and you know became part of like the bigger, you know, group of evil supervillain kind of kind of groups. But whenever you kind of see him in his own media, like when or or or or or when you see him in Young Justice or any of the DC animated properties outside of this particular one, Deathstroke is this very stoic kind of yen spouting, you know, kind of you know, kung fu the legend continues type of type of personality, right? But but you know, the writers here did a great job of really adding a lot of layers to him. He's kind of he's kind of more of uh an army grunt than say like the Zen master type. Did you guys pick that up?

SPEAKER_04 16:32

I definitely Yeah, I I thought he was more of a soldier than a general or something. Sorry, go ahead, Saba.

SPEAKER_00 16:37

Oh no, I was gonna agree. I I definitely do think that he is uh more of the army type. He seems like more stoic, it seems, you know? Like he's not a man of many words, but you can tell that with his family he is different. And there's a lot of like people like that. I could describe my dad like that, although he does not have a double life of murdering people, although I can't be sure, you know.

SPEAKER_04 16:59

You can't be sure.

SPEAKER_00 16:59

He doesn't have a cell phone, actually, my dad. So when he goes places we don't know where like sketchy where he'll be. But usually he's in the garden. So um but yeah, I I do find him to be like like it's more stoic is the word I would use to describe him in terms of and another thing I kinda want to talk about though, uh in terms of like showing his like, you know his goodness, I guess, or like his idea of good or bad, um, is the scene and I think it takes place ten years later, so after, you know, Joseph has that accident, he hasn't seen his family, and he's going into this like really awful house that doesn't have windows or anything like this decrepit house and you know, he he's fighting these people and killing them and this person's like, Who sent you? Like how much money? And he's like, I would have done this one for free. Right? And you wonder what it is, and then you see in the basement of this house like these young girls that are just like stuck there. And so that's like another thing where he's like, I would have just done this case like I would have done this either way, you know, which you know, it is like he he wants to do the right thing, he knows that's horrible and and doesn't want to see something like that yet. When those girls are walking through the house, there's like blood splattered everywhere and it's so kind of horrific, you know, to see. Even though he's done this D to save them, you know, it's like does the means justify the end sort of thing? I think that's like the thing I pull away from that.

SPEAKER_02 18:21

Yeah, no, you no, you hit the nail on the head. That's another great character beat in this mo in this movie that really gives you another side of Slade Wilson or another side of Deathstroke, you know? It's it's it's these little beats, these little subtle beats that kind of show you that, yeah, this guy is paid money to kill people, but he still has a heart and he still has some humanity. And that's what a good writer has to do when dealing with a villain as his main protagonist, because Deathstroke is a fucking villain. And you know, it's it's it's a delicate balancing act, you know. You you you kind of have to put him into some very gray areas, and I think they did a great job of that.

SPEAKER_00 19:03

But do you think he really has like humanity or like a warped sense of it? Because someone with humanity, like what like you know, and the acts that he does are so kind of horrific. Like, you know, when he like cut off, you know, that one general's hat and just had it over. Like that kind of stuff, you know, really, you know, it it really yeah, I'm not really sure where he stands. It's like more than just like race. It's like there's like a lot of stuff.

SPEAKER_04 19:28

He provided a justification for that though. He was like, Oh, this uh political leader was uh not autocrat, I guess.

SPEAKER_02 19:38

Yeah, he seems to explain every time he's brutal. Like he almost but but I get where Sabah's coming from. Like there's a scene where he cuts a dude into literal like man sushi. Like he or or like man sashimi.

SPEAKER_04 19:51

Oh yeah, that was gross. Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 19:52

Fucking amazing. But but like, but as far as as far as the visual experience of seeing that scene and how it was drawn, how it was executed, it's it's it's incredibly done. But no, it is gross. Like this is a brutal movie.

SPEAKER_04 20:18

One of the reviews I read compared it to Mortal Kombat. So that was a more fatality. Those are like fatality. Yeah, they compared it to the fatalities of the It was uh a review on superhero hype. So that was pretty cool. Oh my gosh, that's like a Johnny Cage, but yeah, yeah, 100%. But they were also the ones who gave it such a cutthroat review, they gave it a two out of five. So wow, yeah, they they just uh felt like the movie fell flat compared to Deathstroke character from the comics. So I'm not too familiar with the character from the comics, so I don't know, I can't make that comparison, but uh yeah, you know what?

SPEAKER_02 20:55

My immediate reaction to hearing that you know these guys weren't happy, happy with the translation from the comic book. The only thing that comes to mind to me is that they didn't like that Slade was so not the stoic Kung Fu master, because that's really what Slade has always been. He's always been the stoic kind of type of kung fu master, but the writers here have really given him like another another dimension to his personality. Like, look at the way he trades jokes with Wintergreen. Look at the jokes that he's trading with his with his wife and his ex-wife.

SPEAKER_04 21:30

Yeah, he he definitely reminds me of a dad. Like you get that vibe.

SPEAKER_02 21:34

Yeah, there's like some dad humor in him. Like there's our like he's like death stroke with dad jokes, you know. There's a lot of those, but it does humanize him more, you know? And Death Stroke is a hard character to write for. Like it's really hard to write for a character that doesn't say much. I'm sorry, but that's but but that's it, you know. It's almost like going back to Kill Bill and trying to like rewrite those characters. Yeah, you know, those are tough characters to write. So I take My hat off to the to the creative team. I think that they did a good job of humanizing a character that is known for his brutality, his stoicism, and his you know, just his sense of vengeance and violence.

SPEAKER_00 22:15

Yeah, and I can see that too if you do compare him to com but I've seen him in other m media as well. I mean, you know, Slade Wilson was also heavily featured inside Arrow, uh season one and two, and his depiction there you could also argue was, you know, uh a little bit different than than what we we've seen in the comics as well. And so you know, I think the comics are you know, we see a lot of adaptations where things kind of change and and the characters kind of change. But I think the essence of him is still clearly there, at least for me and and what his character is. To me it was stranger to see just the the kinder side of him, you know, if you can call it that. I have an issue calling it the kind side, but you know, I know that he is loving, but even his love in a way is very intense. I wonder if that's been, you know, the drug that he has, like that's affected as well. You know, like the depth that he he goes to. But at the same time, he does leave his family for for ten years, and I wonder if in if any part of that time he was wondering about them or if he was watching over them and or not, or maybe just was like, you know, I need to stay away for good.

SPEAKER_04 23:20

Adeline calls him out for that too, though. She was like, Where were you? Did you like wonder? Did you check in? Like you didn't really fight to be part of your family, like you didn't fight to see your son.

SPEAKER_02 23:30

Yeah, he's like another yeah, he's like, I could scare you away with an email. There's like, you know, there's like another man would have like fought, you know? Yeah. Fought to stay in his life. But I think but I think deep down, Deathstroke knew that like his his family was safer without him in the picture in a way, right?

SPEAKER_04 23:46

Yeah, if he was gonna keep doing what he was doing, I think that makes sense. Which And then even in terms of his love, like even though uh he's in love with Adeline, he has the affair, and then he tries to justify the affair. He's like, Oh, you know, I just had to make sure that you're actually like the right woman or something. Or he's like, I didn't know until after the affair that you were the right woman for me. And yeah, it didn't mean anything.

SPEAKER_02 24:10

You're dealing with an alpha male that has you know incredible amount of power. And well, well, no, I'm not making excuses for him. I'm just saying that's the character, right? Like I call someone. I don't really see Slade Wilson as like a loyal character. Plus, in the comic books, this is a part of his mythos, right? It is because that's how Rose Wilson is born, right?

SPEAKER_00 24:32

I can understand in the in in terms of that he has just gone through this like life chang altering thing. In my head, at least when I saw those scenes, scenes, it seemed that like he was gonna stay there and wasn't going to leave and was just gonna like run away into this life. That's what it kind of like felt like. And then he changed his mind and was like, I'm gonna go back, you know? And this is like gonna be the whole like friends debate. Were they on a break or were they not? When he's like, you know, you go off, say the military and like they might be having that conversation for a while.

SPEAKER_04 25:03

But it's for those of us that watch Friends, yes, but yeah, I guess uh the way I interpreted it was that they had plans for the future. It seemed like they were yeah, they were engaged. You're right.

SPEAKER_00 25:14

That's a hundred percent right. Ladies suck for more reasons than one.

SPEAKER_04 25:18

And I mean it was only a year, she was only like finishing her uh last year of her uh work, I guess. Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 25:25

But if we if we can't no, go ahead, Sava.

SPEAKER_00 25:28

Oh, I was gonna move it along to like him running, meeting up with Joseph or like him that again. So you can if you have another thing to say on that, I'll wait until I do that.

SPEAKER_02 25:37

Yeah, yeah, no, no, I was just gonna say, I was gonna ask you guys if you could have seen this story play out the same way if they didn't give Slade these little character beats of humanity and and and tenderness, you know, because I don't think it would have been the same thing. I think because Slade is such a villain and because Slade is is such a a master of violence, like they almost had to give you these moments just to even try and relate to him, right? Like if you didn't get that, you couldn't really relate to the character. So I think that was almost a necessary creative decision to have as part of the story. But that's my take. I don't know.

SPEAKER_04 26:15

Yeah, and I think also because the other characters are so strong, maybe he kind of gets washed away a little bit in like their their strength and their character development. Like he doesn't really grow, he kind of just stays the same and everyone else kind of like grows a little or has you know, there's all these plot twists involving the other characters, so yeah.

SPEAKER_03 26:34

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 26:35

Well, if we kind of like push forward, I think the biggest shock to his system is sort of the scene after. So obviously, you know, what ends up happening is Joseph ends up being kidnapped or taken by Hive, and uh that's obviously why, you know, Addy and Slay end up meeting up again and he he sort of started doing info and realizes the jackal is not dead and he, you know, concocts a plan to go save his son. And he is I mean, there's no other word for it. He's backstabbed completely and utterly. And the hatred in his son's eyes for him, who now goes by like now obviously Jericho, as we know him as you know I you can tell, like it it gets to him in a way because like if Joseph looked at him like m like the hate was very palpable in the face or even disgust to a point.

SPEAKER_02 27:20

Yeah, yeah, no. And I like the way that the Hive Queen described Jericho to Slade, like she's like, you're a handgun. Jericho is like an atom bomb. Yeah, like as far as comparing them, as far as like you know, their yield, like you know, how much damage can they, you know, like how much damage can be done here? You know what I mean? You're just trying to communicate to them exactly what's kind of at stake, like those were the stakes, and then at that point, you're kind of in your head, like, oh shit, so this kid is like a total powerhouse, and they're gonna use this kid, they're they're a terrorist organization, and they have a kid that's being compared to an atom bomb, which is which is kind of nuts. So, but yeah, no, I get what you're saying about Jericho is definitely has a lot of resentment for his family, 100%. But then as we move down the story, we figure out who was able to kind of foment this resentment in Jericho, and I think that the choice for it to be his sister makes a lot of sense because I think to get that kind of you know, to get to get Jericho to align against his father, there needs to be somebody who uses I well, maybe not uses, but but you know, through some sort of genuine connection can kind of get to him in a way that that he would turn on his family, you know, and that's his sister, who turns out to be, you know, Rose Wilson, the daughter of this woman that Slade had the affair with at the beginning of the film.

SPEAKER_00 28:46

And in her, like in her defense, like his parents did not make it hard for that turn to happen.

SPEAKER_02 28:52

No, I know. No, I know.

SPEAKER_00 28:54

And it's completely like kids do this all the time, like finding solace somewhere else. And you know, for them like to have this connection through their mind as well.

SPEAKER_02 29:02

That was really cool when they kind of explained that that like you know they found each other with this with the psychic connection before they even physically came together. I really liked that part. I really thought that was cool.

SPEAKER_04 29:13

Because I think otherwise it wouldn't make sense. Like she was living in a totally different country that like probably he would have had to visit or had a desire to visit for some reason. So yeah.

SPEAKER_02 29:25

True. And and she's got powers of her own, she's got Slade's powers, which is this super amazing, incredible level of agility and strength, and and you know, extra hone senses. You know, Deathstroke is basically a killing machine, and so is Rose. So and here's the crazy thing, just a kind of uh sidebar to this interview I do with JM. But JM, I asked him, I was like, How much influence did you take from Titans from this? Because in season two of Titans, both Rose and both Jericho are characters, along with Slade Wilson. And he's like, none. I took none. Like, I didn't even know that this was a storyline in this season of Titans. I was like, wow, okay, interesting. And then where my head went immediately was DC is trying to not only, you know, use what I would call their version of Deadpool. Well, I think I'm almost positive that Slade Wilson came first. Yeah, he did. He totally came first. You know, Deadpool is kind of an answer to Slade Wilson and Marvel, but you know, I think with the popularity of Deadpool, and I think with the cancellation of the animated series, I think DC saw their opportunity to kind of give give fans something kind of to replace, like a placeholder, you know, and that's why they kind of turned the heat up on you know bringing Death Stroke out into you know different forms of media. You know, he showed up in television, he showed up in film, because he was at the end of Justice League. If you I don't know if everybody remembers that, but he was at the he was in the cutscene, he was at the end credit scenes in Justice League. So there were three versions of Death Stroke and being used across multiple multiple types of media, Young Justice, etc. etc. So so I think that that was definitely a big part of their motivation to want to get Death Stroke out and into into the mix out in front of people so they could experience him as a character. But also, I think this has a lot to do with the popularity of villains in general. Like, look how well received Joker was, look how well received Thanos was. You know, I think people want a different experience with their antagonists or sorry, with their protagonists now. They want something different, and I think with a villain you can instantly give that to people.

SPEAKER_00 31:36

Yeah, I mean there's something charming or not feeling in in it, but this is like so Superman was always a hard character for me to kind of like growing up. I mean, I definitely consumed a lot of media with Superman, but he was never one of my favorites because he just seemed too perfect, you know. Right. And I know in later years that's sort of, you know, they've gone more into struggle and everything else, but yeah. Yeah, people like that because they can relate. Like all of us have this thing inside of us or this line that we're teetering in between, you know, not as extreme at the way as Boltzens, hopefully. Um, but this sort of idea of what good is and what's bad and what it means to be that. And so I think that's like a little bit more intriguing than just your, you know, vanilla good guy versus bad guy, you know, with these different layers, these colors, and we've seen that a lot in me. And and so I think the anti-hero is is sort of becoming more popular. I think people see themselves maybe more in that.

SPEAKER_02 32:29

Yeah, no, I think so too. And I think it's also an opportunity, it's almost a vessel for some of the frustrations we're all feeling too. You know what I mean? You know, Thanos, you obviously this is a this is a movie roof for you know for Deathstroke, but but but but I think that this applies. You know, when we hear Thanos's mission in Endgame or well in Infinity War too, you know, we can't help but sit there and kind of nod our head a little bit and being like, you know what? The planet is, you know, the universe is a little overpopulated. I got it. It wasn't so overpopulated.

SPEAKER_04 33:04

Like that, but I don't think I could ever relate to Thanos. I think I'll don't put him in that uh anti-hero dark uh gray area. I feel like it's a villain.

SPEAKER_02 33:14

Well, no, yes, no, his his methodology for achieving his goal is is horrendous, right? Genocide is not an answer. Yeah, but but what I'm saying is the reasons he's doing it, the reasons he thinks it's necessary, right? Those are what makes sense, and those are the only things that make sense. His action that's logic. Right, right. They're all logical, they're all very reasonable, lot like logical reasons for the reason to do it. Do you do it? No, you don't do it. You find another way, right?

SPEAKER_04 33:44

And that's why people are scared of robots. It's because they're all logic and no emotion.

SPEAKER_02 33:48

True.

SPEAKER_04 33:49

And you see that also explored in uh Star Trek a lot. They kind of they kind of explore that with their alien characters.

SPEAKER_02 33:56

Right, right. Did you guys really like the art design and and the aesthetic? What what were your thoughts?

SPEAKER_04 34:03

I liked it. I felt that it was appropriate for in a uh rated R like animated movie. I I kind of liked how it was something in between North American and maybe like anime style. I kind of had a little bit of an anime vibe, which is kind of cool. Yeah, I kind of I I liked the way the characters looked. I like their expressions, I like the color palette and yeah.

SPEAKER_02 34:26

The color palette was really cool. Like it was very like even when it was meant to be menacing, it was a very subtle menacing. That's what I really liked about the actual.

SPEAKER_04 34:35

And the glowing, they like made certain things glow, like uh with the powers and stuff, so that was kind of cool. I actually liked the fight scenes. I thought those were pretty detailed and yeah, like they were physically active. Yeah, they seemed to make sense, like nothing was like, oh, the physics of that are weird, and uh, they seem to like be really specific about the moves that they were doing, like someone trips someone and throws them or twists someone's arm and flips them, or so that was kind of cool.

SPEAKER_02 35:04

Yeah, big shout out to the director Sung Jin on, man. He killed it as far as you know putting together some fight scenes that were just visually, you know, delicious. Like they were great. They, you know, they really gave you everything you were looking for, whether it was blood and gore or just like some really you know premier, you know, martial arts or whatever you were going for, you really kind of got this with this movie for sure.

SPEAKER_04 35:28

And I thought the blood and gore also wasn't over the top. They did like some crazy things here and there, but I felt like that.

SPEAKER_02 35:35

Well, the man sushi was kind of nuts. The man sushi was.

SPEAKER_04 35:41

Yeah, they did it once and you were like, whoa. And then they they got creative. Other people died in different ways.

SPEAKER_02 35:48

Yeah, within like within like a three-minute period, you had you had man Tsushimi, you had blood raining down on Deathstroke with a really weird look on his face. For some reason, I felt that look behind the mask. I don't know if you guys did, but I felt like it was a very strange look. And then you had him showing some show showing showing a guy's head, and I was like, this is like all in three minutes. And then he like and then within like the next 10 minutes, he took somebody's arm, uh he killed somebody. Yeah, like it was it was pretty brutal. Like it's definitely up there with the opening scene of Deadpool.

SPEAKER_04 36:21

It reminded me of Kill Bill or something. Yeah, well, no, it has that vibe to it.

SPEAKER_02 36:25

It's got it definitely has a Kill Bill vibe to it for sure.

SPEAKER_04 36:28

I did feel like they spread it out well throughout the movies, so it wasn't like I will say that scene where uh uh Addy's like arm gets like broken and her leg.

SPEAKER_00 36:38

Like, I'm so bad with that, even like the snapping noise is like I can't, I'm not good with corn guts. That was like a lot for me. And then even after with the words when she was all like, Don't touch me, I'm fine. I was like, Bro, you need to go to a hospital.

SPEAKER_04 36:51

Like, we need to get you there right away. She's she's also trained for those kinds of scenarios, like torture, right? Like she would be trained for that.

SPEAKER_00 36:59

And there was even like, you know, the scenes that with Jericho Joseph himself when Rose was kind of like getting him to like hone his skills and everything, and he, you know, she was like, Get this person to shoot someone, and he's like, I don't want to do that. And then, you know, it ends up turning up a little worse. And I was like, Man, like he would have been okay with just like the one person out. Like you really took them all out.

SPEAKER_02 37:19

Uh when he was Yeah, the way go go ahead, Sub. I'm sorry.

SPEAKER_00 37:23

Oh no, sorry, I was saying like the the way he kind of like made them all fight in the end ended being much more brutal.

SPEAKER_02 37:30

Yeah, no, for sure. Did you guys were you guys impressed with the way that they illustrated Jericho's powers? Because I was. I thought that was probably one of the more visually tantalizing things about this film was the way that they illustrated his powers. The colors they used, the fact that they made his eyes glow and shit. It looked really, really dope. I really like that. Okay, so performances. I want to talk about performances because this is a great voice cast, incredible voice cast, uh, led by Michael Chickless, who was playing Deathstroke, Slade Wilson. Now, I are you guys fans of The Shield? Did you guys watch The Shield?

SPEAKER_04 38:04

I did not.

SPEAKER_02 38:05

No? Okay. No. All right, that's sad. So one of the things, one of the things that I noticed about this characterization of Deathstroke was the similarities between Deathstroke and Vic Mackey, who was the lead character in The Shield, who Michael Chickless also played. Again, another character with a very, you know, leading a very dual life, you know, two identities. You know, one identity that faces his family that's you know very sanitized and you know, daddy know, you know, daddy dearest and all that kind of shit. And then this totally corrupt cop who's willing to do anything to to you know serve his agenda, whether it's sir, you know, whether, you know, whether it's exacting justice or whether it's you know getting drug money or whether, you know, whatever his goal is, he's willing to do whatever it takes. And he literally does whatever it takes in this movie. Sorry, in this TV show. So it, you know, I think that the casting was perfect for what they were going for with Death Stroke in this story. Um Michael Chicklis really brought this character to life, and I thought his voice performance was incredible. I don't know if you guys felt the same, but I thought it was pretty amazing.

SPEAKER_00 39:15

I have to say the standout for me is Adeline Wilson. I think the voice actors Alexander. Yeah, I thought she did like I thought that was an amazing job, and her character felt so captivating in everything that she said as well. That was actually like quite the standout for me in terms of like the actual like voice acting. I thought she did an incredible job.

SPEAKER_02 39:38

Yeah, no, I thought she was great too. Honestly, though, I think you know when you see a character and and and the voice just doesn't match up with the way that they kind of look, I just felt that that was a little bit off. But I like the performance, I liked the actual physicality that she put into the role because you can hear her, like she's definitely in the voice booth, like you know, you know, with balled up fists and throwing punches, like you can hear the physicality in her performance, but I just don't feel like the aesthetic matched. I don't know whether like she kind of had like this like this East Coast American accent, and I just didn't picture that with this character. I don't know. I just didn't I just didn't just didn't jive with me. I don't know.

SPEAKER_04 40:21

I think Adeline was one of my favorites, and I also I liked Rose as a character. I don't I'm trying to remember the voice. Like, I don't know, the voice doesn't like stick with me, but I I did I did enjoy the performance of Rose, so yeah.

SPEAKER_02 40:34

Yeah, Rose was good. I thought Rose was good too. The only problem I had with Rose is she killed Lady Lady Shiva in hand-to-hand combat, and that just does not happen.

SPEAKER_04 40:45

Well, it wasn't it wasn't like a one-on-one fight, right?

SPEAKER_02 40:48

No, I know. He like almost stabbed her in the back or like something like that.

SPEAKER_04 40:51

But yeah, she stabbed her in the back of the neck while she was fighting with Adeline. Right. So she saved Adeline by stabbing Shiva in the neck.

SPEAKER_02 40:59

True, true, true. But still, Shiva is supposed to be pretty formidable. So, but that's just the comic geek in me, you know, kind of uh being a little bit too critical. But yeah, no. The other the other character that stood out to me, and I really want to get into this because I feel like this character isn't much different than Slade, to be honest. Maybe like a hair's hair's degree of separation, is the Jackal. The Jackal and Slade are almost exactly alike, except for this this sense of this sense of you know anarchy and and and like this sadomasochism that that the jackal kind of has. Like he's kind of what do you call it, a nihilist. Like he's very nihilistic about you know the way that he sees the world. Like he doesn't really care about anything. He doesn't seem to give a shit about fucking anything. It just he's the world is very black and white to him, you know. What what what was your take on the Jackal, guys?

SPEAKER_00 41:52

It was like he was kind of looking into reflection. Like they are very similar. Just maybe I wouldn't say opposite sides of the spectrum, but just you know, they're both believe what they're doing is adding to some sort of greater good in a weird sense. I mean, I don't think either of them really are. Like if you're standing on the side of right or wrong, um if you're looking at a black and white like that, but they are very similar to each other. They're and i it's funny that they don't I don't know if they don't feel well Jackal points it out actually at one point, right?

SPEAKER_04 42:23

Jekyll says it. Like he says it. He said it's just a matter of scale that's different. So it's more the same, it's just the scale is different. You're not dreaming big enough.

SPEAKER_02 42:33

Yeah, no, you're right. That's exactly and and and I think that's summarized that's the perfect summarization of the degree of separation between these characters. It's not a lot, right? Like I don't see the jackal, you know, I don't see the jackal no matter what his motivation is, you know, going to some sort of child sex dungeon and saving kids the way that Slade did. Like, I don't think he would care that much, you know, and I think that's kind of why these little these little story beats were in this story was to kind of you know widen that separation between Slade and the Jackal.

SPEAKER_04 43:04

But there's a lot that Jackal's more interested in world domination than anything else, and that's not the motivation for Slade. Slade's motivation is kind of just I don't know, he's picking fights based on political motivations or personal motivations. Well, he's paid, he's a mercenary. Oh, yeah.

SPEAKER_02 43:23

Yeah, so so again, that's something that they have in common, right?

SPEAKER_04 43:26

Yeah, but but and not power, I guess. But he's also kind of like interested in he he doesn't want to live like the life of just a family man. Like that's he that's not enough for him.

SPEAKER_02 43:37

Right, right. And and and with you know, with a death grip, he's holding on to the last shreds of his humanity, right? You know, you hear you you hear Adeline say that you've been compartmentalizing these parts of you, you know, over your life, and you know, you're completely forgetting who you are, you know. So so I think that's a big part of it, too, is that is that he's holding on to these shreds of humanity, and I think that's Where the Knights and Dragons book kind of comes into play is that he still has enough of himself that he can see himself as a good person, but he's but he's delusional about it, without a doubt.

SPEAKER_04 44:10

It's the way he justifies it. So it's like the the dictator hired him to do a hit. So he took the money, did the hit, but then killed the man who hired him to do it. And killed the worst out of the two. I didn't agree with his political alignment or whatever. And okay, so that makes it okay.

SPEAKER_02 44:28

Well, he killed the one that was a bigger piece of shit. Yeah, the one that was like, you know, doing the most harm out in the world. So in a in a sense, Judge Jury and Executioner. Exactly, exactly.

SPEAKER_04 44:38

So in a sense, he's kind of deciding like who who lives and who dies. Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 44:43

Exactly. What'd you guys think of Jericho's performance? I really, I really enjoyed Jericho's performance. And uh the voice actor, Griffin, Puatu, uh, really brought him to life, I think. Uh, really, really, really gave a lot of emotion to that character and a lot of depth to that character. That was my take. And then I think Wintergreen was a nice little bit of comic relief. He said some funny things, but you know, you can tell that he's he's you know, he's got that, you know, he's got that very Alfred kind of vibe to him. And he's played call by Colin Salmon, who is from the Aeroverse, because he's he's uh Oliver's stepfather in season one through three, I think. Yeah.

SPEAKER_04 45:25

I love him.

SPEAKER_02 45:25

Yeah, yeah, he's great. He's great.

SPEAKER_04 45:28

Sorry, on the point of Jericho, I saw Jericho maybe as like the damsel in distress for the first part of the movie, but then when he turns on Slade, you're like, oh, okay, so he's thinking for himself and he has his own ideas and motivations. And then I thought he was gonna be manipulated by his sister, and then he wasn't. They had this whole plan the whole time to take out the jackal. So yeah, that was kinda interesting.

SPEAKER_00 45:50

I do think that he sounded like young compared to them, but in a way that made sense. Like he still sounded like a kid, you know. I mean, so it did Rose, but I even more so where you can kind of understand like how kind of maybe impressionable he kind of was, I think.

SPEAKER_04 46:05

Um I could see I could see Rose being the more experienced one in terms of like life lessons, though, because she was like living in the streets for a while and stuff too.

SPEAKER_02 46:15

So and fighting for money too. She lived her dad's life too. That's crazy.

SPEAKER_04 46:21

It's not like she was a child, she never like had a childhood. So it kind of made sense to me that she took I don't know what the age difference was between them. I didn't calculate that, but it kind of made sense that she felt older to me.

SPEAKER_02 46:31

Yeah, yeah, and and I love that scene at the end where she realizes that this whole time she thought that she she was, you know, she was better than than Slade and Adl Adeline, and she realizes that she's just as as guilty as you know treating Jericho Yeah, you know, the same way almost, you know, like well, not in the same way exactly, but but like her, you know, her her failure to Jericho is a lot different than what Slade and Adeline's is. You know, hers is like this, you know, this twisted mission of you know manipulation for her to get back. Like she's using Jericho as like a weapon, you know for her own ends, you know, which was which was definitely an interesting, an interesting twist to the story. Now let's talk about this final scene because it's like straight out of fucking James Bond, right? Like straight out of James Bond. Wing suits, you know, little James Bond-esque little devices to to magnetically, you know, grip yourself to the side of an airplane. Very James Bond. That's kind of what my takeaway was from it. There's these hive agents with jet packs with wings on them and shit. I don't know.

SPEAKER_00 47:41

Yeah, it really did, I would say, go out with like a bang of sorts with that. And it definitely, I mean, it's showing like other skill sets as well. Like we've been seeing like a lot of the the comment that we saw for most of this movie was kind of very bloody and everything else. And it it like if Slade Wilson wasn't really facing anyone, that was a match for him, you know?

SPEAKER_02 48:02

Yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_00 48:09

And then having everyone there kind of fighting as well, like having his children there, and then also like a line, like just sort of this whole family is like, man, this whole family is definitely gonna need therapy after this too. I mean, they needed it before as well, but it is it w it wasn't I always like in movies when it like people all come together in some sense, like good guys and bad guys. Those those type of scenes.

SPEAKER_04 48:34

When they were fighting as a family for a moment, it reminded me of like a fucked up incredible.

SPEAKER_03 48:39

Oh yeah.

SPEAKER_04 48:41

I don't know why. I just thought of the incredibles when they did like the family team up, and I was like, okay, but like very different vibe. Uh yeah, in terms of the technology, it like fit. I I barely noticed it. It didn't like I wasn't like for or against it in one way or another. It kind of just like made sense where where they used it.

SPEAKER_02 49:04

Yeah, but what about what about the choices made for this extra double cross at the end? Like there was a couple double crosses here. Jericho double crosses his dad, and then at the end, you know, Rose reveals to Jackal that she's double crossing him, and that she wants Jericho to basically take him out, but then she finds out that the Jackal was preparing for this, so his suit is all upgraded, and he's basically gonna try and take both of them out, and then that's when this fight ensues, and then Shiva gets killed as she's fighting with Adeline. But yeah, there's like all these like cross, like there's this there's this back and forth of double crosses and betrayal like throughout this entire movie. No one's telling the truth.

SPEAKER_04 49:47

Normally, I hate that, but given like the characters' backgrounds, it kind of makes sense. Like it makes sense that Rose double crosses the jackal.

unknown 49:56

Yeah.

SPEAKER_04 49:56

She knows that he's bad and she doesn't agree with and she she felt like she was old enough to realize he was manipulating her. Like and didn't have a choice, it's not like she had choices about whether to go with him or not. And then so that made sense. Like, of course, she resented him. It made sense to me that like uh the one that made less sense was Jericho trusting Rose. But I guess if they had a psychic connection, I guess that could make sense that he would pick Rose over his father. And then for sure it makes sense that the Jackal foresaw that Rose might turn on him because he knows that she was kind of like they're not by choice, right? So he probably would have made a contingency plan for that. If you're gonna like force this person to like, I don't know, do your will. Yeah, so right.

SPEAKER_02 50:45

And she knew, or when apparently, like you know, Rose says when they had the psychic connection, she realized what the jackal did to her brother, too. That was definitely a part of her motivation for this revenge plot. But yeah, all this back and forth was you know, it was justified. Like you can't say that the actions of the characters weren't motivated.

SPEAKER_04 51:04

So I would have not liked it if the jackal didn't see it coming. I think it makes sense that the jackal saw it coming because he's got what, like at least 30 years of experience, life experience and work experience on Rose. Like he should have seen, he should have had a plan for that.

SPEAKER_02 51:19

Like true, and he doesn't trust anybody, yeah. Like he clearly doesn't have any faith in any any human being or any sort of healthy relationship with anybody. Like you know, you don't really get a sense of that character, like you know, having any sort of human relationship with anyone.

SPEAKER_04 51:34

And I like his reaction to it too. He just tells us people, okay, guys, like onto plan B then. Like just execute plan B instead.

SPEAKER_02 51:42

Yeah. Yeah, and then they're going after the president, and then the the president comes out of the left field in Air Force One, which was which is interesting. But yeah, no, and then there's this last fight scene with the Jackal and Slade, and they fall out of the air, or no, he blows up the airplane, they go out the the side of the airplane, and then they basically tumble down to the earth, and Slade like uses bombs on the jackal as they're falling and blows them out of the sky, and that's basically the end of the film. So, what did you guys like about this film and what did you guys not like about this film?

SPEAKER_00 52:17

I really like the characterization of Slade Wilson, and that's only because I mean everything is his fault. And it's fairly clear to see, like with all everything that that that is going on. But I I do like the way that he connects the characters. In terms of like scenes, I really liked. You know, that opening is very much stays with you. That's very shocking. But I also do like the bond that Jericho and Rose have, because even though you can say it's based off manipulation, maybe not, there is like love there. Um and I'm I'm a sucker for for a happy ending. So when you know, Rose is kind of accepted into the family, I find that nice. And then and then also, you know, maybe a part two because as Slade washes up on those shores because, you know, if you don't have the body, he's not completely dead, you know. If you can't find like right, that's basically a rule of thumb. And I kinda like how the movie ties in together because that's the first scene that we see too, right? It's him washed up on the shores. So it's like he's remembering this this whole thing in a sense.

SPEAKER_02 53:17

Yeah, yeah. No. What were the things you didn't like about the film?

SPEAKER_00 53:21

Okay, so this is why I'm gonna I'm not a huge blood and gore person. I don't know if you realize this conversation.

SPEAKER_02 53:28

But I I think I've picked that up from you over the over the year, yes.

SPEAKER_00 53:31

Yeah, and the funny thing is like so I really like Game of Thrones, but whenever it got like too bloody or gory, I was like, Oh, I can't see it. Like I'm like compromised. And Cartoon Gore apparently is not any better. So those themes while I do understand it's it's sort of to to showcase his brutality in it. But the thing I I will say, while I do like Slade Wilson, I do like the characters around him maybe a little more. The surrounding him. Like I I I do think that the deaths they go to, and maybe because Slade Wilson is is like a stoic character, that that might be why. I mean, you definitely see layers to him for sure. But like, you know, Jericho and and Rose and and Adelaide, like basically his family members, like those stories I find very compelling as well.

SPEAKER_04 54:13

I specifically liked Adeline's character and the way she could just like deals with the shit storm that she finds herself in. I thought that was pretty great. I think she has like sort of uh grace about her, but also like she's driven by logic. She doesn't get like too emotional. She's kind of just like, okay, you fucked up, but we're gonna fix it and don't get any ideas. We're not getting back together. Fuck you. But I care about my son, and we're gonna work together to get my son. So like I thought that was pretty cool. I liked that it was a story driven by kind of like a mother's desire to save her son, so that was kind of interesting. I did like the fight scenes. I'm also not a huge gore person, but I didn't mind it here. I thought it worked. Um I yeah, I like that. So yeah, and uh the fight, yeah. So the fight scenes and like the way they were drawn, I think, was really cool. And I guess I do like uh the plot twists. I thought the plot twists kept it interesting and it they made sense. They were kind of like grounded plot twists, they weren't too crazy. You didn't see them coming, but at the same time, you didn't see them coming, you didn't predict you didn't predict anything. So every single one of those coming, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no.

SPEAKER_02 55:23

I'm not saying I did, I'm just asking because I like you know, whenever there's a plot twist, I always want to know who saw it coming because no, I didn't think that I thought that Jericho was gonna be happy to see his dad.

SPEAKER_04 55:33

And I didn't see that one coming. Yeah, I didn't see that coming. I didn't see that one coming. Um we didn't know a lot about Rose, so I didn't know I didn't expect that one either. And then I guess I I didn't expect the Jackal one, but I liked that the Jackal saw, like did a counter twist to Rose's plot twist. So yeah.

SPEAKER_02 55:52

Yeah, they were playing they were playing four-dimensional chess. What didn't you like about the film?

SPEAKER_04 55:56

So I did feel that Deathstroke was kind of washed out. The characters around him were just so strong and had so much development. I would have liked to see him develop a little bit more, but as Sebba mentioned, he's not dead at the end of the movie, so maybe we see more character growth for him in a sequel. I don't I'm not sure. I I kind of it's I think he's not angry enough. Like it just seems weird that all this bad stuff happens around him, and he's so angry that he can go kill people, but he's not angry enough about the bad things that happened in his own life. Like that to me didn't really make sense.

SPEAKER_02 56:30

So I think that's a just I definitely think that's a just observation. Yeah, no, he's yeah, he was he was definitely emotionally in more in check than I thought he would be, but yeah, but just again.

SPEAKER_04 56:42

Your whole life just went to shit and like you really don't care, but you care about killing a dictator in South America. Like, I don't know. That that to me was weird, but I I guess like I guess we kind of get a glimpse into his motivation. I I think it's silly that he's like so influenced by this knight character that he would read to his son that he like quotes it so much. Like, I don't know, I thought that was a little silly, but yeah. Overall, I enjoyed the film. I I just would have liked to see maybe stronger motivations for Slade's actions and maybe stronger reactions from him.

SPEAKER_02 57:19

Gotcha. So the big standouts for me, the things I really liked about the film was the actual character uh development of Slade Wilson, just because I've never seen him like that before. He actually had a more identifiable personality, you know. Like I said, in in you know, other media that have experienced the character of Deathstroke or Slade Wilson in, he's always this very, you know, stoic, you know, Yenism kind of you know, spouting type of character. You know, he's definitely still got that, you know, discipline, like super disciplined type of guy. Doesn't say much, you know, I felt like this one was more humanized, without a doubt. And I think that to credit to the to the creative team, they really did a great job of humanizing him and balancing that with the casting of the character. Um, because like I said, you know, if you're a fan of the shield, you can see the similarities between Vic Mackey and Slade Wilson within this performance. Uh, and I don't know if that's what Michael Chicklis was going for, but he knocked it out of the park. You know, it was it was just a brilliant performance, and it really gave the character a lot more dimension than the traditional Death Stroke that I've seen uh or read about in comics and graphic novels. So I was really excited to see the character get that much, that much input and to be that interesting and that compelling. I like the the family dynamic. I thought the family dynamic was really cool. You know, this this basically this fucked up family where the sins of the father being visited upon the rest of the family, and you know, vice versa. Like it's almost like all of all of Slade's sins come back to haunt him, whether it's his son, whether it's his daughter, whether it's you know the woman that he slept with, etc. etc. Just well executed, a very cool story. The animation was fantastic. I really like the stylized way that it was drawn. And obviously the action sequences, the action design was really amazing. Definitely kept your you know, kept you locked on the screen. You wanted to see what was going to happen next. I remember rewinding a couple times to see if Slate actually cut that guy into Man Sushi because I wasn't sure. So, you know, it was you know well executed as far as visually. And the other thing I really liked about it is just the the voice performances overall. Uh, I really thought those were great. And yeah, the you know, the twists and turns of the story, uh great pacing. So, you know, I think this is definitely one that you know any DC animated universe fan should go out and check for sure. Uh, the things I didn't like about it, you know, one of the things that kind of stands out is there's a couple of plot beats that don't make sense to me. Uh the one with the jackal, like, why was the jackal even, you know, at a point in the final battle, Slade asks him, why me? Like, why are you coming after me? And that's when they realize that Slade killed his daughter. But the jackal came after the jackal came after him first before the daughter died. So it really didn't make a lot of sense to me. I thought that could be better, better structured, better timed out to make to actually make more sense. I don't know if you guys picked up on that, but that was kind of my takeaway.

SPEAKER_04 1:00:36

I didn't pick up on the timing of last time. I the timing kind of confused me because they jumped everywhere.

SPEAKER_00 1:00:41

Wait, I'm pretty sure that the jackal s sought him out because he wanted him to do something for him.

SPEAKER_02 1:00:48

And then Yeah, you wanted him to be in hive, right? Like, but but but but when he says why me, the answer shouldn't be because you killed my daughter. It just didn't make sense within the within the continuity of of the story, right? So if it was like, oh, you know, you're the greatest killer on the on on the planet, and I wanted you to be more like me or something like that.

SPEAKER_00 1:01:11

He says that after the the fact though.

SPEAKER_02 1:01:15

No, he says it on the plane during the fight.

SPEAKER_00 1:01:17

He says on the plane, he's like the final scene, yeah. But the why me wasn't to me that why me, and maybe I'm seeing like seeing it a different way, wasn't a why me, like why do you want me to be part of hive? It's like why are you coming after my family still? Why are you doing this? And him being like, Oh, because you killed my daughter.

SPEAKER_02 1:01:35

Yeah, I know, but he came after Joseph long before he killed his daughter too.

SPEAKER_00 1:01:39

But he came after Joseph and was like, I won't hurt your son if you do this thing for me.

SPEAKER_04 1:01:44

Yeah, that made no sense. Yeah, it was like a manipulation.

SPEAKER_00 1:01:46

Yeah, but then I think if he didn't do that thing and then like took his son back, I don't think he would have uh, you know, sought such retribution, but the fact that in the means in the meanwhile of doing that as well, he also killed his daughter, where he's like, Okay, well now I'm going to get even. At least that's how I saw that like story. So 'cause to me that kind of made sense.

SPEAKER_02 1:02:05

But yeah, no, I get that. I just think that the the loss of the daughter could have been better prioritized or you know, better placed than the hierarchy.

SPEAKER_04 1:02:14

Like I I kind of missed it. It was it was like just a beat, and it was like I I barely even remember it.

SPEAKER_02 1:02:21

Yeah, that was really my only that was really one of my only critiques as far as, you know, I guess you could call it a plot hole, a story hole. I don't know. But but yeah, no, you know, I thought it was uh overall a pretty good film and I was happy with it, and I'll definitely go back and watch it again. It definitely gave me you know it forced me to uh be more interested in the Deathstroke character for sure. You know, I may go back and read some comics and you know check out more of his stuff, but but yeah, no, I definitely recommend it. I think everybody should go check it out. If you guys were gonna rate this film out of five, what would you give it?

SPEAKER_04 1:02:56

I give it a a four point five. I enjoyed it.

SPEAKER_02 1:02:59

Four point five? Yeah. I was gonna say four.

SPEAKER_03 1:03:02

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 1:03:03

Yeah, I guess a around four. Yeah. I I'm not good at rating movies by number, I guess. But yeah, I I would say around there. Yeah, it was definitely something it's definitely not the type of movie I usually watch a lot in terms of or at least used to seeing in sort of the DC world as well. So that definitely took me by surprise. So even for that alone to sort of recommend to people and and really taking that at a jump. And I wonder if, you know, if we'll see other movies kind of go down this this lane as well and uh maybe explore these, I guess, darker corners of the the DC universe.

SPEAKER_02 1:03:35

I think we see more villains coming out of the pike, obviously, with Black Adam. They're doing a feature film for Black Adam. You know, he's been featured in animated stories too, so I wouldn't be surprised if we get more villain stories for sure. The killing joke is about the Joker, it's not really about Batman, you know. So, and Killing Joke was a popular animated, well, was it? I don't know. Other fans were kind of up in arms about it a little bit, but I liked it. Anyways, this is the end of our spoiler hot review. I hope you enjoyed it. Coming up next, I'm sitting down with JM Demateus, the writer for Deathstroke Knights and Dragons. So stay with us. I think you guys will enjoy this. Hello, everyone. I'm here with the esteemed, prolific, and Eisen Award-winning comic book scribe, JM Demateus. JM, how are you doing, buddy?

SPEAKER_01 1:04:21

I'm doing good. Thank you.

SPEAKER_02 1:04:23

Awesome, man. Thank you for joining us. Thank you for joining us. It really means a lot to us. As my regular listeners know, we're in the process of talking about your 1997 Daredevil treatment that you did called The Man Without Fear. So we're going to talk to you about that. And we're also going to talk about obviously this new project that's uh live and available right now on Google Play and Amazon and all these places where you get all your streaming goodies, which is Deathstroke, Knights and Dragons. For people who may not know about you or your work, can you tell us a little bit about yourself and your work and kind of run me through some of the catalog that has kind of catapulted you to this to this fame?

SPEAKER_01 1:05:04

Oh, dear Lord, to this fame. Yeah. Yeah. It's so funny. In this business, like we're very, very famous in this very, very narrow beach. You know what I mean? So it's like so it it's, I guess, you know, it is a kind of fame, I guess, but I I it's it's weird to think of it that way. So uh let me try to telescope a 40-year career into a couple minutes.

SPEAKER_02 1:05:22

Sounds good.

SPEAKER_01 1:05:23

I actually started out as a musician, uh, playing in bands, uh as a lead singer, rhythm guitarist, main songwriter. I still write songs, I still play. In fact, one of the things I've been doing during the lockdown is doing some demos of the many songs I've been writing in recent years with an iTour going back into the studio and doing some recordings. So music was always a big love, but whether I realized it consciously at first or not, the the music, the lifestyle of musician was not for me. I am much more substituted to being alone in a room playing with my imaginary friends. And sort of transition from from Playing in bands to doing music journalism. I wrote for a lot of different music newspapers. I did a little bit of writing for Rolling Stone. Yeah, I read that. And but always loved comics. Always loved comics and always wanted to get into comics. When I was a kid, my first passion was art. So I spent most of my childhood drawing. I'm not telescoping this down to two minutes too well, am I?

SPEAKER_02 1:06:21

It's all good, man. It's all good.

SPEAKER_01 1:06:23

And then, you know, the writing sort of took over. Long story short, after knocking on the door for several years in a variety of different ways, I sold my first comic book scripts to Paul Levitz at DC. Okay. In those days, you broke into uh the comic book world at DC by writing for their anthology books, you know, Weird War Tales, House of Mystery, House of Secrets, all those books. And so through Paul, I got my career underway. Soon was working with Paul and then Jack Harris and then Lynn Wien, who became both a dear, dear friend and my my first real mentor in the business. But a certain point, not long after that, I was offered uh a contract at Marvel, went over there thanks to Jim Shooter. And over the years, you know, I've written between my comic book career, I've done live action television and a very long uh career in animation as well. Cool. So between the comics and the animation, I've had a chance to write the vast majority of these characters over the years, as well as doing many, many creator-owned projects uh like Moonshadow and Seekers into the Mystery, and more recently The Girl in the Bay and Impossible Incorporated, as well as you know, writing some books. So between, you know, comics opened the door for me to not just to comics, but to TV and film and books and all these other wonderful opportunities that have come along over the years. And there's really too many to list. So it's just been it's been a great ride, and it continues to be a great ride because I continue to be busy and creative and and uh generating new things every day.

SPEAKER_02 1:07:55

That's amazing, man. That's amazing. And, you know, as a fellow creative, I'm happy to hear that someone has had such a such a prolific career to kind of play in all these different sandboxes because that's what I kind of hope for myself too. You know, I really love animation, I really love comic books, uh I really love film. That's kind of where I really got uh bitten by the writing bug was you know, wanting to write screenplays because I don't know if you find this, but the the prospect of writing a novel was just way too intimidating for me. Yeah, yeah, yeah. It just the demand and and you know the the the prose is just it's it's not as easy as playing in the screenplay sandbox, I would say for me.

SPEAKER_01 1:08:35

Like I just Yeah, I guess I think that's a personal, I think for some people would probably say the exact opposite that they would be much more comfortable writing a novel than writing a screenplay because they don't understand the form, it's a very specific form, and you have to tell a story in a very specific way. So but I but I understand what you're saying. Having done both, having written some books and uh and and and also toiled in the in the screenwriting uh fields.

SPEAKER_02 1:08:57

Very cool, very cool. Well, before we get into some of the screenwriting you've done, because we're gonna talk about Knights and Dragons, I just want to say some of your work is is is very personally familiar to me. The one that stands out the most is Craven's Last Hunt, probably lauded as one of the greatest Spider-Man stories of all time. And I love it. And I read it almost, I want to say like every two or three years, I try and read it at least once. Wow. Yeah, I really like it. Like, like I just really like it. And and and and the characters that kind of resonate with me are characters with a sense of duality or or you know, kind of limit living in an almost uh paradoxical existence. And and and I find that this story kind of has a lot of that.

SPEAKER_01 1:09:40

Um you sort of put your finger on on one of the themes of my entire career. I I you know that's because I remember being like 17 and reading Dostoevsky and being just completely blown away because of his understanding of the duality of human nature. And I've always been uh sort of obsessed with that in my own work as well, along with many other themes. But that's one of the one of the big themes. And I love any character filled with that that level of contradiction and that push-pull between the dual sides and sometimes triple and quadruple sides of our nature.

SPEAKER_02 1:10:11

Yeah, and it allows us to play with so many different narratives in society, whether it's science or whether it's religion or whether it's you know politics or whatever. Like there's all kinds of different you know layers that we can put on these characters to make them more interesting when they have that dual nature to them.

SPEAKER_01 1:10:26

So yeah, for me, there's there's three big wheels that I that I that I tend to focus on. There's the there's the emotional wheel, there's the psychological wheel, and then there's a spiritual wheel, or you can call it a metaphysical wheel. Maybe there's a that maybe the metaphysical wheel is even bigger than the spiritual wheel. So I'd like to you can take the lens and tilt it in all those different directions when you explore one human being. And that to me is what's fascinating. And for me, it's all about really ultimately, excuse me, for all of us, it really comes down to the the essential, and it's a cliche, but it's true, the search for self. The answer to the question, who am I and why am I here? And whether that answer is an emotional one, a psychological one, a spiritual one, a metaphysical one, or even a sociological or a political one. You know, you can you can put that uh screen, many different screens over those questions. But that's that's you know, if I boil the essence of of my work down, it probably all comes down to somebody, somewhere in some form, asking who am I and why am I here?

SPEAKER_02 1:11:28

Yeah, no, I I can definitely detect that in your work. And I think that's why I gravitate to your work so much where where you know it really has that appeal for me, because you know, some of my favorite writers are very much within that wheelhouse as well. You know, I love Damon Lindelof. You know, what he did with Watchmen was unbelievable. Did you watch it?

SPEAKER_01 1:11:46

I did. I did. Oh my god, right? I was very resistant to watching it because I just thought, what are they gonna do with Watchmen? It's not even sat in back, you know, and then watch. And my wife watched it first. It's very funny that she, you know, she said, I'm gonna watch this. And I was like, I don't even want to see it. And then she said, You really should watch this. And she watched the whole thing and then watched it again with me because she liked it so much. And it really was extraordinary. Um, yeah, that's some of the best television I've seen in a very long time. And this is from someone who was going in grudgingly, you know. Yeah. Um very, very well done. Yeah, you know, Lindelof, you know, whether what you know, I was a big fan of Lost. And me too, man. You can complain about how Lost ended, and I certainly have. But when you look at the bigger picture of what they achieved with that show, that show is groundbreaking in so many ways. Oh, yeah. That I can I can I can forgive lapses in the parts if the whole brings me something of meaning, you know? And Lost as a whole really worked, even if if, as I said, I could complain uh loudly about perhaps the last season. Yeah. But it does in the in the big picture, it doesn't matter. It was such a good show and it did so many interesting, wonderful things, and really changed television in a lot of ways.

SPEAKER_02 1:12:58

Yeah, it was great. You know, actually, right before I started watching Lost, I had I had I just ended uh a recent engagement with my partner. And honestly, during that relationship, I'd kind of lost my connection to some of the things that I was in as far as different aspects of culture, whether it be stuff I was reading, stuff I was writing, stuff I was watching, stuff I was listening to. I kind of lost, lost that. And loss was the first thing that I kind of reconnected to. And it was like almost like an emotional tone poem. Like I almost had I almost experienced every human emotion you possibly could as I was watching that show, and it really helped me through that that transition in my life, and and I'll forever remember the show that way. Like that's what it will always mean to me.

SPEAKER_01 1:13:47

That's interesting. So you were lost, but by watching Lost, you were found. Yes, sir. Yes, sir. That's great.

SPEAKER_02 1:13:55

Yeah, no, no, it was awesome. So uh I wanted to talk to you about this Death Stroke project. Now I watched it, I enjoyed it, it was quite good. Lots of big, big pluses for this movie. The the voice acting was phenomenal, the the writing was fantastic, the the action sequences that you guys put together, the direction was amazing. I love the fact that it it was clearly like this art, like how else can you do how else can you do Death Stroke and but like like not make it an R-rated movie? So you guys were smart about that, and you gave the fans exactly what they wanted. And and and I love that you're the guy who got to write this because I you know I really get a feeling from you that like you know you really value the duality in your characters, and if if no yeah, and normally my normal experience with Death Stroke has been as this kind of kung fu Zen master, you know, very kind of reserved and really only spoke when he had to, but you kind of did this this different kind of character design over Death Stroke, and I almost got the feeling that you were watching a lot of The Shield and a lot of Vic Mackey kind of bled into this character.

SPEAKER_01 1:15:07

That's very interesting. I have never watched The Shield in my life.

SPEAKER_02 1:15:10

Really?

SPEAKER_01 1:15:11

But I was very I I know Michael Chikklis's work for sure, and I was very glad that that he did the he did the voice. But you're right, you know, it's it's it was it's always about digging into the character and finding those those things that we've been talking about, the duality or you know, or the the layers and levels, the contradictions. Deathstroke was not a character that I was intimately familiar with. Obviously, I was familiar with him because I write comics. I know, all right, that's Deathstroke, he's over there, he's a super assassin. I remember, you know, because I used to read Teen Titans back in the day, you know, when he first appeared there from uh via the genius of Marvin George. Um but I didn't really know the character. So I had to do, you know, they sent me a bunch of stuff to read, and I had to do, thank God for you know, Wikipedia and online and read the character's multiple histories because you know they keep rebooting and changing these things. So what I did was, based on what I uh I read in the stories, based on what I read online, pulled out elements that I thought would were interesting to me about the character and basically built a new story from that. You know, there might have been there was one story where his son was kidnapped, but it was a very, very different story. And but I like that element, you know, because what really drew me in was the dysfunction of the family.

SPEAKER_02 1:16:26

Yes.

SPEAKER_01 1:16:27

You know, that's what to me, that's what that's what the movie is about. It's this it's the ultimate ugly divorce story, you know, and the damage that it does to these two people in this marriage, the damage that it does to the children, and how in some small way can they try to heal this rift and come back together in some shape or form. So while all the action is going on and the you know, the jumping and kicking and slicing and blowing up and all that other stuff, which you have to do in a death roak deathstroke story, I hope that what's what people get underneath that is a very human story, and again, contradiction. You know, Deathstroke, the way I played in the movie, is is he sees himself as one thing, despite the fact that he's out in the world doing some really terrible stuff. He he views him, but he he has to, which we everyone, everyone rationalizes, everyone finds a way to make what they do acceptable, except perhaps those of us who come from a background that both has Jewish guilt and Italian guilt in it. So it's it's impossible because we're always we're always flogging ourselves with guilt. But other people like Deathstroke, you know, so he's rationalized uh a way to be in the world. And one of his journeys in the story is to come to the point where he sees, through his rationalizations, to who he is and what he does, and how can he possibly even begin to make amends for what he's done, not just in the world, but more importantly, what he's done to himself and his family.

SPEAKER_02 1:17:51

Yeah, and and and he doesn't it's it's it's not him that pays for his sins, it's it, you know, it's his family. His family is the you know the ones that are paying for all the sins, basically. And some sins we don't even know about until you know later on down the story. Now you really did a good job of humanizing him and making him more relatable to the audience. Oh, thank you. You know, that opening scene where he's he's talking to his wife, and he basically they're talking about this affair, and then you see him open up his suitcase to read his son a book with a book that he actually brought along. So you're kind of like, okay, this guy's a scumbag, and then you see him open up his suitcase and he has a kid's book in there so he could read to his kid while he's on the road. Like, like it's it's again, it's this, it's it's this very quick transition in tone and duality to kind of uh continue to humanize the character very well. That's what I kind of took away from it, right?

SPEAKER_01 1:18:50

Because he loves his son. Oh, for sure. And he loves his wife, you know, in in his way. And you know, what he does as death stroke is compartmentalized over in a corner there. What happened with the affair years before, you know, all that to him, that was years before, and that's in this little compartment. And a lot of people live their lives like that. A lot of people, probably a lot of of these sociopaths that are uh out there right now running the world.

SPEAKER_02 1:19:14

Politicians, yeah, yeah, live their lives like that too.

SPEAKER_01 1:19:17

They just do this stuff and they pop in a little compartment and they put it away.

SPEAKER_02 1:19:20

Yep.

SPEAKER_01 1:19:20

You know, they don't they don't think about it and they don't they don't really care. But the fun of you know, the fun of a story is letting those compartments blow up and forcing the character to face them and deal with them, while at the same time obviously having a big uh globe-spanning adventure story.

SPEAKER_02 1:19:35

Yeah, no, it was uh it was a hell hell hell of an adventure story for sure. When when Adeline speaks to uh Slade and they're saying goodbye, he says I love you, but she doesn't say I love you. Can you speak to that? Was that like a conscious Which scene are we talking about? Sorry, when they're getting off the phone after he's read the book to Joseph and and and Slade says, I love you, Mrs. Adeline Wilson, and she's and she says back, and I adore you, Slade Wilson. Like, was that a conscious thing?

SPEAKER_01 1:20:04

Like oh, that she didn't say I love you? No, no, I think the uh the I adore you was was very sincere on her part. She really does adore this man. So that was for her was the same as saying I love you.

SPEAKER_02 1:20:13

Okay, very cool.

SPEAKER_01 1:20:14

But you know what? You can project anything you want into this stuff, and it can work because there could be some level of her of her of her consciousness talking about duality where she's holding that back. So it's easier to say I adore you than to say I love you. So that that could be just as valid an interpretation.

SPEAKER_02 1:20:31

That yeah, yeah, it could be. Yeah, that's definitely what I kind of took from it.

SPEAKER_01 1:20:35

Okay, that's fine. I accept that.

SPEAKER_02 1:20:38

You also did a good job of of setting up his code. Like you gave him a code as being like, even though he was an assassin, a hired mercenary, you gave him a code. And you made it very clear to the audience that there were certain lines he wasn't willing to cross. And he almost kind of and well, you also made it very clear that in his own self-delusion, he felt he was doing the he was doing good for the world.

SPEAKER_01 1:21:02

Right, right, right. In in that opening sequence where he is in this South American country and and essentially believing he's on the side of the angels in this in this revolution that's going on down there, while he is slaughtering people left and right, you know. And there's a line later on uh where one of the villains says to him, you know, it says, you know, he and he's Deathstroke is talking about, you know, in in essence the nobility of his cause, and he says, I'm sure the widows and the children of the of the men that you killed uh down there don't feel the same way, you know. Yes, but there's the compartmentalization again. Well, you know, means to an end. I had to do this, and this is the way I had to do it, and and yet there's, you know, there there's just a mounting, mounting, mounting body count with this guy.

SPEAKER_02 1:21:46

Yeah. Did you have in mind like like when you were going through, you know, how you were going to kind of organize that character's morality, did you use any references from the real military world? Like, did you think back and kind of put yourself in the shoes of like an actual soldier who might have had to carry out orders that he didn't want to carry out, but he had to do it?

SPEAKER_01 1:22:06

Like with no, I mean, you do that with with with every character, you hope. You have to you have to actually be as you know, if you're a writer, you have to be a little crazy to do this. Yeah. Because you have to become these people. So I have to become Deathstroke uh and completely understand his mindset. And part of that mindset was his military training. And then when he's out of the military, as he expresses in the story, he didn't know what the hell to do. And then he sees the results. We don't want to give away too much to anyone that hasn't seen this. He sees the results of the experience.

SPEAKER_02 1:22:38

Oh, this is going up on a spoiler review, so don't worry about that. Okay, yeah.

SPEAKER_01 1:22:41

He sees the results of uh of of what they did to him when he turns into this thing, and all he knows how to do is kill, essentially, and to do it for you know, for God and country and quote high ideals. So in his own way, he is continuing to do that as deathstroke. Sure, they're paying him a lot of money to do it, but you know, a man's gotta live, right? Yeah, at least in his mind.

SPEAKER_02 1:23:06

Now, the antagonist, uh, the jackal. Yeah, you made him not too far removed from Deathstroke himself. It was almost like he had a very slight more of a more of an arc than a hockey stick over into the evil side. You know what I mean? Like it was it was just a slight adjustment. I really thought that was interesting. And and and and you really did a lot of good, a lot of good exposition about the jackal's very kind of nihilistic view of almost everything. Like he was definitely had this very nihilistic kind of almost anarchist where you know, let let the chips fall as they may.

SPEAKER_01 1:23:43

Like, I really in many ways he's he is he is a more honest version of Deathstroke, right? That's true. That's true because he's he's I'm an assassin for hire. This is what I do. I'm not hiding it, I'm not wrapping it up in some self-delusional mythology. This is what I am, and he, and this is what you are, and that's what he's trying to bring out to him in the beginning. You might as well be on our side because you do the same exact thing and you're very good at it.

SPEAKER_02 1:24:07

Yeah, no, for sure. And oh, I wanted to ask you about the shiny night reference in the book. Was that a rat was that a DC Easter egg for Sir Justin?

SPEAKER_01 1:24:16

No, not at all. Not at all.

SPEAKER_02 1:24:17

No, that was accidental.

SPEAKER_01 1:24:19

Wow. That was there was that was just I just I created this idea of the storybook and I came up with a little story of the night. Cool. And I wasn't thinking about anything beyond that.

SPEAKER_02 1:24:29

So uh there's a there's a time jump in the story, and again, you you you take us right back to where Deathstroke lives morally, and he's taking down this this den of human traffickers, and he rescues these women that have been kidnapped and are going to be sold into sex trafficking or whatever. And you get again, you humanize them even more. Like it was very hard, it was very hard to not like Slade Wilson in this iteration. It's very easy to dislike Slade Wilson in other iterations because he's going up against your favorite characters, right? One and two, he's he he's so stoic and he's so kung fu the legend continues with everything he says, that you really get nothing beyond the surface of his Zenisms. Like you really get nothing from him. There's no there's no emotion. You know, in the Judas contract, he you know, he betrays uh little terror, and that's really the only kind of emotional beat you get from Deathstroke. He's not really an emotional character, but he did a great job of like really kind of layering this guy and and and giving us places to go with him because I I really didn't expect for this to be as as complex as it was.

SPEAKER_01 1:25:47

Like I just thank you for saying that. I appreciate that. I couldn't, I couldn't, I couldn't write a story about a character the way you describe that character.

SPEAKER_02 1:25:55

That's good, neither can I.

SPEAKER_01 1:26:00

I'm sure over the years, Deathstroke stories that delved into the character in a in a deeper way. Of course. But you know, where's the interest in a character who's just you know, there's a certain sort of action movie, right? Where the you know, the main character is just a sort of machine and off he goes, and that's what the movie is about. But that's those aren't the kinds of stories that interest me. That's that's to me, that's the least interesting story I could ever possibly tell. Even this style of action movie is not really in my wheelhouse. So it was a challenge for me to, and that's what becomes fun sometimes, because they you know, uh, I I don't get I don't make up, I don't come up with the choice of what which movie I'm gonna be working on. I I inevitably I get a call from someone at Warner Brothers Animation saying, You're interested in doing this. And I'm a freelancer, so I'm always interested in doing this, you know, because that's my that's my job, you know, unless it's something that is so so outside my wheelhouse that I can't find a way in, you know?

SPEAKER_02 1:27:01

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 1:27:01

So this sort of like almost James Bondian action uh movie lots of good spy craft.

SPEAKER_02 1:27:08

I liked all the spy craft, yeah.

SPEAKER_01 1:27:09

Well, here's the funny thing that happened. When I was like fifth, sixth, seventh grade, I was in love with James Bond. I loved those, I read all those books, I devoured the movies, you know, and that was a passion of little me, years and years and years ago, you know. And then on a whim a couple of years ago, I decided, oh, well, I'd like to reread some of those books and see how they hold up. So I think I reread three or four James Bond books, which sort of popped that back in my consciousness again, so that when I started working on Deathstroke, I had I Bond was swimming around in my unconscious, you know. And there is one scene that is very much a Bond tribute, which is the underwater uh fight.

SPEAKER_02 1:27:49

Yes, I picked up on that. I was like, this is so spying.

SPEAKER_01 1:27:54

Yeah, dude. Yeah. But so I was, you know, the the the the 12 year old James Bond fanatic in my soul. was very very happy to do that so that that was really fun but that that kind of helped me to find my way into a type of story that isn't necessarily my forte but you you know you want to keep you want to have as many tools uh i in your toolkit as a writer uh as possible so when someone approaches you with a story that may not be exactly what you're comfortable with you will learn and you will grow by doing it true you know uh and and and and that's death stroke for me one of the big challenges the character stuff is never a challenge to me that's the easy part that's just what I do it's very natural for me I just naturally blow off the top of the character's head and stick my hands in and pull out their psyche and study it I can do that really easily but there are other things that maybe aren't as easy for me so so getting a chance to try to write this kind of action movie was a challenge. You know the stuff at the end where they're leaping out of the plane and you know all that stuff oh the wingsuits were a gangster it was really it was really fun yeah and it's interesting to find that one has the ability to do something that isn't natural for oneself necessarily but as a storyteller you want to you want to be able to to shift and turn and deliver what what people want and yet the trick is to still be true to yourself. So for me to being true to myself is making sure that the characters are deep and and and multi-layered and interesting.

SPEAKER_02 1:29:26

Well you definitely achieved that because they were they were definitely layered and and and and very interesting and complex and and kind of kept you guessing at times as far as you know what were the kind of the true motivations beneath the surface so that's that's that's always a good journey to go on. One thing I kind of noticed was was this this family trinity between between Slade Rose and and Joseph or Jericho how much was this influenced by what's happening on the last season of Titans because that was a huge part of their story for the last season of Titans I don't know if you knew that I've not seen it so not influenced at all but you have to realize probably I probably wrote this before Titans even came on it it but from when I write these things to when they actually come out is sometimes a year and a half or more.

SPEAKER_01 1:30:21

That makes sense yeah because they got to do all the artwork right that makes yeah there's there's a all this animation to be done so it could you know uh when I turn in the script but then the directors get their hands on it you know and there's a whole a whole process and you know sometimes because you know a lot of that stuff is done elsewhere and I'm I'm in New York a lot sometimes I I I am involved in those later stages and and sometimes I'm not um with Deathstroke what was fun was when any anything came up when they they needed something instead of like having someone else just rewrite it they always came back to me there were there were a couple of times when they said you know our timing came up a little short we need a scene here and a scene here can you give us a couple of new scenes you know sometimes they would turn to someone else to do something like that. So I I I you know I got to see all the animatics which are the little sort of the rough draft versions of the of the animation and was able to comment on that and give them my feedback. So it's always great when you can be included every step of the way like that.

SPEAKER_02 1:31:16

Very cool. What was your first reaction to that first scene where Slade literally chops a guy up in a shoshimi.

SPEAKER_01 1:31:23

You know what I've noticed with animation in general is I will write an action sequence whatever it is and then the directors and the animators come along and they just blow the thing up to like points of like oh my God I you know really they did that all that blood all the limbs is like you know years ago when I was working on Justice League Unlimited uh there was an episode that I really loved working on it and it had a a big battle between Superman and Captain Marvel. And so you know I wrote this battle this battle scene but boy when they were done with it this was like such a massive massive you know that uh it's so so that that's that's what the directors and the animators do is that they will take it and they will add these visual touches and they will push things to the extreme and I know you know Deathstroke like the Constantine movie that I wrote started out on CWC. Right. There's a shortened version that's running on CWC the first half anyway and uh I know for C they always they for for this and Constantine they were like we want to push this as far as we can push it this is an adult thing. We want to you know we're gonna push they they really wanted to push the violence and the adult aspects of the story don't hold back you know but no matter how much I push this is so far I'm gonna push and then you know they take that ball and they run with it.

SPEAKER_02 1:32:36

Yeah no that was okay so when I saw that scene I was like all right I'm gonna buckle myself in because this is going to get interesting very quickly and then in the next scene there's like blood raining down on him and and then and then in the next one he's got a guy's head in his hands. I was like all right DC animated universe here we go let's let's rock and roll.

SPEAKER_01 1:32:57

I write a scene like that and that's sort of an example of like this is not not necessarily in my wheelhouse but this is what this character and this particular story needs beats like this. You know what I mean? Yes so you you you you serve the story the story's not serving me and what I prefer I have to serve the characters in the story. And you know it's a big he's basically a super spy as far as I'm concerned he is you know so so you have to write that kind of story. And I'm glad it worked.

SPEAKER_02 1:33:26

Oh it did man it did it blew my hair back. I'll tell you that right now so the other thing I noticed is with the character of Jericho you guys changed his power set a little bit can you talk about that?

SPEAKER_01 1:33:37

Well you know I know he had different powers back in the day but then they revamped the character. So one of the stories that they gave me to read Jericho's powers were more psychic in nature.

unknown 1:33:48

Okay.

SPEAKER_01 1:33:49

So I thought oh that's interesting and that makes him more dangerous.

SPEAKER_02 1:33:52

Okay.

SPEAKER_01 1:33:53

You know that makes him a weapon to be used. Very much so yeah and and so I leaned into that that and that's that you know and it works I think it works in context of the story.

SPEAKER_02 1:34:04

Very no it no it definitely does like you know the the demonstration he does of his actual physical telekinesis was like okay this guy's a literal weapon like it kind of made me flash back to you know the dark phoenix in the X-Men saga like you know this guy has some serious powers and he's only just starting to the like they're only starting to manifest now like this is gonna get this is gonna get crazy.

SPEAKER_01 1:34:29

So right there's I think there's a line that the Hive Queen says to to Deathstroke where she says you know you're a handgun he's a nuclear bomb. Something like that.

SPEAKER_02 1:34:37

Yeah yes yeah yeah yeah well done I really like that one. Now the Rose character I found her the most interesting and the most complex because she's she's doing what she's doing out of the love for her brother. Like that's that's what the takeaway is is that you know she like long before they even knew about each other or met each other there's this mental connection you right you talk about that right right and and and I guess she relives she relives she relives Joseph's story kind of through her through her own through through that connection. Right. And it it and then the the jackal I guess finds her and and then she sees an opportunity to get back at the jackal for what he did to her brother. Right. But at the same time you kind of get the feeling that she's trying to balance what's left of her soul morally because like she almost feels like almost completely engulfed in vengeance.

SPEAKER_01 1:35:35

Right and yet in her I think in her mind she's sort of this is a healing act you to to with Joseph to you know to to to take him and nurture him this way. And she too has to face later in the story the idea that maybe her motivations weren't as pure. She really truly loves her brother but she also was using him. She was using him as well and she has to face that doesn't mean she loves him any less and doesn't mean he doesn't forgive her and love her in return. But she you know all all these characters sort of have to face especially Rose and and and Deathstroke have to face that moment of like maybe I am not completely what I've been telling myself I am. And you know there's multiple levels of even that of who we are there's you know there's so many levels of who we are what's the core of who we are but for the purposes of the story you know these characters have to face that. But that's the way you know when you face that limitation when you face your own delusions about yourself that's the doorway into some kind of growth. Yes. So my belief is that that all these characters will continue to grow from here. You know I I basically had to this is this this is like as if you know DC was rebooting the character from square one. I was approaching like this this is a deathstroke movie a standalone movie it's not connected to anything else it wasn't even connected to the broader DC animated universe. It's just a deathstroke story. So I had to look at all these things that I found that I thought were interesting and essentially reboot the character myself and come up with my own version of the deathstroke story which other people can build on or ignore you know it's up to them. But I hope within the context of the story that people that are fans of the character in enjoy the story that we got to tell.

SPEAKER_02 1:37:20

Well I think they will to be honest because you know I'm gonna go back to this Vic Mackey Shield thing because Vic Mackey was a character that led a dual life. He's a corrupt cop that you know doesn't take his work home with him. You know his family does not know of all the all the shit that he gets into it's it's you know it's quite crazy actually how far he goes in in you know to reach his goals within the context of his job. And and I kind of felt the same way with this character like you guys casted this guy per like you guys casted Deathstroke perfectly because Vic uh because Michael Chicklis can play this dual facing character all day long because he did it for nine seasons and he did it to the point where he won awards for it and that voice and the the the the performance so um yeah I'm sure that's why they cast him like I said I was not familiar with the shield I mean I knew it existed and I know that he won all these accolades for the part you know to me he'll he he he I I love him for for the for being the thing you know whatever you think of those fantastic four movies he was he was a great thing he was perfectly cast as the thing and did a fantastic job in that yeah but so I'm sure that's why that's probably now that you're explaining this that's probably why they cast him yeah no like I that's what I said to myself I was like okay so like when I saw the trailer I was like Michael Chickless is death stroke I was like Michael Chickless is way too big a personality for the death stroke that I know but then when I saw your interpretation I was like okay this works because you kind of gave him more of a more of a an army grunt kind of feel to him than say like a ninja Zen master like that's kind of the vibe that I got and it worked dude it was great it really was great.

SPEAKER_01 1:39:07

Great um I have to say in general with the with with the DC animated stuff and especially these movies I've worked on in recent years the voice casting the voice direction the performances these people do not approach this like they're slumming you know not at all I'm doing I'm doing an animated movie let me just do it for the day and cast my check just just you know they all really go in and and they and they give their all to this and I'm always so impressed with the the people that they cast and and the job that these people do. You know and I worked on the Constantine City of Demons movie um you know Matt Ryan that got Matt Ryan to be Constantine again for the animated version.

SPEAKER_02 1:39:41

Amazing and you know and he loves that character and he put heart and soul into that and just like same thing with that movie every part no matter how small was really really well played um just just really excellent really excellent I feel like the entire DC animated universe is a love letter to the fans that's yeah that that's how I see it. And honestly we did an uh well we actually did an like a self-contained episode about animation itself and one of the points that I made in that episode was is that it saddens me that there's not more big theatrical releases for these animated properties. You know I've like me myself I would have loved to go see Superman Red Sun in the theater. I would have loved that you know but for some reason I guess you know because of the fact that animation still kind of carries a stigma for some adults it's it's just not as it's just not as mainstream or welcomed as as obviously live action stuff is which is kind of sad because you know the action but the uh the budget in and you know as it relates to the spectacle that you can create yes with an animated feature is is you know much more manageable than say the spectacle you can create on the live action feature you're you know you're much more you know you're not as limited by you know when you do animation you can almost do anything you want yeah which would be great you know and when you consider you know something like the the into the spider verse movie amazing i'm I'm surprised because as we're saying remov removing myself from the equation completely DC animation has been phenomenal on you know since Batman the animated series and I've been I feel very lucky that I've gotten to participate in whatever way I can over the years both on the TV shows and and the movies and since they've done such a brilliant job guys like you know Bruce Tim and Alan Burnett and Jim Creek and all these guys um you know that that that Warner Brothers hasn't turned to them and say here's a here's a bigger budget.

SPEAKER_01 1:41:40

Do a big budget animated movie for us. Oh you know look at Justice League Unlimited there you know it's it's as good of an iteration of the of the Justice League as has ever been done and better than most. I mean they understood those characters and so why not give these guys the keys to the kingdom you know why not give these guys the keys and and say go do a live action movie in Rited Forest you know what are you going to but certainly after after you would think after into the Spider Verse they would be tripping over themselves to go to these guys and say give us a big animated movie that we can release in theaters. Well I frankly I hadn't thought about that until you just brought it up and you're absolutely right.

SPEAKER_02 1:42:16

Yeah well with what's happening with COVID now too like this almost makes complete sense because you know you can actually put together an animated feature remotely you don't need all these you know people together in one space.

SPEAKER_01 1:42:29

So you know you don't have to worry about kissing or anything. Exactly there you go to infect each other in some kind of yeah there there you go.

SPEAKER_02 1:42:37

And you know I'm glad you brought up Justice League Unlimited because honestly I could spend an entire episode talking to you about the work that you did on Justice League Unlimited and I'd love to have you back to talk about it at some point because Grudge Match is without a doubt one of my favorite episodes of all of the DC animated anything.

SPEAKER_01 1:42:55

Really that particular episode I would have never guessed that that's interesting.

SPEAKER_02 1:42:58

Grudge Match is so good. It's so good just so good. And like the way that you balanced all those characters and and and still let them shine in their own moments and and uh just oh so good man. So good.

SPEAKER_01 1:43:12

That was a great show it was a great show and that I would got to be a crazy show. And it's a show that as the years have passed has taken on more and more of a classic status. And you know that I got to be a small part of that I think I wrote maybe seven episodes. I'm really glad that I was a part of that. And I have my friend uh Stan Berkowitz to thank for that for bringing me in on that show I worked uh primarily with Stan and with uh Dwayne McDuffie on that show.

SPEAKER_02 1:43:36

Very cool very cool yeah the fans love it man like anybody I ever talk to like Justice League Unlimited if that conversation starts it can go for it can go for hours because it it's it's just so beloved by the fans and and you know that look that that particular look of animation is just so DC DNA now it's ridiculous. Like yeah as soon as you see that jawline you're like okay that's definitely you know Bruce Timm's like Bruce Tim that's the Bruce Timm look so so calling back to the Deathstroke film real quick I like how you almost mirrored Rose with her with Slade and Adeline and you even included Adeline in it too because she's almost just as guilty of abandoning Joseph as Slade is right it's the same it's the same thing there's always there's always that that line that interior line that gets crossed you know same thing she loves her son she thinks she's doing the best for her son at the same time she's in some levels she's doing the worst thing she could have ever done for herself.

SPEAKER_01 1:44:39

She's isolating him and leaving him alone and heartbroken.

SPEAKER_02 1:44:43

Yeah no and and you know I really like how you kind of polarized with the Rose character because the rose character thinks she's doing good too but you know in the context or sorry in the mind of the viewer she's the one that was supporting him and in a way kind of rescued him and you know gave him the support that he needed and the love that he needed and then his his his birth parents were the ones that abandoned him. But she's part of the terrorist organization and and they're not and it's just this yeah it's just and a very interesting structure between those characters for sure.

SPEAKER_01 1:45:18

You know the fact that these characters are so larger than life allows you to take the real emotions of a dysfunctional family going through this kind of pain and then just amplifying it you know to the point of like opera you know so that that's the fun of these stories. But it always as I keep saying it always has to be grounded in real emotion and real real human psychology and and real human heart or else it's empty. It's soulless.

SPEAKER_02 1:45:45

I agree no I totally agree with you. The last thing I want to talk to you about this movie is something that I kind of picked up on and as a New Yorker I want to get your take on this the the terrorist attack that Hive carries out in the final act seems to mirror a lot of the events in 9-11 a little bit. And I wanted to know as a New Yorker were you kind of drawing from your personal experience from that?

SPEAKER_01 1:46:08

Well yeah I grew up in New York City I do I do I live I live in upstate New York so I don't I was not living in the city of 911 but I was you know but my roots are there friends are there. So obviously we were all very connected to that but having grown up in New York certainly that impacted me. But really as I was writing it what I was remembering was that period when George Bush was up in a plane somewhere you know no one knew what was going on yes and he was up in a plane somewhere and I thought well that's interesting if we you know if we unleash these terrorist events and the president is up there and he's vulnerable really he's more vulnerable than he would be if he was if he was in the White House or something. And that's that's kind of what sparked the idea for that sequence because you know you always need your big final action sequence.

SPEAKER_02 1:46:55

True so it's like well what's it going to be where what where is this all leading and then so and then from there you know it unfolded into this whole aerial battle in the wingsuits and the whole thing which was uh really fun to write well done sir no for sure because like you know once once you were playing with with some of these visual nods to some of the things that happened on 9-11 and then you you know you do this big thing with Air Force One I was like okay this is gonna end on a real freaking high note so I like I really really love the way you put that scene together so amazing amazing thank you thank you yeah so before we jump off of Deathstroke here uh can you tell me who was your favorite character to write for this particular film oh that's an interesting question who was my favorite character character to write you know I have to say this one wasn't about one particular character it was about the dynamic the family dynamic what was going on between all of them the four of them you know the four of them were were what was really really interesting to me it was it was looking at obviously at them as individuals and their own psychology and emotional states and how that all played off into and against each other.

SPEAKER_01 1:48:10

They were like a bunch of billiard balls really the four of them continually bouncing off each other and often hurting each other when that happened. So it was really it was really the dynamic more than a specific character the dynamic between the four characters that really fascinated me.

SPEAKER_02 1:48:27

Well Jam thanks for sitting down and talking to us about Deathstroke and sharing you know your background and and talking to us about your work and Moonshadow and all these super cool things. I understand that you have another project that you're working on called Godsend.

SPEAKER_01 1:48:42

Is there anything you can tell us about that I you know I have right now one of the things that's that's happened in the lockdown is that there were a bunch of creator owned projects that I have been sort of on the back burner and I brought them all to the front burner. So I'm more I'm working on four different projects right now. Oh wow we we just put out a little teaser for Godsend you probably won't see it till next year I put out okay I put out a teaser on Twitter uh yesterday for another new project I'm working on. So I have like four different projects that I'm developing originals that I'm having so much fun with right now.

SPEAKER_02 1:49:15

Very cool.

SPEAKER_01 1:49:16

So but I can't really talk about any of them and I also uh got a call recently uh potentially about another new animated movie for uh Warner Brothers awesome we'll see what happens with that it's not a done deal yet I'm waiting for waiting for the final word to come down and in terms of stuff that's out there along with Deathstroke uh Superman Red Sun which came out yep just before the lockdown just in time to cancel the New York premiere which was really really disappointing because I was really looking forward to that but that movie turned out really really well yeah very very happy with that and then they just put out uh a DVD uh called Batman and Death in the Family which includes a bunch of uh DC Universe shorts okay and I wrote two of those shorts one was an Adam Strange short oh very cool and the other you mentioned Neil Gaiman earlier was a death short's death character that for the very first time that death had been used in any other medium other than comics and what I enjoyed both of those shorts but the death one I think is one of the best the best things I've worked on in animation really loved working working that on that one it turned out beautifully it it's almost like a little almost like a little 20 minute Twilight zone episode it's really really really happy with that one. So there's a lot of stuff that's out there and for folks that are looking for comic book work to read just this past week from IDW a Star Trek Hell's Mirror came out okay which is the mirror universe tale mirror universe tale of Kirk and Khan. And you're a big Star Trek fan right I'm a huge Star Trek fan and I I love Kirk and I love Khan so to to to play with those characters and Spock and the mirror universe it was really a thrill and a couple of other collections that are out there along with Moonshadow is uh The Girl in the Bay which came out last year from Burger Books Karen Berger's uh new line at Dark Horse very cool and uh a project I did for IDW a more kid friendly big cosmic adventure called Impossible Incorporated so that takes care of the plugs and one more plug it's not done yeah go ahead bud I do my writing workshops uh they're called Imagination 101 obviously because of of COVID uh I can't do them in person anymore so I am working to bring my writing workshop online and I'm hoping to get it online by November or December at the latest. So anyone that follows me on Twitter or Facebook I'll be getting the word out about that hopefully soon.

SPEAKER_02 1:51:38

Very cool you should talk to Jim Lee maybe he can set you up with that virtual space thing you did for DC Fandome and you can just do it in there.

SPEAKER_01 1:51:44

I got actually I I found someone to host to host and it's a new it's a new site called Comicsplex and they're going to be hosting the hosting the workshop so I'm looking forward to that that's fantastic.

SPEAKER_02 1:51:55

Well JM think again thanks for uh joining us to talk about Deathstroke it's available now on Blu-ray you can get it on Amazon and Google Play and all the different little streaming goodie sites it's awesome please guys go check it out and uh come back to us let us know what you thought about it. You know you can drop us a line on Instagram at meanwhile underscore pod there's all kinds of content up there for you to check out and uh make sure you subscribe to the show. Well guys that's a wrap uh thank you for joining us for the spoiler hot review of Deathstroke Knights and Dragons. Make sure you catch this movie we're definitely recommending it. We think you guys will enjoy it. Thanks again to JM Damateus for joining us and sitting down with us to talk about the film. Really appreciate it man uh we're huge fans and again this episode was edited and produced by our amazing producer Rafi Bedrosian thanks again Rafi amazing work as always we're gonna sign off here I'm Frank McGuire I'm Christina Dudamos I'm Sabamir. Peace