The hierarchy of power in the DC universe just changed. As the Arrowverse bows out with the ending of “Superman & Lois,” its shared universe is giving way to the next attempt by DC to build a cinematic universe, this time stretching across TV and film. James Gunn and Peter Safran’s DC Studios kicks off not with a big-budget theatrical four-quadrant blockbuster, but with a gory, gnarly and irreverent animated TV show. At its core, “Creature Commandos” is essentially a sequel to Gunn’s “The Suicide Squad,” a story of a team of superpowered freaks treated as monsters — who are sent to a foreign country and discover that maybe the authorities should not be entirely trusted, all while becoming a found family that cares for one another because no one has cared about them before — in a project accompanied by plenty of gore, guts, swears and a killer soundtrack.
This is not a negative, mind you. Gunn has proved adept at telling stories about found families and teams in the superhero landscape, and “Creature Commandos” is another winner; an exciting start to the new DC Universe and a fun and heartfelt animated series with deeply flawed characters you can’t help but fall in love with.
Inspired by the comics team of the same name from the 1980s, “Creature Commandos” follows a black ops team of monsters led by Frank Grillo’s Rick Flag Sr. (father of Rick Flag from “The Suicide Squad”) tasked by Amanda Waller (a returning Viola Davis) to protect the princess of a fictional Eastern European country from a militant group of extremist fragile men angry that Themyscira is only for women. The team is comprised of an amphibious mutant called Nina (Zoë Chao), returning character Weasel (Sean Gunn), walking radioactive skeleton Doctor Phosphorus (Alan Tudyk), reanimated corpse The Bride (Indira Varma), and G.I. Robot (Sean Gunn), an android whose sole purpose and obsession is killing Nazis.
Unlike recent DC animated shows like “Harley Quinn” and “Kite Man: Hell Yeah!,” “Creature Commandos” is a serialized story, with each episode centering on one of the characters and using flashbacks to tell their backstories (Flag, curiously, does not get a backstory in Season 1). Thankfully, the show still maintains an air of mystery around the characters, the flashbacks being more about how they came to be as people rather than the science or magic behind their creation — for instance, we see G.I. Robot’s story in WWII, but not the moment he was built, and Weasel’s origin is left a gross mystery. By not overly explaining the inner workings of the show’s universe, “Creature Commandos” maintains a focus on heart and character, on making these outcasts and weirdos feel like fleshed-out characters no matter how long we see them before they’re brutally killed.
This helps distract from the slight predictability of the story (it doesn’t help how closely it resembles “The Suicide Squad”), because no matter how obvious the third act twist is, it’s hard not to be enthralled by the chemistry between the characters and their personal arcs. This is a tragedy of monsters discarded by society and sent to die, with some of them actually dying and opening the door for new team members. G.I. Robot is a standout, his love for killing Nazis going from an easy (and timely) joke to revealing a nuanced and emotional history of longing. Meanwhile Weasel becomes the unlikely heart of the group, with Gunn’s love for animals and misunderstood creatures coming together for the most heart-breaking story of the season, one up there with Rocket’s backstory in “Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 3” while also recontextualizing Weasel’s depiction in “The Suicide Squad.”
It’s this emotional throughline that connects the irreverent humor and the over-the-top violence in a way that doesn’t feel schlocky, as the emotions come from the situations the characters are in, rather than making the characters themselves sentimental.
When it comes to the animation itself, French studio Bobbypills makes a strong impression from the opening scene of the first episode, delivering a show that looks stunning and stands out from the past decade of anime-inspired DC animation. Rather than awe-inspired displays of martial arts expertise in the many action sequences, Bobbypills gives us ugly brawls where every punch, every broken jaw and every gunshot land with weight behind them. The character movements are fluid, captured with dynamic camera movements that aid in making the action dynamic and easy to follow. The only issue is the designs, and the overall visual palette of the show which can feel restrained at times, as if the imagination and possibility that comes with the medium of animation are being held back by having the look of the same universe and continuity as the future live-action DC projects. This is especially true of the design of characters like The Bride, who loses her macabre comics look for a simple makeup job that can be (relatively) easily translated to live-action.
And yet, “Creature Commandos” is rather self-contained, with but a couple of references to the larger DC Universe (including a couple of big cameos) and to “Peacemaker” and “The Suicide Squad.”
This being a James Gunn joint, of course, music is central to “Creature Commandos.” It is rather satisfying to see not only the score by Kevin Kiner and Clint Mansell (who already did a great score for “Doom Patrol”) be effective in conveying the thrills of the action and the emotion of the dramatic moments, but also a fantastic soundtrack comprised of folk and gypsy rock songs by bands like Gogol Bordello or the Norwegian band Kaizers Orchestra, all wrapped up by the inspired choice of using the Venezuelan song “Moliendo Café” as a theme song — which works as great as Wig Wam’s “Do Ya Wanna Taste It” did for “Peacemaker.”
We don’t know how “Superman” and the rest of the DC Universe experiment will fare out. But when it comes to “Creature Commandos,” this is a fun, endearing start to a new cinematic universe that offers gore, thrills, laughs, and emotions galore.
“Creature Commandos” premieres with the first two episodes Thursday, Dec. 5, on Max.