Creature Commandos ep. 2: Excitement for New DC Characters

Course Description: We continue our multi-part discussion on the Creature Commandos, delving deep into the backstories and characteristics. We take a comprehensive look at the narrative threads and emotional tensions within this universe.

Today's Syllabus:
 
Potential for a big character moment
Human emotion and connection
Complex relationships between characters

Guest Lecturer(s): Master Juishin and Zero Cool
Required Reading/Listening:

CREATURE COMMANDOS (2014)
DC HORROR PRESENTS: CREATURE COMMANDOS (2024)
CREATURE COMMANDOS PRESENT: FRANKENSTEIN, AGENT OF S.H.A.D.E. (2024)

Additional Research:

Actors/Actresses:
Joel Kinnaman

Characters:
Nina Mazursky
GI Robot
Rick Flag
Amanda Waller
The Bride
Doc Phosphorus
Frankenstein
Agent of SHADE
Seven Soldiers 

Office Hours: Monday 8:30p EST on Twitch

Transcript

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First I wanted to start with. Nina Mazursky the mermaid or the creature from the black lagoon as it is. And that's because, but that's because by the time this episode drops, we'll be getting the season finale of creature commandos. And hers is the only backstory that we haven't seen yet. 

So I'm thinking. When they delve into that, hers is going to be, she's going to be like the most vicious person of all.[00:02:00]  

The bride and she's she looks at the bride. She goes, don't you see me killing the bed? And the bride's yeah, no, not really. And that's that classic monster trope that I'm vicious on the outside, but on the inside I'm kind and good. But I'm going to, I'm going to be honest with you just as a character. 

As a whole, as a character, as a whole, up to this point that we've seen so far, she hasn't really been utilized. She hasn't done anything. She's really been a hindrance. Maybe she's in a lot of situations. She got caught in the bathtub. She got her helmet busted up, she couldn't breathe. GI robot picked, tbo, took her with it. 

Maybe she's, she hasn't really contributed all that much other than finding the necklace for the bride she could, that's trying to hold back her power. The monster that she, I don't that she is, I don't think she's been pushed far enough and that's why I'm like, I think like that last episode. 

Yeah, we, he's scaling up the violence. I feel like she's going to go in that last episode is just going to [00:03:00] be all out balls to the wall. Just like we just went up and went, treat everybody. 

Oh yeah. I'm waiting for that to happen because she's so far, she's been the books, the, like the book nerd, the librarian who's just been thrown on this mission. Like, why is she here? She hasn't even provided any of the like. Special knowledge or, expertise or anything. She just really, just stands there. 

And the other reason why she went with the briar, because the briar was, she saw her, she said, Wait, you can't leave us. And then she just tagged along. Yeah, and like you said, Zero, she's really been more of a hindrance. Without that helmet, she can't breathe out of water. And without that, then She hasn't proven any usefulness. 

Not yet. Not yet. We're holding out hope that she loses her shit. I'm waiting for it. Don't let me down. That's my personal prayer behind it. I want to see her just lose her shit one time. Don't let me down. [00:04:00] Like when they started killing all the Sparrows. Don't let me down. Now, she has two comic origins when I looked into her. 

Cause I wanted to know who. Exactly. She was first one is she's a daughter of the scientist that created the original creature commandos. Really? Yes. That's interesting. And it was, I think it went, he was a scientist and he found this monster camp in Romania and he got, gained their trust. he was taking their blood and when he came back to the US they stopped him and recruited him to start working on monsters for the US to fight in world War. 1, 2, 2, 1 or two. Okay. I was gonna say, I think it two. And he didn't like what they were doing with it, so he ended up leaving and going back to Romania and he found a [00:05:00] little fish girl. 

And he raised her as his daughter. Second origin is her being the scientists that created the creature commandos to the point where she, her experimentations got out of control. That was the more recent one. Yeah. And then she ended up even experimenting on herself. Yeah. And that's where, I don't know if they're gonna draw from those, but that's, I'm looking forward to see like exactly what they do with her. 

Yeah. What they're going to use. I was gonna ask what, like your favorite. As far as she goes, what was your favorite part with her? But we've already said she hasn't really done much of anything. She found the necklace for the bride. 

That was her major accomplishment. She looked under some trash and, oh, there it is. There it is. Whoop, there it is. This place has been ransacked for how many years? And all of a sudden she [00:06:00] just picks it up. Oh, hey. Oh, there it is. Look at that. That's her big accomplishment. And I'm trying to sit here and think. 

Yeah, that's all she's done. She found the next. She took it. She took an L and she rode in the bathtub. That's all it was. And rode in the bathtub. Alright next picture. Next. Dang, if this is in the indication, that season finale better be awesome. 

Next one I had, Rick Flag Senior. Rick Flag. My boy and a princess. Now I'm going to be honest with you, I didn't know that Rick Flag had a father. Me either. I thought that dude was just born out of A couple of army boots and just went on about the business. I knew he had a father. 

I knew about the character. It just, you really just hear about Flag because his father, in the comic, I think in the comic version his father died in the line of duty so he's just been very, he's always been [00:07:00] portrayed as. The Muslim American was a patriotic of soldiers, yeah. That's, like in the Justice League during the Task Force X episode. 

. Or the or the the, just the New Frontiers movie. Ooh. I liked that one. That one was good. That was a good one. 

Injustice just the league living it. Was that Rick Flagg Sr. No, it was his junior. Okay. That was his son. Oh, but he was talking about his father. . Okay. Yeah. So Senior is the father of Joel Kinnaman's character from the Suicide Squad that died. So he's leading this team. Comic version, he was like the original leader of the wartime, like World War I or II, like Suicide Squadron. 

Not Suicide Squad, but it was Suicide Squadron. And he even mentioned, I like the way they tied it in, how he mentioned. Or him and Waller had a conversation about his son dying. And he even came out a little bit and spoke to the [00:08:00] princess about it. When he was saying that the only reason he joined was because they had the kid at 18 and he was just trying to support his family. 

And then son ended up joining because he wanted to make the country a better place. But, let's be honest, at that point, The ideal of carrying on a tradition may have really come into a factor of why he went into the military at 18 as well. Everybody wants to make their father proud, so following in their footsteps tends to be that way. 

But it was nice that they made that, and it was a very small It was. If you had blinked, you might have missed it. You might have missed it, yeah. But they actually got that in there. Because it was almost a human moment for him. Didn't she? Only really connected with him and flag his son when she was dealing with them. 

She didn't connect with no one else. Everyone else is basically there to be used. And even though he's there to be used, she still take the mind [00:09:00] the moment to connect with him. So right, because she apologized. Yeah, because she apologized. She was spouting off and she was like, Oh, shit, my bad flag. 

I didn't mean to, like touch on that. But they even talked about his his wife where he was saying that they got divorced because the Suicide Squad is initially what killed his son, Peacemaker, he did it, and still working for Waller. And then he goes back and worked for Waller with this new iteration and his wife couldn't understand why. 

So she Which, makes total sense if you're looking from the outside in. Especially if they're responsible for your son's death. Yeah, absolutely. And I can understand that all day long. Looking from the outside in? Yeah. Why the hell would you go and work for the woman who killed your son? Yeah. Some people also don't understand sometimes that soldiers see it as their duty and obligation to [00:10:00] They don't have a choice. 

Yeah, because In their mind, they don't have a choice. Sometimes they don't have a choice, but sometimes And it's because no one else would do it. And they have to. Sometimes you gotta step up. And Flagg's character is almost, I don't want to say the most human out of them, but he's almost that good guy. 

In the whole bunch, where he's like He is the good guy, because he tries to keep from He tries to stay out of the princess's way after she makes it know that she's got an advantage like she's yo I want you and he's trying to avoid her all possible That's fine. He's had a myriad of reasons for not but for me Him showing that he has a human side that he is trying to do the right thing is his interaction with the bride And he's like i'm not here to zap you. 

Oh, we're here to we're here to get the job done They walked away and they left in the auction and [00:11:00] Waller definitely would have pushed that button. Oh she, you saw it. You saw her push the button, like right in the first episode. But then when they got under flag and they tried to wrestle the remote from him, he was like, think about it. 

You think I have the only remote? You think you're going to go up and shit? Cause that's the whole thing. They all don't think about the long picture. Cause, what happened to old boy on the mission to the suicide squad? He got scared, he saw what the shit was going on the beach of Cento, and he fuckin jumped in the water, and she was like, Turn around. 

Turn around. Alright, click. You saw what happened. But he was genuinely trying to keep them as a team, together, and to get them through that mission. Yeah. So that right there to me defines him being a good guy. Him and his son are far from, they have, it seems like they draw upon a stain. 

Yeah. Which is not a surprise. At first I didn't think I was going to like his character. Because, ah, another Ric [00:12:00] Flag, doodly doos. But once again, I was pleasantly surprised in how they developed him. Yeah, absolutely. Yeah, absolutely. The princess. The princess. We not delving deep into that. 

We moving right along. Actually, my, my, my actually interview was before that. With Doc, with Phosphorus. Because they were fighting, and his whole reason was, I'm not trying to kill you, you dick. You guys, yes, you guys are trying to escape, but, I'm also here to try and, we're just trying to do this job so we can go back home. 

So we can go home. Yeah. Brad is up next. And I thought Bride was brutal at first when you initially see her and you see her rage and the rage that she has for Waller and the rage that she has for everything else and she's just pissed all the damn time. But then you see why. But then you see why. 

And you have to, it's like you're brought into this world with [00:13:00] no understanding of what and then you're slowly taught. Where, you're trying to find your place and you have a place. And all of a sudden your place is taken from you. Now you have to figure out what the hell to do. And that right there was just I understand why she's not with Frank. 

It was done. I understand. The dude fucking destroyed the doctor. And that was the doctor. I thought that was a little on the inside where you have the bride and the doctor doing their thing. I was gonna say that too. I thought that I didn't think they were doing it. I just thought that they had because he was teaching her and that was the good part about it but then you show them having intercourse and I was like, wait, is this something? 

Yeah, you did. Yeah, you totally missed that. We're there. We're there. We're there. I do. I know that Frank is dying. I know he was killed. He's she'll never love you like she loved me. I'm like, okay, but you obviously thought that differently. I thought that was unnecessary. The fact that he was teaching her, he was trying to [00:14:00] educate her, he was trying to provide a presence that was, secure and safe for her and to bring her up just because, just like I said, she was brought into the world. 

No understanding, no tether, no nothing. And it's gotta be horrifying. I think he was trying to do the different thing he did with Frankenstein because in Frankenstein, it was just that I'm trying to conquer death. So I'm going to create this thing. And show everybody how wrong that I can do better than God, that I can hold off death. 

And that was the origin of Frankenstein, the monster itself. And in that, the monster, he, he was destroyed. The monster was destroyed in him. But with the Bride, he was trying to correct that mistake by taking the time to teach her. Who she was, because Frankenstein, his whole thing was that he didn't know who he was. He wanted to know who he was, and if you watch any of the other movies that he did with him, he was trying to, he had to learn who he was, not with, he had to [00:15:00] find out on his own. 

If you bullet it down, he made a mistake with Frankenstein. He didn't want to create the bride, but since he did, he took the time. To learn from the mistakes that he made with Frankenstein with the monster. Correct it, yeah. And tried to correct it. And she bonded with him obviously because that's the only person that she knows. 

Yep. And at the time probably the only person that would have accepted her without, without freaking out. Exactly, but this was, essentially Her parent figure. Yeah. And that's, and that is where the Okay, now that's what I got from it. That's what I got from it. I'm like, he was, this is your daughter, the creator the teacher the father. 

And then to jump to, to love her. That threw me, yeah. It was not such a farfetched idea on her part, because that's all she knew. He should have known better and he should have not engaged in that because as soon as that happened, you knew that there was [00:16:00] going to be some kind of animosity. It almost seemed predatory to me. 

Absolutely. Yeah. And that was like if someone were to take advantage of a disabled person. Because mentally she wasn't there. She wasn't. She wasn't on his level. It She probably had the mind of, maybe a 10 year old, 12 year old at that point, still learning, so yeah, absolutely, predatory. 

And it's on the one hand, you have this crazy scientist that made you and groomed you. And then, on the other hand, you got this, murderous, reanimated cadaver. Who's been harassing you for centuries, chasing you. One of the best parts is them whooping each other through the years. That is the best. 

And I don't know, I don't know who did the musical score for it, but that song while she there, just the costume change each other. One of [00:17:00] my favorite parts of the entire series He knows music to scenes he can match music to a scene anytime. That's why it's the music the To the guardians of the galaxy is so great. 

Why even in the suicide squad? That the soundtrack was just it fit so well with everything every scene that he did the music just fit So yeah, but her and him fighting for the ages those costumes and stuff That was one of my favorite parts and that's really one of the reasons why I think that she may be my favorite character. 

Okay. Out of the show so far. Oh yeah? Yeah. Okay. I like her attitude. I like the reason why she does what she does. Because she does have a background where she is hurt. Yeah. She's bitter about it, but she's still getting the job done. Yeah, he took that away from her. He won't give her the time to heal. 

And then she just wants to be left alone. Ain't that easy. He's now the predator because he believes and he's because he's there with that old male that old world male Chauvinistic view of [00:18:00] you're supposed to be mine. You were made for me. That's It's not really the attitude it's just the fact that he conjoled Frankenstein. 

Yeah, frankenstein to make her specifically for him. Yeah But then didn't come didn't think that the other side of that corner Was maybe she didn't want you . He never really realized that she may have wants the needs of her own because he didn't take that side of what he wanted. 

That maybe she would've want something else in turn. And he never took that. He never took it into consider. And that's really what flaws his character towards her. Yeah. You talking about, because he doesn't see her as an individual, he sees her as his property. His property, yeah. And it's almost Frankenstein. 

It's like he's childlike in a lot of ways, he's very childlike because in a way that he lashed out at the scientists after he created in a way that in a later episode [00:19:00] where I don't know if you've seen this one, but. After he set on fire and the gypsy woman finds him and she's nursing him back to hell. 

And she asks them she asks him simple questions. She's like, why can't you see she doesn't love you? And his response like, no. . That's not it. He didn't want, he didn't want to see. And that really left a bad taste of my mouth. What he did to the old woman. Yeah, of course. But if you think about it, even if I wanted to like the character Yeah. 

Even if I had an inkling of trying to support it, yeah. He's misunderstood this da. But after seeing his treatment of the woman that basically cared for him . And I wouldn't say brought him back to life, he was in a state that he was not. and she nursed him back. And this is a blind woman. 

Yeah. And, but his, I was speaking on his his childlike mentality. It's, it never fa, it never fade him that it never fades him. And he can't see, he already said, I would never leave you alone. I [00:20:00] can't take you with me. I'll never leave you alone. So what other alternatives do I have? He has no other because he can't get past that selfish phase of his, where he has to possess her. 

No. The Frankenstein character, I hate him so much, but the part that got me, the shit that tripped me out was when him and Flag teamed up and they were standing outside of the college and he's this monstrous figure, this cadaver put together, and all the kids are staring at him and they're spying on the professor and they turn around and see everybody staring at him and then he just goes I think I just, I left, lost my contact back here. 

This whole thing. 

They must be 

Oh, that part [00:21:00] got me. Maybe the only redeeming moment he's had so far in the entire series. Laughed my ass off. But dude, it's brutal. It's insane trying to. Get into his thought process. There was a scene on the helicopter where he they showed him, they found a bride for him. He's been chasing a bride, looking for her all this time. 

They found the bride for him, and he's sitting there, and of course, he has that jealousy, that, that child way of thinking, saying, why does she look at him like that? . Yeah. That's why I led him to attack flag and he it's probably 'cause of his stupid beard. . I can't grow facial, I can't grow facial hair. 

Then he snaps on everybody else. and he throws a tantrum. Yeah. He's a pet child. Yeah, he's a child. He doesn't know how to deal with his emotions. He wasn't taught how to do. But in [00:22:00] comics Bride and Frankenstein were both agents of shade. 

That's what it was, agents of shade. Agents of shade, and they worked together. They worked for bones. They, it wasn't as tragic. The tragedy came in, they were trying to have a child. And using the science from shade, they had a child, but it was monstrous and it lashed out. And Frankenstein killed the child. 

And then that's when bride was like, I had to, I have to step away from you. Oh, shit. Okay. Yeah I remember that they had worked together in a government and now you say that shade run by bones. Yeah. Okay. But they ended up coming back together, finding out, out shade kept their child alive. Oh. And he was much more likable in the comics. 

Frankenstein was Frankenstein. Yes. Frankenstein Much more likable in the comic than he was Yes. In this. Very much and he, they came, they started introducing him slowly soldiers, seven soldiers or . Seven soldiers. A victory. Yeah. They [00:23:00] started introducing him piece by piece and that, and then he jumped into agents of shade from there. 

But the, they. Teamed up, they reversed the roles, found out the child was still alive, and But he was being used by Shade. He was under their control, and he begged them to put an end to his life. And Frankenstein was like, I can't do this again, and the bride had to step up. A little bit of tragedy on that part. 

Yeah, he was begging for them to put an end to his life. 

With that, we're going to decrease the thermal liquid of this episode and we'll see you back here next week. We will catch you next time. So remember, live your best geek life. Play games, read comics, watch anime, geek responsibly. Peace.[00:24:00]