Today’s surprise revelation that Deathstroke will appear in the DC Extended Universe — perhaps as early as next year’s Justice League — has got fans scrambling to make sense of the short, on-set video released by Batman actor Ben Affleck.
Videos by ComicBook.com
And one of the things that happens whenever a new superhero or -villain is introduced, is a long, hard look at their on-screen costume.
This time around, there’s a bit less of that going on, since Deathstroke is a total surprise announcement, and people are more trying to figure out his role in the movies…and also because, like so much of DC’s burgeoning universe, it seems to draw a lot of its inspiration from a single source.
What did we take away from the Deathstroke costume we saw today? Read on…!
HE’S GOT THE BLUES
While big pieces of the costume look black, you can see blue light reflecting off pieces of his armor at the shoulder in the image above.
That’s worth noting primarily because in the comics he’s traditionally been depicted as having navy blue as his base coat, although sometimes it will be black depending on the artist or the revamp du jour.
BATMAN: ARKHAM INSPIRATIONS
The first and most obvious thing is that it seems to be very inspired by the Batman: Arkham games.
Eschewing Deathstroke’s traditional chain mail look for something more in line with plate armor, the Arkham series was also a point of demarcation for his mask, which moved to being depicted commonly as a helmet, providing him extra protection, as opposed to a headsock-style mask which primarily just protected Slade Wilson’s identity.
The result was a look that evoked a Stormtrooper-like faceless, almost mechanical menace. While that was at odds with how he’d typically been portrayed it did gel nicely with the idea of a soulless killer who does what he has to for money.
The “robo-Slade” look became a standard in the comics with The New 52, and came to live action (albeit in a less dramatically-armored and somewhat more utilitarian fashion) in Arrow.
THE SWORD
The fact that Deathstroke still carries a sword, though, might indicate that, yes, they’re interested in giving him a little bit more of an assassin flavor.
Yeah, it’s a traditional part of his look and he’s had it in the Arkham games as well as on Arrow — but these movies have, so far, been very analytical about what they do and don’t include. It’s hard to imagine a world that puts SO MUCH THOUGHT into what Superman’s presence would mean for world geopolitics being followed up by one where a dude has a purely ornamental sword.
BATTLE DAMAGE
There’s battle damage on Slade’s headpiece. And while that in and of itself might not be a big deal, it tells us something: it says that this is, again, indicative of the same kind of used universe that gave us a middle-aged, scarred Batman with slashes all over his emblem, and a prison full of supervillains ready to be picked for the Suicide Squad.
It’s also interesting to note that the two long, deep gouges in the mask seem to be about the right width apart to come from the spiked vambraces on Batman’s gloves.
Since Deathstroke is already on board the Justice League’s vehicle here, could it be that he’s already got a defeat at Batman’s hands to avenge?
VARIANT COVERAGE?
Not everyone loves a bulked-up, SWAT Team-looking Deathstroke.
For years, he was a fairly slim character, and while he did have his fair share of pouches, bandoliers, and bullet chains, he never looked like he couldn’t move.
That strut in the Affleck video? It looks cool on film but in reality that’s probably how he has to move in order to pick up his feet with all that armor on every inch of him.
“We’ve slimmed him down, we’ve taken away most of the hardware. He will still wear the bandolier and all the guns and stuff when he needs to. I thought it was dumb for him to be wearing this big, clanking bandolier when he’s not even carrying a machine gun. So you will see that, but only when it actually makes sense for him to dress like that,” Christopher Priest, the man writing DC’s newly-relaunched Deathstroke series, told me during a recent conversationt. “He’s an assassin, so I wanted him to look like an assassin. Assassins are quiet, dude! They sneak up on you. They step out of the shadows, slit your throat and then vanish. That’s what an assassin does. And over the years, he’d become so broad, where he’s fighting whole armies and Darkseid and he’s got a flaming sword fighting demons, and I just went, “Guys, with all due respect, I don’t want to write that.” I want to write something that’s a more human character that’s closer to something that Denny O’Neil would write.”
He’s got a point, and while it’s not necessarily a philosophy the filmmakers or anybody else has to share, certainly the fact that Batman will have multiple costumes in the forthcoming Justice League movie opens up a world where the more practical costumes (as opposed to the god- or alien-given ones) might be more adaptable in the DC Extended Universe than they’ve ever been on film before.
