Deathstroke Reportedly To Be Batman Solo Movie Villain

With Ben Affleck breaking the Internet this morning with his Deathstroke video, it’s now being reported that Slade Wilson will be the main villain in Affleck’s solo Batman film. That gives us a little more reason for Affleck to be the one debuting the first look at the villain. While we don’t know who will be playing the iconic super-assassin, we do have some suggestions and suspicions.

Deathstroke the Terminator aka Slade Wilson was created in 1980 by Marv Wolfman and George Perez as a villain not for Batman or the Justice League, but for the Teen Titans. Deathstroke was the perfect villain for the teenaged heroes – an aging assassin, his gruff and older exterior directly contradicted the young characters and their fresh-faced view on the world.

Eventually, though, he became a villain for virtually every hero in the DC Universe. In the pages of Identity Crisis #3, a 2004 event series by Brad Meltzer and Rags Morales, Deathstroke systematically took down the entire (at the time) Justice League. Setting off explosions as a distraction, he stabbed The Flash to take him out of commission (or rather, manipulated The Flash into running right into his sword). A swift punch to Zatanna’s liver made her vomit – and unable to use her backwords-speaking magic. De-winging Hawkman with a single swing, his next swing took off the feathers from all of Green Arrow’s arrows. He takes down Black Canary (in the comics, one of the top 5 fighters in the world) with a swift flipping movement, manipulates Atom into taking out himself (and a reviving Hawkman), and crushes Green Lantern’s hand – and will.

As a Batman villain, he’s fought him on and off for the last couple of decades. Most notably, Deathstroke and Batman clashed in two of the Batman: Arkham videogames, bringing the character back to the forefront. In the animated film Son of Batman, Deathstroke was the primary villain, though he started the film as one of Damian Wayne (the aforementioned son)’s trainers, teaching him the way of the League of Assassins. If they take that route for Deathstroke in the movie universe, it could be an opening to characters like Ra’s al Ghul and even Damian himself. The possibilities with comic book films are endless, able to pull from decades of stories in multiple mediums.

The Batman standalone film was first mentioned when DC Entertainment and Warner Bros. announced a massive slate of movies based on DC Comics characters and properties. Since then, it’s been revealed that Ben Affleck will star in the film, direct the film, and has been co-writing the film alongside Geoff Johns, CCO and President of DC Entertainment and co-head of DC Films. Now, it seems, he may have found his villain.

(via)