‘Doom Patrol’ Star Alan Tudyk Talks Working With Adam West on ‘Powerless’

During an interview at TCA last week, Doom Patrol villain Alan Tudyk talked about working with DC Comics legend Adam West during their time together on the short-lived NBC sitcom Powerless.

In Powerless, Tudyk played the cousin of Bruce Wayne, who was put in charge of an R&D department that focused on finding technological solutions to the problems presented by living in a world with superheroes and supervillains. One of West’s final screen appearances was in an episode of Powerless, which was released by DC after the actor’s death (Powerless had been cancelled before the episode ever aired).

“He was very generous. He was very nice to me. And he was very cool parodying himself!” Tudyk told KSite TV. “He would do that narrator. He had all of those big words like the old Batman [TV show]. But then, like, it would be revealed that he’s talking to a plant. Why is he talking to that plant? But he was very nice. It was weird that he passed away so soon after that, because he was there all day. I’m not saying that Powerless killed him, but I think it’s a possibility.”

On Doom Patrol, the show has its own crazy narrator: Tudyk, whose character breaks the fourth wall, cracks jokes, and makes fun of the heroes who are the main characters of the series. The team squares off with Tudyk’s Eric Morden / Mr. Nobody, who is actually a living shadow, with the power to “drain the sanity of others,” this season.

In DC Comics, Mr. Nobody’s classic depiction is that of a shadowy entity that looks like an M.C. Escher painting come to life. It’s hard to assess the TV version from just this brief shot, but clearly Alan Tudy’s face has been implemented into the design more so than his comic book counterpart, and in this particular scene there’s some kind of bright lighting effect that almost gives Mr. Nobody a “jumbled puzzle pieces” aesthetic, but is probably there to help viewers identify and follow the characters movements onscreen.

Doom Patrol releases new episodes on the DC Universe app on Friday mornings.