Hot off of a two-episode premiere on Max last week, Creature Commandos Episode 3 hit the masses this week, picking up directly from where we left off with The Bride and Nina in peril, looking worse for wear following their first confrontation with the amazonian sorceress Circe.
The last episode of Creature Commandos also gave us a look into both The Bride and Frankenstein’s past in their home country of Pokolistan, and just what that relationship has looked like over the past hundred or so years. This week however we deal with the fallout of The Brides fight with Circe and look back to the second world war, where GI Robot thirst for Nazi blood first formed.
LIVE FROM POKOLISTAN
Right where we left off, Flag and the rest of Task Force M reach the location of Nina and The Brides tracker, they aren’t moving so Flag figures they’re being held hostage. Flag and the gang enter the house ready for a fight only to be met with The Bride, tied to a chair and tape over her mouth. They initially think its a trap, as they should, as the Bride continues to scream through the tape until Flag pulls it off, with the Bride revealing that Circe and The Sons are gone.
GI asks where Friend Nina is, concerned for his his bestie who promised to kill Nazis with him. GI finds her upstairs in a bathtub, with barbed wire draped over it to keep her contained. He expresses that while he is happy to have found her alive, he is quite said that there are no Nazis for him to dispatch of.
Nina expresses that while she is delighted to have been saved, she cannot leave the tub as she cannot breath out of the water, GI determines the easiest way to fix this would be to take the tub with them, so that is what he does.
The rest of the Creature Commandos team downstairs is confused as to why Circe and the sons would just leave them behind, before Flag quickly realizes it was all a distraction, urging everyone to get back in the car because it doesn’t take a genius to figure out where Circe is heading next.
We return to the castle to find it devolved in chaos, the sons have infiltrated and the princess is found running for her life. Ilana is captured but quickly scratches the face of her assailant, yet again running for her life. Jumping outside, the commandos are back and jump right into action. Flag and Bride are shooting, Weasel is chompin’, and Phosphorous is shishkabobbing (make your own mental picture of that).
In the heat of the battle, GI Robot begins to notice his team is pinned down, asking Flag if the people pinning them down are Nazis, to which has the bright idea to tell him that yes, yes these are Nazis so god ahead and do your thing tin man. GI takes flight and does what he has been dying to do since they landed in Pokolistan, kill Nazis.
Mirroring his time with Easy Company, Flag tells the team to hit the deck as GI begins to rain bullets like a tornado of patriotism. Just as GI was really getting going, his days of dispatching fascist scum is cut short due to Circe blowing him to pieces. The team is shocked, especially Nina but Circe wastes no time and heads directly for Princess Ilana, pleading for her life and offering anything, but Circe only wants one thing, her dead.
Ilana is saved by none other than the Weasel, who scurries into the room and tears into Circe with the ferocity of a…Weasel? jury is still out on their ferocity but this was violent. With Circe down for the count, Dr. Phosphorous takes the chance to burn Circes face, and the only thing louder than the sizzling flesh is her screams of pain. Flag looks in horror as The Bride can only express that “You wanted monsters, you got monsters”. Nina, in tears, finds what remains of GI, his head, where can only express the joy he felt to fight nazis alongside her, letting out one last “Cheers for the Tin Man!”.
Circe leaves us with only the littlest of teases for next week, warning us, as Weasel licks himself clean, that the Creature Commandos have “DOOMED US ALL”.
THE TIN MAN’S PAST, PRE CREATURE COMMANDOS
Beginning in Creature Commandos‘ second episode, the show begins to jump back and forth between the past and the present, detailing The Bride and Frankenstein’s origins. This episode takes us back to World War II, when the allied forces had reached Europe and were pushing back against the Nazis.
We’re brought to a forest where GI Robot is traveling with a platoon of soldiers who are revealed to be the legendary Easy Company, led by Sgt. Rock. Traveling through the woods Rock quickly stops the troops, believing there to be Nazi’s nearby. Radioing Sure Shot, another member of the company, Shot informs Rock that they are surrounded and needed to fall back immediately.
Pinned down by Nazi forces, GI Robot knows it is his time to shine and quickly informs Sgt Rock that he and the others needed to get down. GI Robot begins spinning around and around, dropping bullets almost as fast as he’s dropping nazis, his passion in life. We do not get to see a ton of Easy Company but some of the noticeable members are Sgt Rock, Little Sure Shot, Four Eyes, Bulldozer, Wildman, Bogman and Canary.
The next time we flash back to GI’s past, we’re taken to a talk show where GI is brought center stage, praised as a hero of the war, killing over a thousand enemies during his time served. GI scans the audience, looking for you know whats, concerned and asking if the host was sure that there were no nazi’s in the audience, threatening any who try to hide among them, shocking the audience.
Focus shifts to two figures in the crowd, an army general and a scholarly dressed man smoking a pipe, expressing his knowledge on “AI Systems”, what he prefers to call robots. The scholar talks about his fascination with footage he’s seen of GI in action but is amazed by how self-aware GI is, calling him the “first of his type”. The general informs the stranger that GI is being retired from the stage and offers him up to the man to study for his own projects.
The man is revealed to be Dr.William Magnus. If that name does not ring any bells for you, Magnus is solely responsible for the creation of the superhero team of androids, the Metal Men, who first debuted back in Showcase #37 released in March of 1962.
Magnus informs GI that he is studying him but all GI can ask about is if there are any Nazis nearby. Magnus tells GI that he is too preoccupied with Nazis and asks him if he wants to kill Nazis with GI expressing that what he wants is “irrelevant”, and that he must follow his directive. Magnus asks what GI would want if he had no directive, GI can only say that he would want to be reunited with his boys from Easy Company.
Magnus takes us to his chalkboard where we get our first hint at the Metal Men of the DCU. With a brief blueprint and only their insignia to tease Lead, Mercury, Platinum, Gold, Iron, and Tin.
A large time jump lands us in a military antique shop, GI has been reduced to an expensive wall ornament and is purchased by a portly military buff named Sam Fitzgibbons. For those that don’t know, there is always a character named Fitzgibbons in a James Gunn project. The characters are named after Gunn’s childhood best friend. This Fitzgibbon is voiced by Michael Rooker, another constant of James Gunn projects. Sam takes him home to meet his cats and get him fueled back up, needing someone to watch The Dirty Dozen with.
Sam gets GI dressed, telling him they’re heading into town to meet up with some friends. As they get there, friends of Sam’s begin asking who he brought with him, introducing GI and telling his friends that he thought he’d be a help with “The cause”. GI grows a bit cautious, he notices little red flags around the room but continues throughout the room. Taking their seats, GI, Sam, and everyone else in the room are welcomed to the meeting of the Hub City National Socialists club, with curtains pulled back to reveal a giant Nazi flag, to which GI can only express “oh boy”. Coming back to the nazi thing in a bit, Hub City, a location from DC Comics that is home to Vic Sage, better known as the blank-faced vigilante, The Question.
As you can presume GI wastes not a second to waste some Nazi scum and kicks festivities off with his new pal Sam. GI annihilates the entire room, as the scene jumps back and forth from the past to the present as GI mows down Nazis and more Nazis (the Sons of Themyscira).
GI is arrested and charged with murdering all those Nazis in cold blood. When he is taken to prison we are walked past four jail cells, each containing a different obscure DC villains like Shaggy Man, Fisherman, Animal-Vegetable-Mineral Man and Crimson Centipede. GI is left to collect dust and cobwebs for an undisclosed amount of time, before he is presumably taken into custody by Amanda Waller and Argus.
Next week’s episode will already send us over the halfway mark for Season 1 of Creature Commandos and our appetizer for whats to come from James Gunn and the DCU. There is still so much to learn about this new world and the mission our terrifying monster friends are on…and don’t forget, Cheers to the Tin Man!
The first three episodes of Creature Commandos are streaming now on Max! Check out the trailer below!
