In Review: Doom Patrol – Pilot

Synopsis: The reluctant heroes of the Doom Patrol – Robotman, Negative Man, Elasti-Woman and Crazy Jane face the threat of Mr. Nobody, who’s after The Chief.

Review: Friday saw the launch of ‘Doom Patrol’ on DC Comics Streaming service and the show got off to a very interesting start.

The Story

The story opens in Nazi Germany and sees Eric Morden going to see a scientist in order to have himself altered. It is here where we see the creation of Mr. Nobody. Morden then jumps us ahead to the 1980s as he gradually takes us through the origin stories for Cliff Steele aka The Robot Man, Larry Trainer aka Negative Man, and Rita Farr aka Elasti-Woman.

We learn that Chief found all of these people and tried to fix them or at least make their lives more comfortable. We also meet Crazy Jane who has many different personalities each with its own power. I have to confess to liking Hammer Head the best because it’s pretty close to what I can be like when being told to do something, which I really don’t want too.

This opening story spends a decent amount of time with each character and begins to show us the dynamics between the various outcasts.

The Acting

The acting throughout this opening episode is all very strong. Alan Tudyk does an excellent job of narrating each of the origin stories but is also quite scary as Mr. Nobody, who is only really glimpsed in this opening episode.

The chemistry between Brendan Fraser and Diane Guerrero is really good and the two get to play a really nice scene where Crazy Jane takes Robot Man to a toy store in order to buy his daughter, who he believes  to be dead a present, which is something he just wants to do in order to feel human again.

Overall

This pilot is a pretty strong beginning for Doom Patrol and the relationships between the characters have gotten off to a really strong start.

I’m really looking forward to seeing how this series progresses in the weeks to come. Especially given that I felt the ‘Doom Patrol’ episode of ‘Titans’, which gave us a first look at some team members was the strongest episode of that series.