Deathstroke the Terminator
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Deathstroke the Terminator (Slade Wilson), also called simply Deathstroke (and originally simply the Terminator) is a character, a supervillain and sometime anti-hero in the DC Comics Universe. He is a mercenary and assassin who first appeared in The New Teen Titans (1st series) #2 (1980). Wizard Magazine rated him the 84th greatest villain of all time.Wizard #177
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Publication history
Deathstroke received his own series, Deathstroke the Terminator, in 1991; It was retitled to Deathstroke the Hunted for issues #0 and #41-45 and then simply "Deathstroke" from 46 through 60. The series was cancelled with issue 60 shortly after the conclusion of Zero Hour. In total Deathstroke ran for 65 issues (#1-60, plus 4 annuals and a special #0 issue).
Even though the character of Deathstroke the Terminator pre-dates Arnold Schwarzenegger film The Terminator by four years, the Slade Wilson character is now simply called "Deathstroke", even by characters who had called him "Terminator" for years. The full title has not completely fallen out of use, having been referenced as recently as Justice League Elite.
character biography
Origins
Imbued with enhanced physical prowess by secret army experiments attempting to create metahuman soldiers for the U.S. military, Deathstroke the Terminator (called "Terminator" for most of his published existence) became a mercenary soon after the experiment when he defied orders to rescue his friend and mentor Wintergreen, who had been sent on a suicide mission by a commanding officer with a grudge. However, he kept this career secret from his family, even though his wife was an expert military combat instructor- indeed, she had been responsible for a significant portion of his early training-, until a criminal named the Jackal kidnapped his younger son, Joseph, as a hostage to force Slade to divulge the name of a client who had hired him as an assassin. Slade refused to do so, claiming that it was against his personal honor code, and attacked and killed the kidnappers at the rendezvous. Unfortunately, Joseph's throat was slashed by one of the criminals before Slade could prevent it, destroying his vocal cords and rendering him mute.
After taking Joseph to the hospital, Slade's wife Adeline, enraged at his endangerment of her son, tried to kill Slade by shooting him, but only managed to destroy his right eye. Afterward, his confidence in his physical abilities was such that he made no secret of his impaired vision, marked by his mask which has a black featureless half covering his lost eye. Without his mask, Slade wears an eyepatch.
The Teen Titans
Slade has a long history as an enemy of the Teen Titans, beginning when his other son, Grant, became an early Titans foe called the Ravager who was physically enhanced to fulfill a contract to kill or capture the Teen Titans. However, those enhancements proved fatal and Slade agreed to complete the contract. As a result, he attacked the Titans continually and finally succeeded in capturing them by introducing Terra (whom he shared an intimate relationship with, despite her being barely sixteen years old) into the team as a spy.
At the end of this plot, Slade was defeated and captured with the help of Joseph, who joined the team as Jericho, using his father's body to free the Titans (Although it is important to note that Slade didn't actually try to fight his son's control. Slade was put on trial for his crimes, but the trial was deliberately sabotaged by Garfield Logan, aka Beast Boy so that he could kill Slade himself, believing he was responsible for Terra's betrayal of the Titans. However, when the two confronted each other, Beast Boy found himself unable to kill Slade. Feeling some empathy for his grief, Slade explained his past with Terra, and Beast Boy realized he was not to blame for the choices Terra had made. The two men parted on peaceful terms afterward.
Months later, Slade encountered the Titans again while they were investigating a mysterious plague linked to a group of biologically engineered beastmen, one of whom was a target of an assassination by Slade himself. When Troia and Raven were both stricken by the plague, he aided them in destroying the beastmen and finding a cure for the contagion. Shortly after this, he came to the Titan's assistance again during the Titans Hunt storyline when most of their members were abducted by the Wildebeest Society, and proved instrumental in tracking them down, only to discover their leader was none other than Jericho himself.
It was revealed that Jericho had been possessed by the corrupted souls of Azarath, who were using him to capture the Titans and use them as physical hosts in order to survive. During the transfer process, Jericho's true self resurfaced briefly, begging his father to kill him. To spare his son any more pain and save the remaining Titans, Slade was forced to drive a sword through Jericho's heart, seemingly killing him. This act still haunts him to this day, though Jericho later turned out to have survived death by transferring his mind into his father's body seconds before his death.
Afterward, Slade continued his life as a mercenary, but also acted as an occasional hero, aiding the Titans or acting on his own to help others, most notably during the Total Chaos storyline when the Team Titans arrived in the 20th Century to assassinate Donna Troy before she could give birth to her son, who in their timeline had grown up into the tyrannical despot, Lord Chaos. His relationship with Garfield Logan had also changed around this time to the point where they became friends as well. Slade also met Pat Trayce, a tough former-cop who would become the new costumed Vigilante. Pat Trayce and Slade quickly became lovers, and began a tumultuous on again/off again relationship.
Family business
After Slade thwarted an assassination attempt on the President of the United States, he was subsequently framed for the murder of a U.S. Senator. The man responsible had taken on the identity of the Ravager and was hunting down Slade's friends and loved ones. Eventually with the help of the Titans and Sarge Steel, Slade was able to prove his innocence, and the true culprit was revealed to be Steve Dayton, under the alias of the Crimelord, who had again succumbed to mental instability caused by his Mento helmet.
Meanwhile, his relationship with his estranged wife Adeline took a tragic turn as Slade underwent a process to gain regeneration power, allowing him to survive any wound so long as his brain is intact (this power is limited, as Slade can not regenerate his lost eye since that injury happened before he gained his healing factor) . After gaining the power, Slade was forced to give his wife a blood transfusion, resulting in her gaining a similar healing factor which manifested itself as a form of immortality. This drove Adeline insane, shaming Deathstroke into going into a semi-retirement state.
In Titans #12, Deathstroke teamed up with the Titans to face his wife Adeline, who in her insane state, had revived The H.I.V.E. and sought to rid the world of all superhumans, blaming them for Jericho's death. During the battle, interrupted by Vandal Savage and a band of villains that he had organized from recent Titan battles, Adeline's throat was slit and begged Slade to kill her, since her version of her healing factor wouldn't heal the wound but allow her to live in spite of it. Deathstroke refused, but Koriand'r, aka Starfire of the Teen Titans shocked her teammates and Deathstroke by using her starbolt blast to disintegrating her completely, per Adeline's wishes. This was a turning point, as Deathstroke renounced all ties with the Titans as a result of this act of mercy on Starfire's part.
Recently, it was revealed that Jericho managed to transfer his consciousness into Deathstroke in the instant before his death. Taking control of his father, Jericho forced Deathstroke to murder his longtime butler, mentor, and companion Wintergreen. He then launched a series of attacks against the current Teen Titans, most notably shattering Impulse's knee with a shotgun blast, before leaving his father's body. Deathstroke has since manipulated his one remaining child, Rose Wilson, into the mercenary business as the new Ravager, in order to find and kill Jericho, using a specially-designed serum to heighten her hostility and push her over the edge; unfortunately, the process also resulted in her being driven at least partially insane, to the extent that she cut out her own left eye in an attempt to prove to her father that she was just like him.
In Identity Crisis, Deathstroke was enlisted as a bodyguard for Doctor Light, who was being chased by the Justice League. In the ensuing battle, Deathstroke nearly beat the team of Elongated Man, the Flash (Wally West), Zatanna, Hawkman, Green Arrow, Black Canary, the Atom, and Green Lantern (Kyle Rayner). He systematically took out every member except for Rayner, whom he had the potential to disable through trying to usurp his ring's energies using his own formidable willpower. Fortunately, before the outcome of this conflict with Rayner ended, Green Arrow stuck an arrow in Deathstroke's right eye socket, enraging him. Slade went ballistic and began to beat Green Arrow, but was stopped when the majority of the team tackled Deathstroke to the ground. Dr. Light used his powers, and the two escaped. Near the end of Identity Crisis, Deathstroke confronts Green Arrow on a rooftop. Arrow sees his reflection in the windows of a nearby building, but when he turns to confront Slade, Deathstroke is gone. Instead Green Arrow finds Slade's cowl and a note stuck to the wall by the very arrow he stabbed in Slade's eye socket. The note reads, "This is yours - We're not done."
Infinite Crisis
Deathstroke was a founding member of Lex Luthor's Secret Society of Super Villains in the Infinite Crisis storyline. He was seen in Infinite Crisis #1, hiding in a warehouse south of Metropolis waiting to ambush the Freedom Fighters with several other members. The battle didn't last long, and by the end, Deathstroke had impaled Phantom Lady through the chest, calling his action "just business".
He was the employer of an undercover Dick Grayson, whom he hired to train his daughter Rose. However, after the two had a confrontation with Superman, Deathstroke discovered that Nightwing had been teaching Rose the values of heroism. He could not kill Grayson in front of his daughter because doing so would undo all of Slade's teachings. Nightwing offered a deal: he would stay away from Rose if Slade would keep the metahuman villains out of Blüdhaven. The deal held for 34 hours until Infinite Crisis #4, when Slade, under the orders of Alexander Luthor Junior, the real leader of the Society, went with several villains- who included old Titans Doom Patrol foes and Brotherhood of Evil members Monsieur Mallah and Brain- to drop Chemo, another fellow villain who appeared to be a nearly brainless monster made of pure energy and radioactive chemicals, on Blüdhaven, killing thousands. Slade gave the explanation to the Brotherhood that Nightwing should be made to believe that he can never go home again.
Grayson took the first of his revenge by bursting in on Deathstroke and Rose's training session, revealing to the latter that the Kryptonite that Deathstroke had implanted in place of her missing eye was radioactive and deadly to humans as well as to Kryptonians (though slower in its effects on humans, as revealed by Lex Luthor's old possession of a Kryptonite ring that forced him to transfer his brain to a cloned body). Angered, Slade went after Nightwing with a grenade, only to have Rose try to stop him. Amid the smoke of the resulting explosion, Rose fled, telling her father that she hated him. Dick disappeared as well, but not before leaving a note for Slade warning him that he'd be back to make him pay for Blüdhaven.
At the climactic Battle of Metropolis at the conclusion of Infinite Crisis, Slade was confronted by Batman, Robin and Nightwing. During the struggle he was questioned regarding his motives for aiding the Secret Society. His claims of monetary motivation were deemed unsatisfactory, and he was told to take responsibility before being rendered unconscious.
One Year Later
Slade appears in the Green Arrow series after the one year jump in DC Comics's storylines. Apparently in hiding, he nearly murders a crony of several Star City businessmen who want to hire him for a murder. Before finishing his violent refusal, he asks the name of the target; when informed that it was to be the mayor of Star City, Oliver Queen (whom Deathstroke knows is secretly Green Arrow), he spares the lackey and decides to take the job.
However, things don't quite go according to plan, with Green Arrow using the resources of both his identities, then trapping him within a ring of armed National Guardsmen. The fight ends with Deathstroke's arrest and subsequent conviction and incarceration; however, this is revealed as a ploy to gain access to another jailed foe of Green Arrow's who has information on the hero's activities in the "lost year", which include Green Arrow studying under an assassin who once trained Deathstroke himself.
Deathstroke is also active behind the scenes in Teen Titans, currently in the process of organizing a counter-team of teen superhumans that will be known as Titans East. The current Titans team included Ravager, who now wanted nothing to do with her father. Deathstroke seemingly intended to "reclaim" Ravager and a recently resurrected Jericho from the Titans or, if that failed, to crush them along with the rest of the team. For these reasons, he specially selected each member of Titans East, believing that, overall, each member would successfully counteract every member of the current Teen Titans line-up.
As indicated over the course of the subsequent issues, Deathstroke was manipulating every member of his new team in one way or another. He had blackmailed former Titan Risk while at the same time offering him an outlet for his rage, was drugging Cassandra Cain with the same serum he'd used on Rose, and supplied Inertia with a formula which granted superhuman speed to compensate for the loss of the Speed Force following the initial battle with Superboy-Prime. His team, however, slowly fell apart over the course of the attack, as Robin managed to free Batgirl of his mind control serum and Raven convinced Duela Dent to switch sides. Slade and his remaining Titans subsequently faced off against both the current Titans and a group of old Titans led by Nightwing. Although he was defeated, he still manages to escape with the aid of Inertia. In the end, however, it was revealed to the readers that Slade's real mission to was provide his children with something he could never offer them - a real family, in the form of the Teen Titans. By attacking the Titans, he insured that Rose and Jericho would become more trusted by their associates, and thus grow closer to the team.
Shown in Justice League of America #12, Deathstroke has been blackmailing Brion Markov, the half-brother of the original Terra, and ruler of Markovia, by way of claiming to have disrupted his powers. Using this leverage, Deathstroke hopes to gain information regarding the Justice League's current roster.
Deathstroke appeared in Justice League of America (vol. 2) #13 as a member of the latest Injustice League.
Powers and abilities
Deathstroke possesses various enhanced abilities. These include the strength of ten men, heightened speed, agility, stamina and reflexes. He has the capacity to use up to 90% of his brain making him a combat skills and tactical genius (written at a time when it was conjectured that humans only used 10% of their capacity), making him adept at turning opponents' own abilities against them, stemming from his years in the military and combat with various heroes. Deathstroke also possesses a regenerative factor in his blood that enables him to heal from physical injury much faster than a normal person. This has also made him effectively immortal, enabling him to recover from what would otherwise be fatal injuries, though recovering from what would be a fatal injury renders him insane and animalistic for a short period.
He is also a highly formidable opponent in physical combat to the point that even Batman can only fight him into a stalemate. Green Arrow #66 claims that an assassin known as Natas taught Deathstroke "almost everything he knows". There has been argument over how good of a martial artist Deathstroke is. While he has defeated multiple opponents in hand-to-hand combat and has even been acknowledged by Cassandra Cain as "toying with me, he is holding back", he is not considered one of the DCU's greatest martial artists despite his impressive record, due to his enhanced capabilities and artificial enhancements providing him with an unfair advantage. Deathstroke is also skilled in the use of many weapons ranging from guns, rifles and swords, which are usually among his current weapons of choice. His signature weapon is a power staff that fires lethal and non-lethal energy blasts from both ends. The staff can also be used to strike using energy at each end. His bodyarmor is composed of a mesh-woven, kevlar, chainlink mail, capable of stopping small arms fire. Most of the metal he wears and uses are made out of Promethium.
Alternate Versions
- In the intercompany crossover The Uncanny X-Men and The New Teen Titans, Deathstroke meets his equal in the form of Wolverine, who fought each other to a near standstill. At the same time, however, he proved skilled enough to defeat Colossus in a one-on-one fight despite the latter's superior physical strength.
- The Marvel Comics character Deadpool is similar to Deathstroke. Deadpool commonly uses the name "Wade Wilson", similar to "Slade Wilson". In Superman/Batman Annual #1 written by former Deadpool author Joe Kelly, Deathstroke from the anti-matter universe appears and has similar characteristics related to Deadpool (such as Deadpool's "merc with a mouth" wisecracks, a black spot on his mask over his eye somewhat resembling Deadpool's, and some measure of a healing factor). This character tries to introduce his name multiple times but is always interrupted. The most he was able to get out was "Dea-". It could be implied Deadpool is the Marvel counterpart of Deathstroke, who was created 11 years earlier. Marvel seemingly acknowledged this in the Cable/Deadpool series, where Deadpool sometimes answers a letters column. Deadpool claimed that he didn't want to be in a Marvel/DC crossover, because people might mistake him for a certain DC character.
In other media
Lois & Clark
In the fourth season of Lois & Clark: The New Adventures of Superman, an assassin by the name of Deathstroke appeared in "Bob and Carol and Lois and Clark." The only commonality is the fact that he is an international assassin known as Deathstroke. In Lois and Clark, Deathstroke is a former scientist. An accident in the lab exposed him to magnetic particles, permanently altering his body and granting him magnetic powers. His assistant, who afterwards becomes his wife, helps by creating a special suit to contain his powers and keep metal from being drawn to him while out in public. The suit even has a symbol of its own: resembling the force lines of a magnetic field, forming a stylized figure eight. After this, he becomes an assassin, murdering his targets with his powers, first by drawing the target to him, then by magnetizing the iron in their blood cells, causing a figure-eight mark on the chest as the person dies of a heart attack.
The couple take the name Bob and Carol when the arrive to Metropolis, making friends with Clark Kent and Lois Lane as they discover that Lois is going to be interviewing an eccentric reclusive billionaire. The couple plan to assassinate the billionaire before he goes public, taking his identity and thus his fortune. The plan is foiled when Superman interferes, destroying Deathstroke's containment suit, which causes him to be magnetically drawn to a steel pillar until the police arrive. Very much like Superman, this Deathstroke kept a secret identity by wearing a pair of glasses.
Teen Titans The Animated Series
Deathstroke appears in the Teen Titans animated series, where he is referred to only by his first name, Slade, and voiced by actor Ron Perlman. The name "Deathstroke" did not make it through the censors due to hesitance to use the word "death" in a children's animated series. Like his comic book counterpart, he has only one eye and an orange and black color scheme to his clothes. Like many others in the series, his character has partially been altered. He has been changed from metahuman mercenary and assassin, to an enigmatic criminal mastermind, as well as a dangerous and destructive terrorist.
Slade is the Titans' main adversary and was the primary antagonist for the first two seasons of the show. He is shown to be ambitious, calculating, and emotionless. His main goal is apparently to destroy the Titans and conquer the city, and quite possibly the world, for unknown reasons — although it is possible that he is simply a criminal with ambitions of power and has no ulterior motives. He has at least one extremely advanced secret hideout, and a seemingly massive army of technologically advanced robot minions. In addition, he has superior physical strength, and fighting skills that surpass Robin's. Slade is also a bona-fide genius, with great knowledge in robotics. He seems to also possess some knowledge of ceremonial magic (as seen in Forces of Nature). But Slade's most notable quality, is that he is a master of manipulation. He is able to discover the worst quality or fear in his opponents or the people he plans to use. Then he picks at it, until it has become their "Achilles Heel", with which he will then exploit.
In many episodes, he tries to recruit others to his side. He initially hires Jinx, Gizmo, and Mammoth from the H.I.V.E. Academy, but the Titans succeed in beating the three graduates. Slade then disguises himself as Old One from The Forces of Nature and tries to trick Thunder and Lightning, two teenage storm elementals, into destroying Jump City, but that too failed when Beast Boy helped the brothers to see the error of their ways. Robin appears to capture Slade in "Masks", only to discover that it is a robotic duplicate. In the "Apprentice" story arc, Slade forced Robin to join him, with the threat that if he did not, Slade would use nanobots he planted in the Titans to destroy them from the inside out. Robin eventually overcame Slade with his friends' help. From that day on, Slade seems to have become more determined to have Robin and his comrades eradicated. Slade had tried to be Robin's mentor, a father-figure, but Robin shunned him saying he already had a father. This is one of the very few references to Batman in the series, as he looks up to the sky and bats fly by. In season two, Slade recruited the superpowered girl Terra, who in the animated series is portrayed as a merely misguided enemy than a wholly irredeemable villain. In "Betrayal", Terra betrayed the Titans to Slade. In "Aftershock" Parts One and Two, Terra seemingly destroyed the Titans at the command of Slade, who took over the city with her help. The Titans returned, however, and with Beast Boy's help, Terra overcame the link her new suit had to Slade, and she sent him to his doom in a lava pit.
As a result, Slade was absent for most of the third season, with the exception of "Haunted". In this episode, he is a figment of Robin's imagination, due to a chemical reagent released from his mask into Robin's body, which made him see, hear, and feel Slade. Robin was nearly killed, but Robin saved his own life by turning on the lights, thus banishing the Slade hallucination, which only worked in the dark. Oddly enough, it was revealed that this gas had been triggered from the outside, and the series was finished without answering the question of who set it off. Slade's appearance in later episodes may indicate that Slade set it off himself long before actually returning in person.
Slade returned for season four, as the servant of Raven's demonic father Trigon. Now possessing pyrokinetic powers, the ability to fly, superhumanly durability, and a red mark on his forehead, called the Mark of Scathe. He delivered Trigon's message to Raven on her birthday that she would cause the end of the world. In the episode "The End Part 2", it is explained that Slade's defeat at Terra's hands had indeed killed him, and that Trigon had promised to give him back his flesh and blood body in exchange for his services. However, Trigon went back on the deal, and Slade decided to join forces with the Teen Titans. While Cyborg, Starfire, and Beast Boy tried to distract Trigon, Robin and Slade went to find Raven in the underworld. Upon returning to the surface with Raven, Slade led the final assault on Trigon, having recovered his flesh and blood and stolen the demonic weapon of one of Trigon's minions using it to slice off Trigon's horns. Raven finally defeated her father and restored the world to normal, but Slade escaped the Titans shortly thereafter, with a solemn promise from Robin that nothing has changed, and will make that clear if he ever sees him again.
Slade makes his final appearance in the last episode of the series, "Things Change" when Beast Boy was searching for answers on why a newly revived Terra seemed to have lost all memory of her past or superpowers. Slade confronts Beast Boy, denying anything to do with Terra's sudden return, saying that if Terra didn't remember her past, it was because she didn't want to remember; that he should leave her alone, in peace. Infuriated by his speech, Beast Boy attacks Slade, only to find that it was just another of his many robot-duplicates.
The Judas Contract
Slade will appear in the upcoming straight-to-DVD Teen Titans adaptation, Teen Titans: The Judas Contract, an adaptation of the Terra storyline from the comics. However due to the targeted PG-13 rating and the subject matter, he will be called Deathstroke in the film. This is unrelated to the more youth-oriented anime-like Teen Titans.
The Dark Knight
At the 2008 ToyFair convention a Deathstroke action figure was revealed for the toy line based on the upcoming Dark Knight film, sparking speculation over whether or not Deathstroke will be featured in the film or the animated tie-ins that precede the film. Deathstroke will appear in the accompanying Dark Knight video game.
Similarities to other comics characters
A similarity between Deathstroke and the Marvel Comics mercenary Taskmaster was also noted in Wizard Magazine #177: "Both Tasky and Slade are amoral profiteers, and thanks to mutual designer George Pérez, even their original costumes are similar." They share an orange/blue colour scheme and many design elements (such as buccaneer boots, flared gloves, and a near-identical collection of weapon belts). The largest differences were their masks, Taskmaster's cloak, and the white in Taskmaster's costume. Both characters were designed by George Pérez in 1980, within a few months of each other.
Another Marvel Comics character having many similarities to Deathstroke is Deadpool. Both having similar costumes, fighting styles, professions and rhyming names (Deathstroke, Slade Wilson to Deadpool, Wade Wilson). However the two have completely different personalities with Deathstroke being a brilliant cut-throat mercenary whereas Deadpool is a sarcastic, "merc with a mouth".
External links
References
Categories: American comics characters | DC Comics characters who can move at superhuman speeds | DC Comics characters with superhuman strength | DC Comics martial artists | DC Comics metahumans | DC Comics supervillains | DC Comics titles | Assassins | DC Comics characters with accelerated healing | Dictators | Martial artists | Mass murderers | Mercenaries | Terrorists
