Feature Story
DC's “Doom Patrol” surprised TV viewers by presenting an adventure anthology that soon morphed into a superhero staple. The action-packed dramedy follows a team of misfits as they battle to save a world that wants nothing to do with them or their oddball powers. Now, fans are getting the chance to see how the season ends during the Season 3 finale, airing Thursday, Nov. 11, on HBO Max.
Sometimes known as the Legion of Strange, Doom Patrol is made up of Kay “Crazy Jane” Challis (Diane Guerrero, “Orange Is the New Black”), Rita “ElastiGirl” Farr (April Bowlby, “Drop Dead Diva”), Vic “Cyborg” Stone (Joivan Wade, “EastEnders”), Larry “Negative Man” Trainor (Matt Bomer, “White Collar”) and Cliff “Robotman” Steele (Brendan Fraser, “The Mummy,” 1999).
Of course, we can't forget about Miles “Chief” Caulder (Timothy Dalton, “Licence to Kill,” 1989), the doctor who protected the team from the outside world by letting them live in his mansion.
While (beware: spoilers lie ahead) Chief died from old age earlier this season, his loss continues to impact the team. In the show's beginning, Chief was captured by the omniscient Mr. Nobody, sending the Doom Patrol on a journey to rescue him. Along the way, the
Patrol discovered secrets about themselves and their guardian, who they learn is responsible for the events that led to their powers.
In the aftermath of the Chief's death, the team has gone their separate ways, each struggling with their respective identities.
While Kay battles Crazy Jane, the dominant identity of her trauma-induced dissociative identity disorder, Victor struggles with the feeling that death is stalking him, knowing that his cybernetically enhanced powers are what led to his own mother's death. Though not a resident of Doom Manor, he joins the team because of his longtime friendship with Chief.
Cliff, voiced by Fraser and performed onscreen by Riley Shanahan (“The Gender Card Flip,” 2016), is a former NASCAR driver whose brain was transplanted into a robot body after a car crash destroyed his own, obviously leading to some identity issues of his own.
Similarly, Larry is a former pilot with the United States Air Force who has negative energy living inside him. Disfigured from the plane crash, he covers himself in special bandages to prevent radioactive emissions from escaping his body and infecting others. Bomer voices the character and appears as Larry without the bandages, while Matthew Zuk (“Greyhound,” 2020) physically portrays him when wrapped in bandages. Needless to say, Cliff's Robotman and Larry's Negativeman are proof that DC comics writers love their crash-origin stories.
Rita, also known as Elasti-girl, is another example of this love. A former Hollywood actress, her cellular structure was altered into a gelatinous state after having been exposed to a toxic gas. This led to powers that allow her to change her body's shape, though they also cause her to struggle with maintaining a solid form — another classic trope in the DC Universe.
Last season, Doom Patrol joined forces with Chief's daughter, Dorothy Spinner (Abi Monterey, Broadway's “The Shapiro Sisters”), who can bring her imaginary friends to life.
While the members of Doom Patrol have been facing their own demons and grappling with the origin of their powers in connection to Chief, Dorothy has kept herself busy ... endangering the world. She unleashed an ancient entity known as the Candlemaker, a wish-granting deity destined to reduce the world to wax. Dorothy's battle with the Candlemaker was nothing less than turbulent as the deity must bend to her will despite their destiny to be enemies.
At the start of this season, Doom Patrol's faceoff with the Candlemaker tore them apart, both physically and emotionally, and now the arrival of Madame Rogue sets the team on a new path.