Best Look Yet At Joe Manganiello As Deathstroke

Posted by the man himself on his Instagram account. More on that later.

February 2018 Deathstroke Solication

There's always a moment of incredulity when the Deathstroke solicitations are made available. Christopher Priest is amazing at somehow taking Deathstroke in all sorts of new places while remaining true to the character. One of these days, his name will not be attached to this title and it will be devastating.

And with that, let's check out the solicitation for #28, due for February.

DEATHSTROKE #28
Written by CHRISTOPHER PRIEST
Art by DIOGENES NEVES and TREVOR SCOTT
Cover by RYAN SOOK
Variant cover by SHANE DAVIS and MICHELLE DELECKI 

“Chinatown” part one! In the aftermath of the shocking events of this year’s Deathstroke Annual, Slade finds himself at a crossroads as his ad hoc “Dark Titans” team dissolves and even Wintergreen finally abandons him. Slade begins a turbulent backslide to his old ways, bringing him face to face with China’s New Super-Man! 

On sale FEBRUARY 7 • 32 pg, FC, $3.99 US • RATED T+

This super-Man looks to be getting a bit of a push (to use a wrestling term) that month as his own book gets re-titled and becomes a team book. Cool to see Deathstroke as part of the process. 

Classic And Arkham 'Stroke From Iron Studios

I stumbled into the following figurine by Iron Studios while searching for upcoming Deathstroke trade paperbacks.

It was originally meant to ship in February of this year and I can only assume that it did. It is a limited edition item, made of polystone and hand-painted, based on art and design by Ivan Reis. 

The detail is impressive enough on what is a pretty complex outfit, but the maskless option displays some quality work on that level too.



Iron Studios produced a Deathstroke figurine based on the Arkham video game series as well and the same applies to that one.





Judging from the Amazon listing, that one will come out early next year. These will run you about $120 to $150 U.S.

Dark Nights: Metal #3 Variant (and one of his own)

This book came out on October 11th with several covers. Though he does not seem to play a huge role in what is a large cast for a single issue, Deathstroke did get the John Romita Jr. variant cover treatment. Check that out, if you missed it.

And while we're on the subject of variants, check out this beauty from Shane Davis for issue #23 of Deathstroke's current book. Just gorgeous.

Have A Killer Christmas With DC's Holiday Special!

When the DC Comics Holiday Special was first announced, there was no mention of Deathstroke in its solicitation text.

Join Superman, Wonder Woman and the Flash as they deliver powerful messages of hope like only The Worlds Greatest Super-Heroes can! Plus: Sgt. Rock fights the Nazis on Hanukah, the Teen Titans take on the literal ghost of Christmas past, and Swamp Thing battles that creeping feeling of existential dread! And don’t miss the legendary Denny O’Neil’s return to comics with an all-new Batman story!

So the usual suspects. And Sgt. Rock.

No big deal, Deathstroke isn't exactly a Christmas kind of guy. One can only imagine the conversation at the dinner table.

But Den Of Geek received some preview pages from DC Comics and it turns out that Deathstroke does appear. And, as one might expect from Deathstroke, he has Santa Claus at gunpoint.

That's the original outfit, minus the split mask. So this flashback goes WAY back to prior to Slade Wilson having his right eye blown out by his now ex-wife. Here's the info that DC gave Den of Geek:

Out of the kindness of his heart Joey Wilson donated one of his Christmas gifts to charity. Little did he know that his father Deathstroke hid a nuclear trigger in the gift for safekeeping. Now Deathstroke and his partner Wintergreen have to get the trigger back and get to Deathstroke’s Sister-in-Law’s house for Christmas dinner.

Sounds fun. For more preview material, check out Den Of Geeks' own article about the book.

I was reminded of another Christmas encounter that took place in issue #7 of volume one involving guest-star Batman. Writer Marv Wolfman cleverly used a couple of street-level scenes to display the difference in perception and tactics between the bat and Deathstroke.

Batman drives by a break-in attempt. When the would-be thieves see him, they run away. His reputation is such that all he had to do was slow down momentarily to scare them off.

Deathstroke isn't quite so well known so he has to take far more direct measures.

 Better than any gift card that dude might have found in a stocking.

The Holiday Special will be in stores on December 6th.

Revisiting Nuclear Winter

Since I own the individual issues to the first Deathstroke regular series, the solicitation for the third reprint collection from that run wasn't of great interest to me. But coming across it again on Amazon months later, it might actually be worth a longer look.

This was how the book was originally marketed:

In these stories, hunted by the CIA and the Teen Titans, Deathstroke is in trouble--he may be dying. But his chances for survival lie with a figure from his past, half a world away in Cambodia.

While his pursuers believe him to be dead, Deathstroke takes refuge on Titans island--and when he regains his strength, he's shocked to learn that the island has been taken over by the forces of the evil Lord Chaos. How will he escape with his life? 

Collects Deathstroke, The Terminator #14-20.

Here's the new version of the solicitation text:

The unthinkable is happening: Deathstroke the Terminator is dying. The serum that gave Slade Wilson his enhanced abilities seems to be killing him, and the CIA is still hunting him for crimes he didn’t commit. With no one to turn to, he must seek out his former enemies/allies, the Titans. But what he discovers at Titans Tower could lead him to salvation…or global nuclear war!

Plus, Deathstroke must join forces with Peacemaker and the Huntress to stop the madman known as Kobra!!
 
 Collects DEATHSTROKE THE TERMINATOR #14-20 and SHOWCASE ’93 #6-11!

 

Well! Not only is that much more clear, but that added content is motivating!

As described here in the past, Showcase was an anthology book which, if my memory is sound, typically featured three unconnected stories. I thought it was standard size but a quick research reveals that each issue was actually 48 pages in length. The story in which Deathstroke takes part would probably have been a solid 12-16 pages long per issue then.

I know I have at least one issue of that run of Showcase stashed away somewhere and I don't recall being particularly motivated to gather the rest no matter how big a fan of Deathstroke I was and remain. The story didn't particularly grab me at the time, Slade seemed out of character, and Peacemaker is a tool.

But in a collection, clocking in at 272 pages total, of which about 120 pages or so are new to me, and including guest stars like Katana and Deadshot...I might just have to take the plunge on this after all.

The book is now due for release on December 12th, according to Amazon. It bears noting that DC comics lists it on their website as having been released last month and with only Deathstroke issues 14-23 (instead of 14-20) included. There is no mention of the Showcase story. It feels a little early for a new edition of a book that was released three weeks ago, so it may be best to wait until this book is actually in stores and content can be reviewed before ordering it.