Creature Commandos Episode 3
"Cheers for the Tin Man"
Writer: James Gunn
Director: Matt Peters
Cast: Sean Gunn, Anya Chalotra, Maria Bakalova, Frank Grillo, Alan Tudyk, Indira Varma, Zoë Chao
Like the last episode, this one goes back and forth between flashback and present day pretty much constantly, which is a surprisingly good way of keeping both narratives moving at a quick pace. When one slows down, the other ramps up, until both end with a huge burst of welcome and deserved — if graphic — violence. Not for kids, but I wouldn't mind showing kids the deaths of many, many Nazis.
While the previous episode focused on The Bride's past, this is G.I. Robot's (Sean Gunn) story through and through. We pick up with Circe (Anya Chalotra) and her Sons of Themyscira storming the castle of Pokolistani Princess Ilana Rostovic (Maria Bakalova). Rick Flagg Sr. (Frank Grillo), Dr. Phosphorus (Alan Tudyk), and Weasel (Sean Gunn again) have rolled up to where the trackers for The Bride (Indira Varma) and fishwoman Nina Mazursky (Zoë Chao) led them.
G.I. Robot has a flashback to World War II and we get a great, if not that hidden Easter Egg: G.I. Robot rolled with Sgt. Rock and Easy Company, the stars of DC Comics' Our Army At War and later the standalone Sgt. Rock title. They're all there: Little Sure Shot, Four Eyes, Wildman, Bulldozer, Canary, and Bogman, moving through a forest at night. They're ambushed by a large platoon of German soldiers, led by a Nazi colonel voiced by Flula Borg (who played Javelin in the precursor to Creature Commandos, The Suicide Squad). G.I. Robot takes the initiative and extends his robot legs super high to get a great vantage point for mowing all the Nazis down, in more and more graphic ways. Like, intestines hanging out. It's nice.
Later at the bar later, Easy Company celebrates G.I. Robot, proclaiming, "Cheers to the Tin Man!" which stays with G.I. Robot to the present day.
And in the present day — Flagg and the team burst into Frankenstein's castle and find The Bride and Nina (who is in a bathtub wrapped in barbed wire), but no Circe or Sons of Themyscira. The attack on The Bride was a ruse to get Task Force M away from the royal palace where the real attack will be. Picking up the entire bathtub with Nina inside, G.I. Robot and the team head back for Battle, Part II.
In a flashback, we are shown G.I. Robot's introduction to the world in late night '60s television, well after the war ended. Always alert, he scans the crowd for Nazis and begins to suspect the host when he claims there are no Nazis in the audience. His appearance is a flop, but it gets the attention of roboticist Will Magnus (also voiced by Alan Tudyk), who brings him back to his lab for study. Although we aren't shown Magnus's Metal Men, he tells G.I. Robot that he wants to use him to create the next wave of automatons. G.I. Robot just wants to be reunited with Easy Company and kill Nazis some more.
It's a gory scene at the Princess's castle. Soldiers attack her but wind up with scratches across the face. Her guards are torn to pieces by Circe and her troops. The Creature Commandos finally arrive and in a great moment, Dr. Phosphorus melts bullets before they hit his face. He retaliates by absolutely torching the shooter. He's terrifying, it's awesome. They need to make an action figure of him ASAP. Nina also gets her suit back, but she's not one for fighting.
We're thrown back in the past again, now with G.I. Robot fully decommissioned and in a display of military antiques. He's gathering dust but he's piqued the interest of a collector of military gear, Sam Fitzgibbons, voiced by perennial James Gunn favorite actor Michael Rooker (Guardians of the Galaxy, JFK, and Savant in The Suicide Squad). Fitzgibbons gives G.I. Robot some gas and lets him move into his small house with his multiple cats. It doesn't seem like Sam Fitzgibbons is an existing DC character, but it is interesting that the prison doctor in Gunn's The Suicide Squad had the same last name.
Fitzgibbons takes care of G.I. Robot until, on a snowy winter day, he takes him out to meet a few of his friends at some sort of lodge. He tells G.I. Robot that his friends will love him. "Cheers for the Tin Man?" asks G.I. Robot. Fitzgibbons heartily agrees. But at the it's clear what this meeting of "The Hub City National Socialist Club" is: a Neo-Nazi gathering.
Fun fact: Hub City is the home of DC Comics characters The Question and Blue Beetle, but was created by Charlton Comics prior to being merged with DC.
We zip back to the castle in the present day where the Commandos are under fire. G.I. Robot asks if the attackers are Nazis, and Flagg gives him a very overdue, "Yes, they're Nazis." To the sound of The Dresden Dolls' "Coin Operated Boy" (Gunn loves merging his work with contemporary soundtracks), G.I. Robot goes absolutely off on the Sons of Themyscira, blowing them apart in a bloody shower of limbs. We cut back and forth from the carnage of Pokolistan to the carnage of G.I. Robot breaking up the Hub City National Socialist Club. Just absolute bullet-driven mayhem.
But there are consequences to the Hub City massacre. Thirty-two Nazis are dead but G.I. Robot is brought up on charges. He's found guilty and paraded to a cell, marched past cameos from DC villains The Shaggy Man, Animal-Vegetable-Mineral Man, The Crimson Centipede, and a fourth villain that might have been the Pied Piper (but I'm more than willing to be corrected on that). G.I. Robot sits in his cell, gathering cobwebs, not changing into his prison clothes, until the present day...
... Where he's blown to pieces by Circe.
Yep, it's not a James Gunn superhero movie if a character you come to like doesn't die on camera. G.I. Robot is blasted into shrapnel.
Inside, the Princess holds off her attackers with an antique pistol kept in a safe in her wardrobe, but she's no match for Circe, who throws her around the room, smashing furniture.
It's not all lost though: Weasel comes in handy and launches a flurry of biting and clawing at Circe that brings her down to the ground, where Dr. Phosphorus burns the hell out of her face. Is she dead?
Nina, a noncombatant monster, meekly walks through the aftermath of the battle and finds G.I. Robot's head. The head is glad to see her, and before its power dies, manages to get out, "We fought Nazis together, you and I! What a beautiful day. Cheers for the tin…" It's heartbreaking.
But Circe is not dead. In fact, she informs the Creature Commandos that by stopping her they've doomed the world!
New episodes of Creature Commandos premiere Thursdays on Max
