Doom Patrol is returning for a second season, this time launching simultaneously on the DC Universe and HBO Max streaming platforms. Now HBO Max has released a trailer for Season 2, giving us some idea of the zany superhero antics in store this summer.
You can check out the Doom Patrol: Season 2 trailer in the video player above or embedded below:
[ignvideo url=”https://www.ign.com/videos/doom-patrol-season-2-trailer”]
Given the wider exposure for Season 2 and the generally kooky nature of the series, you may be wondering just what the heck is going on in this series. Read on for a quick recap of Season 1 and how new character Dorothy Spinner (Abigail Shapiro) looks to be driving the plot in Season 2.
Doom Patrol: What the Heck Is This Series About?
You can check out IGN’s Doom Patrol Explained feature for a more detailed rundown of the franchise, but the easiest way to describe both the comics and the show is as DC’s answer to the X-Men (though technically Doom Patrol debuted first). Like the X-Men, the Doom Patrol are led by a wheelchair-bound philanthropist intent on gathering people whose bizarre powers make them outcasts from polite society. In this case, Professor Niles Caulder (Timothy Dalton) hopes to show self-loathing heroes like Larry Trainor (Matt Bomer & Matthew Zuk), Rita Farr (April Bowlby), Cliff Steele (Brendan Fraser and Riley Shanahan), Vic Stone (Joivan Wade) and Jane (Diane Guerrero) they can use their powers to benefit society.
Unfortunately, Caulder also has his own motivations and dark secrets, as our heroes discovered over the course of Season 1. The team came to learn their powers were actually a result of Caulder’s experiments with immortality. By the end of Season 1, though, they’ve mostly made peace with that fact and learned how to come together as a supremely weird but close-knit family.
Doom Patrol is technically a spinoff of fellow DC Universe series Titans, with most of the main cast first appearing in a Titans: Season 1 episode. However, The CW’s Crisis on Infinite Earths crossover has since established that Titans and Doom Patrol take place in different worlds in the live-action DC multiverse.
[widget path=”global/article/imagegallery” parameters=”albumSlug=doom-patrol-ezekiel-patrol-gallery&captions=true”]
Why Dorothy Spinner Is Important in Season 2
The new trailer doesn’t shed a great deal of light on the plot of Season 2, especially given that the early character montage mostly draws on older Season 1 footage. But we do have some idea of how Season 2 will kick off. Season 1 ended with the team defeating a maniacal, oversized cockroach named Ezekiel and emerging with Caulder’s long-lost daughter Dorothy in tow. Unfortunately, when they did they realized they had shrunk along with the corpse of Ezekiel. With the Season 2 premiere being titled “Fun-Size Patrol,” and with one shot showing Cliff punching a “giant” rat, it’s a safe bet the team will have to figure out some way of returning to their normal size.
In general, it appears Dorothy herself will play a pivotal role in Season 2. At some point Dorothy will go rogue, and Caulder can be seen warning the team that her powers threaten the entire world. That’s because Dorothy is easily the most powerful and dangerous Doom Patrol member introduced so far. She has the power of imagination – any being she imagines is brought to life and continues to exist as long as Dorothy lives.
If the series follows the example of the comics, it’s possible Season 2 will revolve around a villain known as the Candlemaker. This malevolent psychic entity was banished to another plane of existence, but Dorothy’s powers offer it a way back into our reality.
That remains to be seen, though, as the series is already taking some liberties with the source material. Whereas the comics depict Dorothy as a human child with a severe facial deformity (hence her ape-like appearance), the TV series re-imagines her as the daughter of Caulder and an immortal, prehistoric woman named Slava. Caulder’s obsession with achieving immortality is motivated by a desire to protect Dorothy.
[ignvideo url=”https://www.ign.com/videos/2019/02/12/doom-patrol-explained”]
The first three episodes of Doom Patrol: Season 2 will premiere on DC Universe and HBO Max on Thursday, June 25. Until then, check out our Doom Patrol: Season 1 finale review and see how the series stacked up against the competition in IGN’s Best Comic Book TV Series of 2019 award.
[poilib element=”accentDivider”]
Jesse is a mild-mannered staff writer for IGN. Allow him to lend a machete to your intellectual thicket by following @jschedeen on Twitter.
Source: IGN.com Doom Patrol: Season 2 Trailer Reveals the Strangest DC Hero Yet