You’d be hard-pressed to find a traditional hero in DC’s upcoming animated series, Creature Commandos. The first officially canon project in James Gunn’s DC Universe, Creature Commandos features a fearsome lineup of monsters and straight-up villains like the Bride, Doctor Phosphorus, Weasel, and GI Robot. But the leader of the renegade team might fit the definition closest: Rick Flag Sr., the father of the doomed Rick Flag Jr. (Joel Kinnaman), who met his demise at the hands of Peacemaker (John Cena) in Gunn’s The Suicide Squad.
Voiced (and played in live-action) by Frank Grillo, Rick Flag Sr., is a stalwart soldier who doesn’t ask questions when he’s brought in to lead the Creature Commandos. But Gunn has teased that he’s a “morally complex” character with shades of grey that have yet to be unveiled, a sentiment Grillo agrees with.
“[You see it] in his behavior and in his allegiance,” Grillo tells Inverse. “I think the death of a child, the murder of a child, even an adult child, is catastrophic in affecting one's behavior. That's kind of the through line for this guy is that he's dealing with, or not dealing with so well, the death of his son.”
Rick Flag Sr. gets introduced in Creature Commandos and immediately makes his leap to live-action with appearances in Superman and Peacemaker Season 2. While he plays a supporting role in Superman and an antagonist in Peacemaker, Grillo teases that his character’s story will play out in those appearances, and possibly beyond them.
“Based on how things end in Peacemaker, in Superman, and in Creature Commandos, Rick Flag will be around for a while. I kind of liken him to the Sam Jackson character in the Marvel world,” Grillo says.
Is that the headline, I ask him — “Rick Flag Sr., is the Nick Fury of the DCU?”
“I could be totally off base and wrong, and that would be the end of me,” Grillo responds. “But my gut is that you're going to see him weaved through a lot of different things.”
Whether that thread is woven in a straight line is another question Grillo is vague about answering. His upcoming appearance in Superman, in which set photos have revealed that he’s wearing a different costume and is not as obviously gray-haired as in Creature Commandos, is a “different phase,” Grillo says cryptically.
“It's a different phase. A different world, really, in Superman. And Rick Flag has a different job,” Grillo says. He expands, “When you get promoted, or you get shifted over into a different department, or you have different authority, you have different power, and it changes your behavior.”
As for what his role consists of in Superman, Grillo was again vague: “There is something I have to do with Superman that I'm not necessarily in agreement with.”
In Peacemaker, Flag gets “another kind of promotion,” Grillo says. And that will put him on a collision course with Peacemaker, during which Flag becomes “a force to be reckoned with.” Does he seek revenge for the death of his son?
“There's not a day that goes by in Rick Flag Sr.'s life that revenge isn't in his head,” Grillo says.
