Slade Wilson has a massive reputation problem, and it’s catching up to him in a hilariously chaotic way. In Deathstroke: The Terminator #4, the creative team of Tony Fleecs and Carmine Di Giandomenico serves up a kill-crazy family reunion that plays out like the worst “Take Your Kid to Work Day” imaginable.
The issue drops us straight into the fallout of issue #3, where we learned that Slade, allegedly, killed his best friend, Wintergreen. It turns out that when you spend your life as a cold-blooded mercenary, people don’t exactly give you the benefit of the doubt. Even your own family immediately believes the worst of you, and that brings us to the present.
Title: Deathstroke: The Terminator #4
Creatives: Tony Fleecs (Writer), Carmine Di Giandomenico (Artist), Ivan Plascencia (Colorist)
Characters: Deathstroke (Slade Wilson), Ravager (Rose Wilson), Jason Todd, Wintergreen (mentioned)
Villain: Deadshot, Deathblow
Format: Ongoing Series
Our Rating: 8.5/10 Stars
Family Therapy with Sleep Darts
When we last left Deathstroke, he was getting jumped by Deadshot and Deathblow. As I said in my review of that issue, the stakes there felt pretty low, functioning as barely an inconvenience for a guy like Slade. The real trouble starts when his daughter, Rose Wilson, better known as Ravager, crashes the party.
Rose isn’t looking for a heartwarming father-daughter team-up. She’s hunting for revenge because she’s convinced Slade murdered Wintergreen. Instead of a sit-down chat, she opens up with sleep darts and flying fists. You actually end up feeling a little bad for Slade here. When a rumor starts circulating that you killed your best friend, and absolutely no one questions it, not even your own kid, it really highlights how toxic your life choices have been. While the fists are flying, the visuals steal the show as usual. Carmine Di Giandomenico’s pencils paired with Ivan Plascencia’s colors make this book gorgeous to look at. The burning safehouse scenes are particularly stunning. Plascencia drenches the pages in a pervasive, vibrant orange glow as the building burns, creating a crisp, intense atmosphere that elevates the entire scene.
Trying to Find Humanity in a Killer
Eventually, the fighting pauses for a bizarrely touching heart-to-heart while Slade casually gets a job from the dark web to secure some quick cash. Rose tries to appeal to her father’s better nature, but her advice completely falls on deaf ears. Slade is a killer. If he’s not taking mercenary contracts, what else is he supposed to do? Become a professional chef? It’s just not who he is, and he isn’t changing anytime soon. Watching Rose attempt to find a scrap of humanity in him feels like a lost cause. People don’t change their entire character that easily, and if Slade suddenly went soft, it wouldn’t be believable. He functions mostly on anger, pride, lust, and greed. Rose is clearly just looking for her father’s love, which makes the dynamic tragic, even if her efforts feel wasted on a guy like him.
Anyways, the issue takes a hilarious turn when they need a getaway vehicle. It drops a fantastic nod to a fan-favorite pairing: Rose and Jason Todd. The revelation that Rose has some sort of history with Gotham’s premier bad boy is just great, and Slade utterly trips out when he realizes exactly whose car they are stealing to escape.
Highly Cinematic Standstill
From a pure pacing standpoint, not a ton of actual plot progression happens in this chapter. We’re still dealing with the exact same players and the ongoing mystery of who is setting Deathstroke up. However, Fleecs and Di Giandomenico compensate for the slow narrative pacing by delivering a deeply cinematic experience. The set pieces, the heavy emotional beats, and the top-tier lighting design make the entire comic feel like a high-budget action movie.
Overall, Deathstroke: The Terminator #4 is a solid, beautiful read that shows a fascinating side of Slade. He’s a man who, in his own deeply flawed, twisted way, might actually care about the people close to him, even if he has a terrible way of showing it.
‘Deathstroke: The Terminator’ #4 Review: Slade Wilson Is Inherently Unredeemable (And We Love It)
Deathstroke: The Terminator #4 is a solid, beautiful read that shows a fascinating side of Slade. He’s a man who, in his own deeply flawed, twisted way, might actually care about the people close to him, even if he has a terrible way of showing it.
