Deathstroke

A hero is defined by their villains, and the world of superhero comic books is filled with some of the scariest and silliest bad guys around. Rogues’ Gallery aims to settle the score and determine who is the true arch-nemesis for some of favorite superheroes, and we need your help to do it! However, this week we're stepping out of the usual status quo to talk about villains in a different context; that being the team of villains coerced into heroic acts by the United States government --- The Suicide Squad

With DC Rebirth on the horizon, the DC Universe is getting a makeover . We’ve already seen Yanick Paquette’s designs for Black Canary and Huntress, but yesterday outgoing Midnighter artist ACO posted several rejected and final designs for the upcoming Deathstroke series by Christopher Priest, Igor Vitorino and Felipe Watanabe.

DC Comics hosted a special livestream event at WonderCon in Los Angeles on Saturday afternoon to unveil the creative teams behind its DC Rebirth event, which relaunches the entire DC Universe line with new issue #1s and multiple double-shipping titles. The relaunch will set the future course of DC Comics at a time when fans are wondering whether the company will embrace a new and diversifying audience or double down on serving a shrinking core audience. The event was introduced by DC All Access host Tiffany Smith, with DC co-publishers Jim Lee and Dan DiDio and chief creative officer and Rebirth chief architect Geoff Johns introducing and interviewing the creative teams as they joined them on stage at the Los Angeles Convention Center.

Our longest-serving Arrow and Flash recappers, Matt Wilson and Dylan Todd, have joined forces to deliver our Legends of Tomorrow post-show analysis, Stuff of Legends. This week's episode, "Star City 2046" finds our heroes stranded in a desolate, future version of a city some of them call home. Things are not as they remember, to put it lightly. Steve Shill directed the episode and it was written by Marc Guggenheim and Ray Utarnachitt.

The one and only Batgirl of Burnside is getting her own DC Icons action figure, complete with motorcycle and smartphone this November. That's it. That's the news. We can wrap it up. I could talk about the rest of the new DC Icons announced by DC Collectibles today (via IGN), but then I wouldn't be able to get in my car to drive to Los Angeles and grab this figure from the production room while all of the DC Collectibles employees are at Toy Fair this weekend. I consider myself a patient man, but I can't wait until November for this. Batgirl was just one of six new figures announced for the Icons line, as well as two accessory packs to add even more Easter egg mayhem to these figures. Technically I guess you would count Grail as a seventh figure even though she's part of a two-pack with Darkseid, but you get what I'm saying. Right?

In honor of the caped crusaders of the convention scene, ComicsAlliance has created Best Cosplay Ever (This Week), an ongoing collection of some of the most impeccable, creative, and clever costumes that we’ve discovered and assembled into a super-showcase of pure fan-devoted talent.

For as bad-ass as Deathstroke is, he sure hasn't gotten much love over the years in the collectibles department. Sure, he's had a few figures here and there, but until the New 52 came around and DC kinda-sorta-maybe made him a "good" guy, finding great Deathstroke merchandise wasn't all that easy. It's still not exactly as simple as going to the store and finding a figure on the shelf, but his prominence in other DC ventures over the past few years has made Deathstroke slightly more accessible to fans beyond the printed page. Case in point, Batman: Arkham Origins. There, Deathstroke made a major splash as one of the leading big bads brought in by Black Mask to take down the mysterious Batman. Of course, the fight against Deathstroke wasn't exactly all it was billed up to be, especially based on some of the game's trailers, but without his inclusion there, we wouldn't have this ridiculous statue coming from Prime 1 Studio. The company has been steadily releasing statues based on the Batman: Arkham series over the past year or so, not to mention all its ventures into the likes of Transformers and Voltron. But those robots in disguise aren't the reason we're here. We're here to talk about Deathstroke, and this impossibly detailed statue.

With seventy-five years of shared universe history spread out over multiple companies and periodical continuity reboots and multiple earths, getting into superhero comics can be a daunting task for anyone uninitiated into the genre. Why on earth do we have to make it so much harder for new fans by making their names so confusingly similar? With Deadpool set to return to the big screen in 2016, Deadshot being prominently featured in the forthcoming Suicide Squad movie, Deathstroke being a major player on TV's Arrow, and Deathlok recurring on Agents of SHIELD, casual fans are being bombarded with a surfeit of the "[death][noun]" formula. Add to that the fact that most of these guys tote giant guns, swords, full face masks and/or reticles over their eyes, and that's just a recipe for confusion.

As readers will know from our weekly Best Cosplay Ever feature, we’re big fans of cosplay at ComicsAlliance. The comics, sci-fi, gaming, and fantasy communities have proved time and again their exceptional talents for homemade disguises and superheroic sartorial excellence, and all of their craft and skill will be on display this weekend at HeroesCon. Our chief cosplay correspondent Betty Felon is on hand to document as much of it as she can. Scroll down for some of the very finest cosplay from HeroesCon!

The CW’s superhero series Arrow re-imagines Green Arrow for a TV audience as a tough, often ruthless vigilante bent on setting things right in his home of Starling City by punishing the wicked. ComicsAlliance’s Matt Wilson is back for the third season of the popular series in our recap feature we’re officially dubbing Pointed Commentary. This week: A major villain comes back for an appearance, Flashback Ollie goes back home, and all the dirty laundry about a character's death gets aired out.