Doom Patrol Season 4 Episode 1-2 Review: Doom Patrol and Butt Patrol
Doom Patrol is back with the two-episode Season premiere of Doom Patrol Season 4 Episode 1, “Doom Patrol,” and Doom Patrol Season 4 Episode 2, “Butt Patrol.” Friends, you’ll be happy to know the show is as wonderfully weird as ever.
The stakes will be high for Season 4. The team is tasked with saving the future by preventing a zombie apocalypse in the very first episode. And because this is Doom Patrol, this isn’t your run-of-the-mill apocalypse, either. It’s a “buttpocalypes.”
Yes, you read that right. Apparently, the zombie butt monsters that the team accidentally created on Doom Patrol Season 3 Episode 3, “Undead Patrol,” bring about the end of the world. Because, of course, they do.
I cannot even begin to tell you how much joy I have every time the butt monsters appear and how they have become a bigger and bigger part of each season.
The development that they are now showtune singing apex predators is the chef’s kiss of Doom Patrol shenanigans.
Based on the preview released last month, it doesn’t seem like the butt monsters will be the big bad of the season. That honor will almost certainly go to the mysterious Immortus. Still, I am all for an increased butt monster presence on Season 4.
Personal aside, pretty sure using the words “butt monsters” and “buttpocalypes” multiple times in a real review was not on my bingo card when I started writing about TV. So, sincerely, thanks for that Doom Patrol writers’ room.
It’s not all butt monsters and showtunes, though. The first two episodes also set the character arcs and the emotional stakes for each Doom Patrol member.
The season’s most provocative character stories look like they will be Rita & Madame Rouge’s. Both their individual journeys and their fraught relationship already show great potential.
Plus, as we know from Season 3, Michelle Gomez and April Bowlby had fantastic on-screen chemistry. I will never complain about more scenes of them together.
Madame Rouge’s story looks like it will be particularly good this season.
Going into the season, it seemed Rouge’s central conflict would be the internal tension between her desire for redemption and to be a good person and her aggressive sociopathic nature.
That certainly seems to be part of her story going forward. It’s still an intriguing one too. However, the first two episodes set up some additional complexities. Complexities that make me even more excited to see where her story goes.
It will be fascinating to watch her navigate the guilt she feels about the people she turned into weapons, even as the team asks her to do it again.
Rouge’s apprehension about the position she is in is evident as she listens to Cliff talk about feeling something for the first time at the end of “Butt Control.”
I am rooting for her. I know there will be times when she crosses the line this season, but I want her to have her redemption. More than that, I want her to find a way to earn Rita’s forgiveness. She is much more interesting as a morally ambiguous ally than a villain.
Rita’s story this season also looks promising. Some of what they are setting up for Rita feels like things we’ve seen from her before. There is a danger that we will keep retreading the same ground over and over again, as we do with Larry.
Still, her new fear of losing people, anger towards Rouge, and April Bowlby’s consistently excellent performance should be enough to keep it fresh.
Larry, on the other hand, I’m about ready to give up on. It’s still early. I hope I’m wrong, and Larry ends up with a sensational story this season.
I’m keeping my expectations low, though. Every season, Larry’s story has been about self-loathing or guilt and it’s gotten stale.
I would never advocate for less Matt Bomer, but without something significant to shake up his character, it seems Negative Man may have run out of story material.
One of the most unexpected developments of the first two episodes is how genuinely moving Cliff’s scenes are.
Cliff’s stories have never been bad or uninteresting. They have, however, never given him anything as emotional as that last scene in the kitchen on “Butt Control.”
Listening to him talk about the first he’s felt in decades being killing something rather than his daughter’s hand in his or holding his grandson is heartbreaking.
Hat’s off to Brendan Fraser for making viewers feel so much for a character with no facial expression to help convey his sadness and pain. What that man can do with simple inflections in his voice is impressive.
If the rest of Cliff’s season is anything like the first two episodes, his story will be another standout of the season.
We are in for another weird, irreverent ride on Doom Patrol Season 4, and I couldn’t be more pleased. Bring on the wacky, bring on the “what am I even watching” moments, and bring on all the marvelous character-driven stories that ground it all.
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New episodes of Doom Patrol stream Thursdays on HBO Max.
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Sarah Fields
Sarah is an obsessive geek who likes to get into the weeds and over think things. She is passionate about Sci-Fi and comics and is a giant classic film nerd. Sarah cares deeply about media representation and the power of telling diverse stories. When she's not writing or watching her favorite shows she spends her days working in the non-profit world trying to make life a little better for those that need some extra help.