Titans rumors: What you need to know from Jericho to The Judas Contract

Titans season 2 doesn’t start filming until March, but there are rumors that Deathstroke and his family could be involved. Here’s a refresher for fans.

Titans is a show about family. In all iterations of the Teen Titans team, comics, series, and movies alike, it’s always been about family. It might feature a convoluted family tree, where some of the branches are possessed by demons, some are secretly a part of another more nefarious tree entirely, and others wither and die only to be resurrected again. Despite the estrangement and drama, the Titans team is always a family.

On its own, the DC Universe series has started to lay the framework for the Batfam, the extended Logan family, the royal Tamaranean family, and a demonic household. While Roth-Azarath drama will linger on the Titans series, there are reports that a new family could join season 2: the Wilsons.

According to That Hashtag Show writer Charles Murphy, Deathstroke (Slade Wilson), the Ravager (his daughter, Rose), and Jericho (his son, Joseph) will join Titans season 2. The production allegedly has released a casting call for Deathstroke, and they’re looking for a Latinx, Asian, or Caucasian man, That Hashtag Show adds.

Though Trigon is clearly still the dominant antagonist on Titans, the Wilson family would weave seamlessly into the overarching family theme of the season. Dysfunctional families are a recurring theme and plot device throughout the various Teen Titans comic book runs. Granted, we’d never really categorized any of Teen Titans teams as dysfunctional because the teams are hyper-supportive; however, we can’t say the same for the sporadically chaotic Wilson family.

When you’re an ex-military man who made the career change into the homicidal mercenary business, it can be difficult to make plans for family dinner, especially when your kids join the heroic teams that are always trying to take you down. Although the series might be creating a new version of Slade Wilson, complete with his apparent transition from his life in the military to his villainous lifestyle, season 2 could set the foundation for an evil and notorious Teen Titans tale: The Judas Contract.

Regardless, given the impending and current threats, you probably have a lot of questions on how the Wilsons and The Judas Contract could fit into the series after we left off on that cliffhanger, and we have you covered.

The Judas Contract

Aside from being a successful animated film, The Judas Contract is arguably integral to DC Comics, and that importance extends to any Titans-relevant DCU series. In addition to ensuring the longevity of the Teen Titans namesake team, Dick Grayson’s new identity, and a few lifelong archnemeses, The Judas Contract story arc starts when Deathstroke takes on a contract from the H.I.V.E.  that his son, Grant, was pursuing before he died.

“Judas” in the narrative’s title refers to Tara Markov (or her alias, Terra), as she betrays the Titans team members on the surface. We specify that she apparently betrays the team because, although she joined the Teen Titans, she was never loyal to the team — save for her futuristic role in the Teen Titans East team in Teen Titans (2003).

You might already be familiar with Tara from her various comic issues or her recent debut on Young Justice: Outsiders. Regardless, the contract is vital to the Titans team development as Tara is to The Judas Contract. Given Titans writer Geoff Johns mentioned that it would be silly for the series not to incorporate The Judas Contract, if the series does incorporate Deathstroke and The Judas Contract into the script, we can anticipate Terra’s cameo in the show too.  (When we do see Terra on the show, we just how the series doesn’t incorporate her gross romantic obsession with Slade.)

Jericho in Deathstroke (2016) #35. Photo Credit: DC Comics.

Here’s the deal with the Wilson family

Slade might not have taken Trigon’s parenting courses, but his parental guidance is still messed up, to say the least. No, his daughter isn’t a walking demonic portal. However, he isn’t opposed to strict parenting techniques — which include attempting to murder his kids… and he sometimes succeeds.

Wilson family bonding time might be nonexistent, but his ex-wife, Adeline Kane, does have a supportive role in Deathstroke’s life. Apart from training him in combat, Adeline helped Slade navigate from his villainous path to a complicated antihero. Despite indirectly and directly helping Slade become less of a jerk, she also embarks on a villainous arc of her own — organizing a new H.I.V.E. team of villains. Her strange turn to evil also marks one of Deathstroke’s team-ups with the Teen Titans.

We can’t predict what the new version of Slade Wilson, his character development, and his family dynamics will look like, or if the series will include his extremely heightened reflexes and intelligence. However, Deathstroke definitely doesn’t have a traditional family. Beyond manipulating Rose on a few occasions, Slade doesn’t have the best relationship with any of his kids, but especially not Rose since she tries to distance herself from him altogether.

While Rose eventually takes on the Ravager moniker after Grant dies, she adopts a new identity around the alias. As a sometimes-member of the Teen Titans, she mostly uses her enhanced perception to at least try to live a less homicidal lifestyle.

Meanwhile, Joey (better known as Jericho) has some conflicting character development. While Rose gradually works to distance herself from whatever missions her dad works on and nefarious actions in general, Jericho transitions from the life of a hero to a villain.

Though Jericho starts out as a prominent Teen Titans member, he has an unfortunate paranormal experience on Azarath. Basically, the souls of the interdimensional realm possess him, but the souls are influenced by Trigon, so he turns evil until Raven helps his soul and resurrects his physical body.

Seeing as Deathstroke and Trigon both have a connection with Jericho, he would help tie them together. After all, Slade still isn’t over what Jericho did to William Wintergreen (Slade’s sort of father figure), and regardless of Jericho’s good or evil alignment, he’s a target for Deathstroke.

Despite the fact that Trigon and Deathstroke are common archenemies of the Titans, we can assume the second season probably won’t draw inspiration from the Teen Titans animated series when Deathstroke made a deal with the devil (the eighth devil, Trigon, specifically). However, weaving Slade, Rose, Adeline, and Jericho into the live-action lore doesn’t mean that we won’t see Trigon anymore.

Given the powerful heroic lineup, the team will probably banish Trigon back to his layer of Hell. This won’t be a permanent solution for the interdimensional demon, though. If Rachel can temporarily control her Soul-Self and use it to send her dad back to one of her portals, she can sequester him for a while, which will give him some time to brood before he surprises the team again. Still, the series might redirect its attention to Deathstroke as a primary antagonist for season 2.

Based on the new reports about Slade’s new on-screen backstory and Geoff Johns’ comments at NYCC, the show will take some creative liberties with Deathstroke’s journey to his antihero persona, but we can expect to see a similar villain to antihero narrative nonetheless. Given the show’s apparent affinity for changing its on-screen characters, both with the Slade rumors and Angela’s on-screen counterpart, we could see new versions of the rest of Slade’s family as well.

Deathstroke (2016) #26 – cover. Photo Credit: DC Comics.

So… why does Deathstroke hate the Titans?

Other than being a grumpy old man who can’t get over the fact that his kids don’t want to join the somewhat murderous family business (unless they’re manipulated, by Slade, an event on Azarath, or anything else), Deathstroke blames the team for Grant and Jericho’s deaths (at least for a moment in time).

Sure, the introductory conflict in the Teen Titans (2003) comic paints Slade as a scorned, but misguided, antihero, who suddenly wants to intimidate, punch, and shoot the Teen Titans until he convinces them to give up their heroic endeavors for good. He might seem like he’s heartbroken over having to kill his own son, but it turns out he’s just being possessed by Jericho (thanks to his body-leaping abilities).

The mission to avenge his son has always been there, though. The first Ravager, Grant, dies fighting the Titans while he was working the H.I.V.E. contract. Inheriting the contract and getting a chance for vengeance against the team, whom he holds accountable for his son’s death, is just an added bonus to Slade’s contract work. Even after he finishes the contract, Deathstroke still made it his personal mission to defeat the Teen Titans every now and then.

Since Slade does sometimes help the team of teens, at least conditionally, he doesn’t necessarily hate the Titans. It’s mostly just business, after all. Regardless, there’s no doubt that we’ll see a similar conflict on the series.

The contract also brought us Nightwing

In the foreword to The New Teen Titans: The Judas Contract, Marv Wolfman and George Perez note that the contract birthed Dick Grayson’s new heroic alias as Nightwing. Deathstroke and company’s on-screen saga probably won’t kick off with The Judas Contract immediately — after all, the contract needs time to unfold and mesh with the show’s current events. However, Slade Wilson’s introduction could be the breakthrough Dick needs to finally reinvent his heroic persona. (You know, once Trigon stops possessing him.)

Speaking of Trigon, Deathstroke’s entrance as the main antagonist on the series doesn’t mean we won’t see Trigon again. Unless the on-screen team somehow finds a way to defeat Trigon permanently in season 2, we’ll probably see another unexpected demonic encounter in the future.

As ScreenRant reports, the first season of Titans progressively gained more viewership as the series went on. Now that a canon Titans nemesis and potentially two more sometimes Titans members are rumored to join the series, we can only expect the season 2 premiere to gain even more popularity. We’re thankful for that because we want the series to succeed — so that we can continue watch Titans beyond its second season.