The modern gaming landscape is filled with big stories and bigger ideas. Many AAA gaming titles are as packed with lore as a Homeric epic. Hell, FromSoftware even brought in Game of Thrones creator George R.R. Martin to fill out the expansive narrative corners of Elden Ring‘s the Lands Between! That was not always the case, however.The concept of “lore” was not frequently a consideration for ’90s and ’00s games which were primarily concerned with generating a satisfying gameplay experience through primitive graphics. And yet, gamers came to respect and cherish these titles’ meager canon anyway. There’s no better example of this phenomenon than Sony’s vehicular combat series Twisted Metal. Amid all the carnage of Calypso’s demolition derby, certain characters, weapons, locations, and even themes began to emerge. cnx.cmd.push(function() {cnx({playerId: "106e33c0-3911-473c-b599-b1426db57530",}).render("0270c398a82f44f49c23c16122516796");});Peacock TV series adaptation Twisted Metal got to pay homage to that unlikely mythology in its first season. Now the second season is poised to dig even deeper into the history of the games. Showrunner Michael Jonathan Smith and stars Anthony Mackie (John Doe), Stephanie Beatriz (Quiet), Joe Seanoa (Sweet Tooth), and Anthony Carrigan (Calypso) stopped by Den of Geek Studio at San Diego Comic-Con to tease what’s to come. “The lore is so unhinged. It’s just crazy,” showrunner Smith says of the Twisted Metal franchise. “We have dockets in the writers’ room that is so thick of all the weapons and levels to make sure we have all those Easter eggs so fans can ‘Leonardo DiCaprio [pointing] meme’ the screen at all times. It’s always so fun to include that stuff.”Per Smith, the Leonardo DiCaprio pointing meme material this time around will include some surprising references to one of the story’s most beloved characters. “We included some Axel lore that is so nuts. If you’re really deep in the Twisted Metal lore and you see what we included from Axel’s backstory ,you’ll be like ‘I cannot believe that the Twisted Metal creators and writers included this stuff.’ It’s so deep and it’s so insane how we included it.”While Twisted Metal‘s first season was able to introduce plenty of familiar faces from the game, including the iconic conflagratory clown Sweet Tooth (played by Joe Seanoa and voiced by Will Arnett), season two fully reveals the man behind the demolition derby curtain. Calypso, played by Anthony Carrigan (a.k.a. Noho Hank in Barry and Metamorpho in this summer’s Superman) is a wonderfully deranged dandy who fits the Twisted Metal universe as comfortably as his preposterous wig fits his head. “Honestly the wig does all the acting. I take very little credit, it’s all the hair,” Carrigan jokes. “The blueprint of the character was there but we were able to collaborate and have fun. I took a lot of liberties, I’m gonna say. A lot of liberties. But I think the whole vibe of the cast just really likes to have fun – push the envelope and have a good time.”“It’s a testament to you, dude,” Mackie adds to Carrigan. “A regular actor would have came in, not taken risks, not pushed the envelope, and just stood there and said the lines. But all the weird shit came from you. You went full weird. It was beautiful to see. It was like ‘oh what’s this dude gonna be’ and then you’d be on set and hear [INDESCRIBABLE HAUNTING LAUGH].”The flexible format of the show’s premise also allows for Twisted Metal to experiment with some new characters as well, including the introduction of one particular post-apocalyptic heavy who is so revolting that this interviewer begged Smith for an apology. “When we broke the idea of Big Baby, I explained it to my wife and she was like ‘I hate Big Baby,'” Smith says. “She was really mad at me that we came up with it. She told me to cut Big Baby and I said ‘Big Baby stays, honey. It’s Big Baby or me.'”We appreciate the effort to cancel Big Baby anyway, Nan. The first three episodes of Twisted Metal season 2 premiere Thursday, July 31 on Peacock. New episodes premiere Thursdays culminating with the finale on August 28.The post Twisted Metal Season 2 Will Include Deep Lore For a Beloved Game Character appeared first on Den of Geek.