''Death Battle'' (stylized as ''DEATH BATTLE!'') is an American animated

web series A web series (also known as webseries, short-form series, and web show) is a series of short scripted or non-scripted online videos, generally in episodic form, released on the Internet (i.e. World Wide Web), which first emerged in the late 1 ...

about

battleboarding Battleboarding, also known as versus debating and "who would win" debating, is an activity that involves discussing and debating around Combat, hypothetical fights between individuals; most popularly, Character (arts), fictional characters. August ...

. Originally published by the website ScrewAttack in 2010, the show has changed considerably over its history. It is the longest-running web series in the battleboarding genre, and has gained a

cult following A cult following is a group of fans who are highly dedicated to a person, idea, object, movement, or work, often an artist, in particular a performing artist, or an artwork in some medium. The latter is often called a cult classic. A film, boo ...

Format

The show is narrated by fictional hosts named Wiz and Boomstick, respectively voiced by series creators Ben Singer and Chad James. These characters were originally disembodied voices, but as the show progressed they became animated characters. Wiz is a genius scientist who presents scientific information and mathematical calculations, while Boomstick is a street-smart redneck that discusses weapons, armor, and feats. Each episode of ''Death Battle'' features a matchup between fictional characters from different media that have similar powers, skills, or backstories. The majority of each episode showcases background information about each character while analyzing their abilities and feats, and ends with a fully-animated battle scene that decides the winner of the matchup, taking into account the prior analysis. The show's formula is inspired by shows such as '' Animal Face-Off'' and ''

Deadliest Warrior ''Deadliest Warrior'' is an American television program in which information on historical or modern warriors and their weapons are used to determine which of them is the "deadliest" based upon tests performed during each episode. The show is c ...

'', but uses fictional characters in place of animals or historical warriors. Notable episodes of ''Death Battle'' include "

Goku Son Goku is a fictional character and the main protagonist of the ''Dragon Ball'' manga series created by Akira Toriyama. He is based on Sun Wukong (known as ''Son Gokū'' in Japan and the Monkey King in the West), a main character of the cl ...

Superman Superman is a superhero created by writer Jerry Siegel and artist Joe Shuster, which first appeared in the comic book ''Action Comics'' Action Comics 1, #1, published in the United States on April 18, 1938.The copyright date of ''Action Comics ...

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Galactus Galactus () is a fictional character appearing in American comic books published by Marvel Comics. Formerly a mortal man, he is a cosmic entity who consumes planets to sustain his life force, and serves a functional role in the upkeep of the p ...

Unicron Unicron is a fictional villain from the ''Transformers'' media franchise. Designed by Floro Dery, he was introduced in the 1986 animated film '' The Transformers: The Movie'' and has since reappeared in '' Transformers: Armada'', '' Transform ...

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Makima is a fictional character from Tatsuki Fujimoto's manga series ''Chainsaw Man''. She is the main antagonist of Part 1, the "Public Safety Saga", and is the caretaker of main character Denji, promising him food and shelter if he comes under her c ...

". ''Death Battle'' has featured multiple styles of animation across different episodes, including 2D pixelated animations and 3D animations integrating

motion capture Motion capture (sometimes referred as mocap or mo-cap, for short) is the process of recording high-resolution motion (physics), movement of objects or people into a computer system. It is used in Military science, military, entertainment, sports ...

technology. The show's battle animations typically feature high levels of

graphic violence Graphic violence refers to the depiction of especially explicit or detailed acts of violence in mass media. It may be real, simulated live action, or animated. Intended for viewing by mature audiences, ''graphic'' in this context is a synonym ...

Spin-off shows

''Death Battle'' has had multiple spin-off series. ScrewAttack created the series ''Desk of Death Battle'', which showcases pop-culture trivia that the ScrewAttack team found interesting while researching and writing the main show, presented by ''Death Battle''

supporting character A supporting character is a character in a narrative that is not the focus of the primary storyline, but is important to the plot/protagonist, and appears or is mentioned in the story enough to be more than just a minor character or a cameo a ...

Jocelyn the Intern, who is voiced by

Lisa Foiles Lisa Renee Foiles Cloninger (born September 29, 1986) is an American actress, presenter, video game journalist, model and author, who first came to prominence as a cast member of the Nickelodeon series ''All That'', later voicing Jocelyn the Inte ...

. Additionally, ''DBX'' is a spin-off series that, like ''Death Battle'', features both 2D and 3D animated battles, but with winners decided by a poll among fans rather than research or debate.

History

ScrewAttack (2010–2019)

''Death Battle'' debuted in 2010 as a web series published by the website ScrewAttack; ''Death Battle'' became ScrewAttack's most popular show. The website began to shift its focus towards the show, and in 2019 ScrewAttack rebranded to focus exclusively on ''Death Battle''. The show was acquired by

Rooster Teeth Rooster Teeth Productions, LLC was an American entertainment company headquartered in Austin, Texas. Founded in 2003 by Burnie Burns, Matt Hullum, Geoff Ramsey, Jason Saldaña, Gus Sorola, and Joel Heyman, Rooster Teeth was a subsidiary o ...

, and all of ScrewAttack's existing content was moved to the Rooster Teeth website.

Rooster Teeth (2019–2024)

''Death Battle'' was published by Rooster Teeth from 2019 until 2024, at which point Rooster Teeth was shut down by its parent company,

Warner Bros. Discovery Warner Bros. Discovery, Inc. (WBD) is an American Multinational corporation, multinational mass media and Outline of entertainment, entertainment Conglomerate (company), conglomerate headquartered in New York City. It was formed from WarnerMedi ...

. In 2020,

Amazon Prime Video Amazon Prime Video, known simply as Prime Video, is an American subscription video on-demand over-the-top streaming television service owned by Amazon. The service primarily distributes films and television series produced or co-produced by ...

sponsored a promotional episode of ''Death Battle'' to advertise the second season of '' The Boys''. Rooster Teeth created a spin-off

card game A card game is any game that uses playing cards as the primary device with which the game is played, whether the cards are of a traditional design or specifically created for the game (proprietary). Countless card games exist, including famil ...

based on the show, titled ''Death Battle: The Game''.

Independent (2024–present)

Following the closure of Rooster Teeth, fans of ''Death Battle'' speculated about the show's future, and the

hashtag A hashtag is a metadata tag operator that is prefaced by the hash symbol, ''#''. On social media, hashtags are used on microblogging and photo-sharing services–especially Twitter and Tumblr–as a form of user-generated tagging that enable ...

"#SaveDeathBattle" trended on

Twitter Twitter, officially known as X since 2023, is an American microblogging and social networking service. It is one of the world's largest social media platforms and one of the most-visited websites. Users can share short text messages, image ...

. The rights to the show were acquired by series creators Ben Singer, Chad James, Austin Harper, and Sam Mitchell, making it an independent series. In July 2024, the staff of the show announced a

Kickstarter Kickstarter, PBC is an American Benefit corporation, public benefit corporation based in Brooklyn, New York City, that maintains a global crowdfunding platform focused on creativity. The company's stated mission is to "help bring creative project ...

campaign to fund future episodes. The campaign surpassed its original goal of $75,000 within the first twenty-one minutes of launching. The campaign ended on August 29, 2024, and raised a total of $740,000 from 7,836 backers.

Episodes

: Plus bonus episode

Season 1 (2010–2013)

Season 2 (2013–2015)

Season 3 (2016)

Season 4 (2017)

Season 5 (2018)

Season 6 (2019)

Season 7 (2020)

Season 8 (2021)

Season 9 (2022)

Season 10 (2023)

2024 episodes

After ''Death Battle'' became independent, the show stopped using the original season format, with episodes instead being internally categorized by year of release.

2025 episodes

Reception

''Death Battle'' is one of the most popular web series dedicated to

, and the show's YouTube channel has been described as a "central hub" for fans of the genre. The show has a cult following, and several online communities exist both for discussing the show and writing fan-made episodes. It also inspired similar shows such as ''Super Power Beat Down'' and ''Grudge Match''. ''Death Battle'' helped popularize the use of mathematical calculations to determine the strength of fictional characters; in the battleboarding fandom, such calculations are called "calcs". The show has also inspired a number of

fan fiction Fan fiction or fanfiction, also known as fan fic, fanfic, fic or FF, is fiction typically written in an amateur capacity by fans as a form of fan labor, unauthorized by, but based on, an existing work of fiction. The author uses copyrighted ...

sites and

crossover fiction A crossover is the placement of two or more otherwise discrete fictional characters, settings, or universes into the context of a single story. They can arise from legal agreements between the relevant copyright holders (known as intercompany ...

, most notably Death Battle Fanon Wiki.Frederickson, Laurence A. (April 21, 2020).
The Elegant World of Fan Fiction: Its Effects on Literature in the 21st Century
'.

University of Texas at Austin The University of Texas at Austin (UT Austin, UT, or Texas) is a public university, public research university in Austin, Texas, United States. Founded in 1883, it is the flagship institution of the University of Texas System. With 53,082 stud ...

. p. 6 It has also faced occasional controversy and backlash online surrounding the chosen winners of some episodes.

Notes

References

{{Rooster Teeth 2010 web series debuts 2010s American adult animated television series 2020s American adult animated television series Action comedy web series Adult comedy web series American adult animated action television series American adult computer-animated television series Rooster Teeth franchises Television shows about death games