We need to talk about Cyborg's dad, Doom Patrol fans. So many times now on Doom Patrol, Vic has mentioned that he's enabled "privacy mode," and yet his father has still been able to track his location, listen to his conversations and reach him on comms.

The latest grievance happened in the most recent episode, "Puppet Patrol," when Silas Stone tries to screw Vic out of using the S.T.A.R. Labs jet and credit cards only to then grant him the use of the jet to "save the day" after the mission had already been completed. Is he just always monitoring his son secretly through Cyborg's Grid system? How much is his father able to control from afar? How much does Silas want Vic to know about the control he has over his son? How worried should we be about this? I feel like we definitely need to be worried about this!

Nothing bad has come of it…yet. But the potential for foul play is ridiculously high. And I'm not being overprotective here—it seems like Vic is also starting to suspect that something's not right. That was made clear by his continued complaints about how his father shouldn't be able to reach him while in privacy mode as well as his attempts to authenticate the footage of the accident that killed his mother and turned him into Cyborg. Clearly, he feels that there might be more to the story than just an angry tantrum-turned-fatal-accident.

And listen, I'm no expert, but the blast that took him and his mom out doesn't seem to come from the same direction in which he angrily shoved chemicals off the table after getting into an argument with his mom about getting grounded for his grades. The blast appears to be coming from their front right side instead of the left, which means there could be some foul play going on. There's definitely some kind of cover up, but for what?

Is it possible that Vic's dad is responsible for the accident somehow? Did he want to turn his son into Cyborg and this was the easiest way to do it? Honestly, for how much Silas controls (or wants to control) everything Vic does, this seems like the most plausible solution. Vic was just an ordinary teenager fighting for his independence, and this could have been an easy way for his father to make sure he'd always be under Silas' thumb. As for Vic's mom, she could have just gotten caught in the crossfire.

Or maybe the opposite is true and Silas was trying to kill his wife for some unknown, nefarious reason and Vic just got caught in the crossfire. Or was someone else trying to take out Vic's mom, either for her actions or to get revenge on Silas? What were the Stones up to that would put their family in harm's way? And why is Silas working so hard to make sure that Vic doesn't know about it? I have so many questions that hopefully will get some answers soon enough in future episodes of Doom Patrol.

No matter what the reason is for the Stone family accident that created Cyborg in the first place, it's clear that Silas is way too invested in his son's life. Yes, he spent much time and money in saving his son's life and turning him into Cyborg, but isn't that what any loving father would do in the event of a horrible accident?

With everything we've seen from him (and even more that I'm sure we haven't discovered yet) it’s clear that Silas is not just protecting his IP here. He's inappropriately spying on and controlling Vic's life from afar. And pretending to be the hero by sending the jet to take Vic and the rest of the Doom Patrol home from Paraguay after the mission had already ended was just an egregious, horrible display of control that Vic needs to wake up to.

Do you think something shady is going on with Cyborg's dad? Let's chat! Send me your theories on Twitter at @SydneyBucksbaum.
 

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Sydney Bucksbaum covers movies, TV and comics for DCComics.com, and writes about Superman every month in her column, "Super Here For..." Follow her on Twitter at @SydneyBucksbaum.