Axel

Axel

"No! There's been too much destruction! It was a mistake for me to compete. And it would be a mistake to let Twisted Metal continue! ...I want to remove violence from the world!"

—Axel, Twisted Metal: Head-On

Axel is a character from the Twisted Metal series. He drives a two-wheeled contraption throughout the series. The vehicle itself is named after him.

Twisted Metal 2

A prisoner in his own vehicle, Axel has roamed the world looking for an escape. A noble man pushed to the brink, Axel will destroy anyone who prevents his quest for freedom. But true freedom means confronting the man who placed him in the machine.

Vehicle: Axel

Driver: Axel

Info: Male

Age: 35

Born: Louisiana

"For 20 years, I've been stuck in this hellish contraption, hiding and waiting for the day when I would be brave enough to fight back. If I win, I'm confronting the man who did this to me. I promise you, I won't be a freak forever."

Vehicle Type: Daddy's Revenge 209

Handling: Intermediate

Armor: 3/5

Special Weapon: 3/5

• Supernova Shockwave: Axel's Special Weapon is an expanding Supernova Shockwave that originates from the platform his legs are locked into. Striking with the force of nuclear explosion, the weapon does more damage the closer a victim is to Axel. This weapon is also effective when Axel is in the air.

Speed: 2/5

License Plate: REV 13:10 (Revelations 13:10)

Voice actor: Peter J. Macon

Wish: To get revenge on the person who put him in the contraption.

Ending:

Twisted Metal 2 - Axel's Ending

Twisted Metal III

When Axel was a boy, his father strapped two giant wheels to his son's arms and legs. For twenty years, Axel has lived a tormented life filled with daily retread and challenging trips to the bathroom. He's back to win Twisted Metal and become one with his machine forever.

Vehicle: Axel

Driver: Axel

Info: Male

Age: 38

Born: New Orleans, Louisiana

"Many years ago, my father forced me into this terrible machine. When I finally freed myself, I was permanently disfigured. My torment was not over. I'm climbing back into my machine one last time. When I win I'll finally be free!"

Vehicle Type: Daddy's Revenge 209

Handling: Sluggish

Armor: 3/5

Special Weapon: 3/5

• Shockwave: A ring of powerful energy that radiates out and electrocutes any victim nearby.

Speed: 2/5

Wish: To become one with his machine.

Info and Ending:

	Twisted Metal III - Axel's Ending

Twisted Metal 4

Axel returns in Twisted Metal 4 as Super Axel, a metallic-armored version with a spike on the outer side of each tire. He is the boss of Amazonia 3000 B.C. He can be unlocked by completing Tournament mode or inputting ↑ → ↓ ↑ L1 at the Password screen.

Driver

Name: Axel

Info: None

Vehicle

Type: Two-Wheeled Machine

Handling: ?

Armor: ?

Speed: ?

Special Weapon: ?

• Supernova: Sends a shockwave that knocks away close-by vehicles and set them on fire.

Twisted Metal: Black

Axel's wife was murdered when he wasn't even looking. One moment he was the happiest man in the world, only to have his optimism brutally stabbed, strangled, and stomped under the feet of a great evil. Crippled by depression going nowhere, Axel can only hope to win this mysterious contest. But will he have the courage to face his wife's killer?

Driver

Name: Axel

Blackfield Asylum Patient Profile:

SEVERE DEPRESSION

Info: Male

Age: 38

Disorder: Obsessed with revenge fantasies, violent.

Treatment: Note to staff: DO NOT attempt to treat, lost cause.

Wish: Avenge the death of his wife.

Voice actor: J.S. Gilbert

Fueled by pain and anger, Axel builds the two-wheeled death machine for penance. He straps himself between the giant wheels to punish himself for the death of his wife. His guilt is eased each time his bare feet are shredded along the ground. Axel's Special Attack lets loose an electrified ring to damage nearby opponents.

Vehicle

Name: Axel

Vehicle Type: Two-Wheeled Machine

Control: 6/10

Speed: 5/10

Armor: 5/10

Special Weapon: 6/10

• Shockwave: Axel shoots out a blue ring of energy that blows the opponent up into the air.

• Encasement Rage: Axel's secondary Special Attack can be used by quickly pressing ↑ ↑ ↑. It allows Axel to use his machine's giant wheels to his advantage, used by ramming into an opponent.

Story

Axel is looking for the person who killed his wife. He feels responsible for her death and feels revenge is the only sense of closure he will get. So he enters a contest hosted by Calypso who said that he will reveal the killer.

Dialogue

1. "Someone killed my wife. She was my life. Calypso says if I win, he'll reveal the killer to me. What husband would refuse?"
2. "We were at the park. I looked down at my paper...when I looked back up, she was gone. My wife...gone."
3. "3 months later, her body was shipped to us...in pieces. It took 8 months to get it all back...my dear wife..."
4. "Minion won last year's contest. But I'm not afraid. If I can find a way past his force field, I know I can beat him."
5. "I made this vehicle with my own hands. It's my penance, my punishment for letting my wife die. I will not fail her."
6. "This battleground is small and full of enemies. I must keep moving if I want to survive this."
7. "This is the last battleground in the contest. If I win I'll discover the truth. I'll face my wife's killer..."
8. "The law won't stand in my way. Where was the law when my wife went missing? To me, they're as guilty as the killer."

Ending

Axel won the contest and went to Calypso and demanded to know who killed his wife. It turns out that it was Sweet Tooth who killed his wife. Axel then began blaming himself for his wife's death, until Sweet Tooth said that she didn't die easy and that she begged for him as he killed her. Axel then shot Sweet Tooth, killing him. Although Sweet Tooth was dead, so was his wife. He then drove off, deciding to stay in his vehicle with his powers. Stating "The clown is dead, but so is my wife, I WILL NEVER BE FREE!"

Twisted Metal: Small Brawl

Unveiled in a deleted ending, Axel is the kid in the wheelchair that Calypso kicks down the hill in the intro cutscene of TM:SB. His wish at the end was to walk again, which Calypso grants with a robotic prosthetic. However, Calypso has control with a remote and makes Axel walk into rakes that are scattered about. The ending was cut due to potential offense it may cause to paraplegics. He is unlocked on the level Playground Peril by shooting the middle swing and collecting the icon.

Axel is usually known for having average stats in all categories. In TM:SB, Axel is noted for having moderate armor and somewhat low acceleration and top speed. However, he has absolutely exceptional turning.

Driver

Name: Axel

Vehicle

Name: Axel/Daddy's Revenge 209

Armor: 6/10

Acceleration: 4/10

Top Speed: 4/10

Handling: 10/10

Special Weapon: Axel first fires a single missile, when hit by an enemy, He spins wildly, while firing the same missiles to the targeted enemy.

Deleted Ending:

Twisted Metal: Head-On

Name: Axel

Vehicle: Axel

Age: 38

Height: 6'3

Weight: 280 (An extra 60 is contributed by his arm and leg augmentations)

Handling: 5/10

Armor: 6/10

Speed: 4/10

Special Weapon: Axel's signature supernova shockwave returns, with an upgrade bonus as well.

Voice actor: Scott MacDonald

It’s been over 10 years ever since Axel's father incarcerated him inside a two wheeled machine. Finally going against his father, Axel in defiance tore his arms free from the contraption only to find later that he was incapable of living without it. He came across Dr. Zemu, who created cybernetic limbs for his arms and feet that would allow him to be able to pilot his vehicle once again. However, there was one thing Axel had to do in return. Should he win the Twisted Metal Tournament, Axel must turn his wish over to the Dr. Zemu.

Twisted Metal: Lost

Vehicle: Axel

Driver: Axel

Axel is still aching over the murder of his wife. Feeling her death was his fault, he chooses to stay strapped to the wheels, his feet dragging against hot asphalt, ripped apart, bleeding, and causing him tremendous pain. One day he hopes he will have done his penance and the spirit of his wife will forgive him.

Twisted Metal (2012)

Axel (the vehicle) is a returning vehicle in this game. Those who pre-ordered received a code to unlock Axel 30 days early. If not, then the game needs to be updated and then it can be played.

Vehicle Type: Big Wheel Contraption

Speed: 2/5

Armor: 3/5 (170 pts.)

Special Weapon: 3/5

• Spiked War Wheel (60-100 pts.)
• Crowd Control (20 pts.)

Overall: 8/15

License Plate: ?

Axel's new primary special, "Spiked War Wheel", is similar to the secret special in Twisted Metal: Black, conjoining both wheels into one with petruding spikes. The special will shield the player in a spinning wheel of death, which can be steered into opponents for significant damage. The secondary special is the classic shockwave that can also be charged up to knock back enemies caught in the blast radius.

Axel also has a unique trait of being able to jump higher than any other vehicle in the game. This perk comes with a price, however: Axel has fairly low armor and slow special regeneration.

Trivia

• Axel's name is most likely a reference to the fact that he is essentially a part of the axel between the two giant wheels.
• Despite being imprisoned in the machine for over twenty years, Axel hasn't suffered from muscle atrophy. In fact, he's pretty well built; this may be because, theoretically, it should take extreme strength to control his vehicle.
• Axel is technically the first character to have two specials. As with a cheat code, Axel can cause severe damage to a vehicle simply by ramming them, somewhat similar to Hammerhead, except Axel does not go on top nor any special sound effect is heard.
• It may be possible that because Axel is a machine, he is immortal. Several pieces of evidence point to this is the fact that he has been the same age (38 years old) in several Twisted Metal games, even though the tournaments are held annually. And the fact that he has medium armor, despite the fact that his body is exposed to the ballistic projectiles fired by the contestants. And that Mr .Grimm, another character whose body is exposed during the contest, has horrendous armor. One could argue the giant wheels shield his sides.
• Axel has appeared in all games except Twisted Metal.
  • Although, Axel was a concept in it.
• Axel in Twisted Metal (2012) is not a character, but his vehicle is useable.
• Axel is the only unlockable character in Twisted Metal: Black other than Minion who does not require the player to destroy a grounded control panel to unlock.
• Sweet Tooth's appearance in Axel's Twisted Metal: Black ending doesn't make sense. Sweet Tooth was a contestant, therefore for Axel to win, he should've already killed Sweet Tooth. However, it is possible that Calypso revived him so Axel could find out who killed his wife and kill him personally.
• Axel, along with Shadow, Cousin Eddy, ATV, and Tower Tooth, are the only vehicles that have 2 special weapons in Twisted Metal: Head-On, while everyone else only has one.
• Axel, in Twisted Metal 2, was accompanied by a snake. However, this snake never appeared in any subsequental appearances.
• The appearence of Axel in Twisted Metal III suffers from many continuity errors. His ending in Twisted Metal 2 shows that Axel confronted his father, tore his arms out of the machine and walked off with only half of his arms left. In TMIII, he is in the machine, but his arms appear to be completely fine in his ending, and his bio states that he climbs back into his machine. This doesn't make sense, because he only has half of his arms, with the other halves still in his machine. His arms would need to be stitched back together in order for him to use it again, but there is no stitchmarks. Even if the previous game's ending was taken into account, he wouldn't be able to use the machine again anyways because he had walked away from it, leaving it in a field. Because of these reasons, it remains unknown how his arms appear to be fully intact, and how or why he uses the machine again in TMIII. This is likely due to the change of developers, with 989 studios wanting to include a popular character regardless of past games.
• Axel's license plate in Twisted Metal 2, REV 13:10, refers to the passage Revelations 13:10 which reads "He that leadeth into captivity shall go into captivity; He that killeth with the sword must be killed with a sword. Here is the patience and the faith of saints." (King James Bible, Cambridge Ed.)
• Axel's Twisted Metal: Small Brawl ending was removed due to the fact that it has possibly offensive content. In the ending, Axel is in a wheel chair and he asks Calypso to make him legs. Calypso does build him a pair of robotic legs, but Calypso has a remote that controls these legs which hurts him by making him walk into some rakes. This decision may have resulted in Axel being switched from default character to unlockable status, as he would have been the only default character without an ending. Axel's driver can still be briefly seen in the game's intro.
• In Twisted Metal 2, whenever he uses his special, he says "Axel Power!" He is one of two TM2 characters who speak when activating the special (the other being Grasshopper).
• In Twisted Metal: Black, despite Axel's love for his wife, he did not use the wish to bring her back and instead used it to attempt to ease his own pain and get revenge.

Quotes

Twisted Metal 2

• "Father! Please! Release me!"
• "No, father! I've learned my lesson! Let me show you what I've learned!"
• "I am a free man! And you are no longer my father!"

Twisted Metal III

• "AAAAAAHHH! Let me out of heeeeeereeee!!"

Twisted Metal: Black

• "I had won the contest. I went to Calypso and demanded my prize. I wanted to know who killed my wife... and I wanted revenge."
• "It was him! That freak in the ice cream truck! He was ALWAYS around the neighborhood! I had not been more careful. I should have sensed something was wrong."
• "It was MY fault! Maybe I'M the one to blame for my wife's death!"
• "The clown is dead. But so is my wife. I will never be free."

Twisted Metal: Head-On

• "I promised him... my victory wish."
• "I'm sorry. But I... wish... for peaceAAAGGGHHH!!"
• "Let me out of this thing!"