Just Another Batman Blog

  The Royal Flush Gang aren't really a Batman exclusive team of villains. They were created in 1966 by Gardner Fox and Mike Sekowsky for The Justice League of America #43. So, technically, since Batman is a member of the Justice League, this counts. But also, I like this concept, and it's my blog... This is a gang of thieves, the theme is playing cards, obviously, and the five members of the team identify with a different face card. There are a few different iterations of this group.  The first group dressed all as Clubs, and then changed to Spades. Kerry, Queenie, Jack, Thomas Dillon (the Ten), and Amos Fortune used "stellaration" to change their luck and help commit burglaries. They fought the Justice League three times, and the Joker . They were all killed during their last battle with the Justice League.  The second group is the most recognizable. Created in 1982 by Gerry Conway and Don Heck. I'll come back to them...  There are a few other versions of the Roy...

  Created in 2020 by James Tynion IV and Guillem March, the Underbroker is a cool addition to the Gotham underground. I've written extensively on this blog about the difference between cartoon villains, and grounded criminals. I have brought up the idea that most criminals do not see themselves as bad people, and commit crimes for a variety of reasons and motivations. As I've said before, there are no Snidely Whiplashes running around tying damsels to train tracks, but there sure are plenty of Bernie Madoffs and Whitey Bulgers running rackets and pyramid schemes.    The Underbroker appears to be what the Terrible Trio could have been. Through his law firm, Graves Willock and Crain where he is a senior partner, Harlon Graves launders money for Gotham's criminals by hiding it in the hedge funds he manages. The Underbroker is THE banker for Gotham Crime. His clients must include most of the other characters on this blog...  Catwoman , the Penguin , Black Mask , Two Fac...

  This is a group whose membership changes depending on the era, the writer, and the medium. The League of Assassins, also known as the League of Shadows, was originally created by Danny O'Neil and Neal Adams for Strange Adventures #215 in 1968. I already featured a few members of the League in this blog.  According to DC canon, The League was founded by Ra's Al Ghul in 1013 AD. However, if Ra's Al Ghul is intended to be the historic imam Hassan-i Sabbath, than the League was actually founded in 1090. The League carries out missions to destabilize, destroy and allow reformation of what they consider to be decadent and irredeemable societies. The League is a global terrorist organization, with a purpose seemingly higher than usual terror groups whose goals are more oriented toward national or religious solidarity.  The League first appeared in a Deadman story, but due to its global nature, is also an opponent of the Green Arrow, Richard Dragon, Black Canary, The Question...

  I've said it before on this blog, and I'll say it again, good villains in fiction need good criminal motivations. Good Batman villains need to be more than obsessed with beating Batman. The idea of a villain plotting and scheming to take down Batman, like some Western gunslinger kid looking to out shoot the most notorious outlaw, is only really good and compelling maybe one time. We had that one time in Batman comics, it was called Knightfall . After Bane's storyarc, we didn't need to revisit a personal crusade to tear down and ruin Batman for no other reason than bragging rights. However, comicbook writers continued to do just that. We got Bane, followed by Hush . The Joker  has done it multiple times. This is getting out of hand.  Simon Hurt was created by Grant Morrison in 2008, based on an unnamed scientist character created by Sheldon Maldoff and Charles Paris for a one issue story in Batman #156 in 1963. His backstory is a bit of a crazy retcon, but stay with...

 Throughout Batman's publication history, there have been several Alice in Wonderland themed characters. The Mad Hatter appeared on this blog before. There are several others, and in 2008 Paul Dini and Dustin Nguyen brought them all together for a crossover event, creating a few characters in the process. Below is a membership breakdown:  The Mad Hatter was created in 1948 by Bill Finger and Bob Kane. His full write up is here .  The Tweedles : TweedleDee and TweedleDum, created in 1943 by Don Cameron and Jerry Robinson, are a pair of nearly identical mob bosses. Together they mastermind the crimes they commit, and direct others to implement them. During War Games, the original TweedleDum is killed, and his twin takes his place... which is a writer's ploy to undo another writer's dumb decision and make continuity work. Obviously. The Tweedles have this weird obsession with Lewis Carroll's Alice books, independently from the Mad Hatter, and a few other characters who ar...

  Earlier I wrote about the Terrible Trio . This gang of three white collar criminal dudes hide behind animal motifs, The Great White Shark, the Vulture, and the Fox. Gotham also has another threesome criminal gang, all women, all arthropod aliases, all criminal.  Created in 1966 by Robert Kanigher and Sheldon Moldoff, these three vamps debuted together for a Poison Ivy driven story. The Silken Spider, Tiger Moth, and Dragonfly made such a name for themselves criminally, that they became known as the World's Public Enemies, and went by the aliases Public Enemy Number 1, Number 2, and Number 3. They appear to be high stakes thieves in their original incarnation. Poison Ivy apparently is jealous for some reason and wants their fame.  Later, they are rebooted as members of the League of Assassins . I'm a fan of this idea, I don't think you can have enough agents for the League. Kevin Smith gives Tiger Moth a cameo in his unfinished Batman run.  This Tiger Moth incarnat...

Pulp fiction seems to have a villain motivation problem. Back when I wrote the first post for this blog, about the Joker , I included a quote from Ben Bova. He states, "in the real world there are no villains. No one actually sets out to do evil [. . .] There are no villains cackling and rubbing their hands in glee as they contemplate their evil deeds". Villainy, in pulp fiction, is just bad guys doing bad things for no other reason, presumably, than to be bad. Snidley Whiplash hasn't any reasons for tying women to traintracks, normal people don't do that. But, normal people do hatch plans like Iago to psychologically control others through gaslighting, manipulation, rumors, and drama. Real people do cheat and steal to amass wealth. There is no believability or realism to Snidley Whiplash's villainy, but sociopaths and white collar criminals do exist.   These characters, the Terrible Trio, are far more like Snidley Whiplash. Created in 1958 by Dave Wood a...

Ruling Gotham from a shadowed perch, behind granite and lime. They watch you at your hearth, they watch you in your bed. Speak not a whispered word about them, or they'll send the Talon for your head Retconning in comics happens all the time. This insufferable need for fanboys to have an understandable continuity butts up against new writers and ideas. Storytelling in comics has become better, taken more seriously, and sometimes new ideas require backstory that may or may not come into conflict with already established continuity, hence reboots and retcons.  In 2011, Scott Snyder introduced the Court of Owls into the Gotham/Batman mythos. Borrowing from real world conspiracy theories of secret societies like the Illuminati, Free Masons, and Skull and Bones, Snyder created a clandestine group of rich elites that control Gotham's destiny through extortion and murder. They manipulate city politics to favor their own interests, and cultivate hitmen known as Talons...

The Gotham mafia may be one of my favorite Batman villains. No one else seems to fawn over them the way fans do for any of the other Batman villains. Looking up Falcone or Maroni fan art on the internet is useless. I can find a billion awful Harley Quinn pieces, but Carmine Falcone turns up just a few scans from comic pages. Batman's origin always included becoming Batman to fight crime in Gotham, a city with a high crime rate. Miller, I think, wanted to ground his Batman in reality, and historically big cities had organized crime problems. Gotham, being the culmination of every corrupted, dark, and dangerous part of every city everywhere, should have organized crime. Bob Kane, Sheldon Maldoff and Bill Finger created Lew Moxon as the crime boss responsible for Batman's parents' murder, Sal Maroni as the mobster responsible for disfiguring Two Face, and Tony Zucco as the racketeer who put a hit on Dick Grayson's parents. But organized crime didn't take a fron...