Just Another Batman Blog

There has been far more interest and emphasis put on Batman villains as gang leaders and organized criminals than as petty criminals and thieves with silly motives.  A need to make the villains believable and grounded in realistic crime grows from the Christopher Nolan films, and also the comic arcs written by Jeph Loeb, Grant Morrison, and of course Frank Miller. Two Face and the Penguin have been reimagined as mob bosses, and The Black Mask has become a better, more compelling villain because of this refocus.   The Black Mask was a villain recently resurrected from obscurity and pushed to the top tier of Batman adversaries. Filling the need for interesting gang leader/mafioso type characters, Black Mask bridges the gap between ordinary organized crime characters like the Falcones , and the more colorful deranged crazies like the Joker and Scarecrow . Roman Sionis first appeared in Batman #386 in 1985. Created by Doug Moench and Tom Mandrake, Roman Sionis appear...

Dr. Hugo Strange (not to be confused with Marvel's Doctor Strange, or Nedor Comic's Doc Strange) appears in Detective Comics months before Batman #1 (the first appearance of the Joker and Catwoman). Dr. Hugo Strange is also very much like another early villainous doctor, Dr. Death. Their physical appearance, and their use of science to create weapons may lead one to question whether the two early characters are that much different. They appear six months apart and are nearly identical. This character was created by Bob Kane and Bill Finger.  Strange originally operates as the leader of a gang, and uses science to create fog machines and super strong 15 foot mutant henchmen. He is also the first villain to deduce Batman's identity, and attempts to auction off the information.   Strange gets reinvented in the early '90s as a psychiatrist obsessed with the Batman, and tries to become the Dark Knight. In the Prey and Terror storylines, he works with the GCPD...

Bet you can't guess the next Batman villain to be featured on my stupid blog. I'll give you some clues, it'll be a game like 20 questions. Some may even call it a riddle... Created by Bill Finger and Dick Sprang (best name in comics history!) in 1948, The Riddler first appeared in Detective Comics #140. Edward Nashton, sometimes named Edward Nigma (E. Nigma being a synonym for mystery), is unlike other villains, as he rarely kills anyone, however, his obsession with solving puzzles and proving his superior intellect puts him right in the same ballpark with all of the other obsessed Batman villains.   Unlike some of the other campy Batman bad guys who were able to be rewritten by contemporary writers into scary villains, The Riddler has always been, and probably will continue to be, a joke. There is something far too silly about a criminal who leaves clues that will lead to his arrest. His modis operandi does not allow him to be taken too seriously. A criminal t...

This latest installment of Batman Villains is going to be all about nostalgia. Most of the time, I complain about squandered opportunities back in the day to make villains more than two dimensional crooks with a theme, and celebrate the recent adaptations, and reimaginnings that have revived characters like the Joker , Mr. Freeze , and the Mad Hatter . But, there is at least one character that has gone the other direction. What happened to Bane? In 1993, Bane makes his debut in the Knightfall story arc. Created by Chuck Dixon, Doug Moench, and Graham Nolan, Bane was supposed to be both a physically imposing villain, and an intelligent criminal mastermind, influenced heavily by the famous Doc Savage character of 1930's pulp. Bane's character is made famous in Knightfall for physically crippling Batman, breaking his back after besting him in hand to hand combat. This is definitely one of the most iconic images in Batman history, right up there with the death of Jason Tod...

I began playing Arkham Asylum again after reading a bit about the new Batman Arkham Origins game set to be released in October. Although the Joker is clearly the main antagonist (as he ought to be in a Batman game), I had forgotten how many other villains had substantial importance to the plot. Some of the supporting villains in this game were reimagined, saved from the borderline ridiculous reputations created in earlier incarnations. Poison Ivy is one of these characters. Almost doomed from the start, Poison Ivy was created in 1966 by Robert Kanigher and Sheldon Moldoff and debuted in Batman #181. She is a reaction to the growing feminism and environmentalism of the time and fit right into the "campy villains with a theme" trend of the 50's and 60's. Connected with plants and ecology, Poison Ivy becomes a vengeful Mother Nature type of character, extracting revenge on people for abuses to the environment. JT Krul was instrumental in developing the character...

Many Batman villains are highly intelligent with severely warped psychosis.  Mr. Freeze is a good example of a highly intelligent scientist bent to extreme measures, making him turn to crime to fund his obsession. Created in 1959 by David Wood and Sheldon Moldoff, Mr. Zero is a prime example of the thematic camp villains committing crimes based on their theme. Mr. Zero's name was changed on the Batman television show to Mr. Freeze, which was then changed in the comics to match. Mr. Freeze has a few origin stories, all of them resulting in his body chemistry changing, requiring his need to wear a supersuit that keeps his temperature below zero. Originally, Mr. Zero was researching cryo-technology, weaponizing it. His freeze weapon backfired and turned him into a sub-zero freak. Paul Dini re-imagined the character as a brilliant scientist whose wife Nora became terminally ill. Dr. Viktor Fries cryogenically freezes his wife until he can find a cure.  An accident during...

Awhile ago, I started writing pieces about Batman villains. Today's post is about Catwoman, most recently portrayed by Anne Hatheway, although not ever named Catwoman in the film, the character has similar traits, appearance, and modis operandi, and shares the same alter ego, Selina Kyle. Selina Kyle, The Cat, or Catwoman, debuted in 1940 in Batman #1, the same issue that debuted The Joker . Created by Bob Kane and Bill Finger, Catwoman appears as a cat themed cat-burglar (clever) wielding a whip. A femme fatale character, Selina Kyle seems to have similarities to several film noir actresses, and Irene Adler from Sherlock Holmes. Her original origin cast her as a former flight attendant with amnesia who began a life of crime. Later stories have her recant this statement, admitting she lied. In 1987 Frank Miller rewrote the origin, casting Selina as a reformed prostitute, turned cat burglar. In Jeph Loeb's Long Halloween/Dark Victory saga, there is a strongly hinted, but...