Just Another Batman Blog

Phil Cho's commission Another in a list of stupid villains that could be cool and scary under the right writers, Killer Moth was created in 1951. Bill Finger, Dick Sprang, and Lew Schwartz created the character for Batman #63. Introduced as a common criminal already in prison, Killer Moth has no original identity. He sees Batman as a vigilante resource for the police, and upon release, decides to set himself up as an "anti-Batman", a resource for criminals. He becomes a grifter, and creates for himself the identity of Cameron Van Cleer, a wealthy businessman and philantropist. As an alter ego to his alter ego, he also becomes Killer Moth, a henchman for hire with a moth motif, complete with workable wings and a spiderman webslinger-esque cacoon gun. Now, the premise of a Batman for criminals, a gun for hire that anyone can call with a beeper, is a pretty cool idea. Later on, other mercenary/hitman characters get created, but Killer Moth had the idea first. However, ...

The 12 issue miniseries Hush was published in the regular  Batman monthly title in 2003. It was amazing, and really got me hooked on Batman stories. The title character Hush, created for this particular story is one of those retconned characters that don't feel forced and helped to give Batman's infamous backstory a bit more foundation. Tommy Elliot, first appearing in Batman #609, was created by Jeph Loeb and Jim Lee as one of Bruce Wayne's childhood friends from the same social status. Elliot is a sociopath, murdering both parents for the family fortune, jealous of Bruce Wayne for losing his parents first, and devoting a life to plotting revenge, for some reason. Eventually he returns to Gotham, partners with the Riddler and puts together a scheme involving many Batman villains with the goal of taking down Batman/Bruce Wayne. This makes the 12 issue Hush storyline great, as it incorporates a large portion of the Batman villains gallery, mixes it with a who-dunnit my...

Comics, like most western media, has had a diversity problem. With origins in the late 30s and early 40s, born of pulp fiction magazines, comics character creation relied heavily on stereotypes. Asian characters were treated particularly badly. We still have trouble today creating Asian characters who are not martial artists, or wise old Eastern mystics (also kung fu masters somehow). However, a martial arts based character, depending on the martial art, probably should be Asian. Richard Dragon was one of those characters, with his own title, in the early 70s. In 1975, Lady Shiva made her first apearance in Richard Dragon #5, created by Dennis ONeil, and Ric Estrada. Like most stereotypical Asian characters, Lady Shiva is a master martial artist, an assassin, has a mentor/teacher named O'Sensei, and has a daughter with a dude named King Snake, and has aliases that include names like the Paper Monkey, and the Jade Canary. Over time, the Lady Shiva character has been refined a...

There are reasons we create monsters in fiction. Stephen King once said "Monsters are real. [. . .] They live inside us, and sometimes they win". This echoes an idea in sociology, which I couldn't find a reference for, which claims that society creates monsters as analogies to the crazy, animalistic behavior humanity is capable of. Ghosts, and goblins, fairies and witches, demons, ghouls are all symbols for psychopathic activities that real people commit. Serial murder, rape, cannibalism, kidnapping are all traits of the fictional monsters we've created. There are no real monsters, spoiler alert. As King said, it's only us. Victor Zsasz was created in 1992 by Alan Grant and Norm Breyfogle in Shadow of the Bat #1. He is portrayed as a serial killer, a sociopath who considers what he does to others as merciful, freeing them from their earthly misery. Zsasz keeps track of the souls he frees by marking his body with tally marks. This tally mark idea is echoed by ...

DC comics has, over time, delved into supernatural and religious contexts to come up with superheroes and storylines. The Spectre, Dr Fate, Ragman, Azrael, and Zauriel, among others, are all heroes who take their powers from religious artifacts, or mythologies. There was even a Batman Elseworlds story Holy Terror , where he was an ordained priest by day, Batman by night.  However, there aren't many stories in contemporary comics involving the believers. Pulp fiction from the 1920s and 30s, a place where comics gleaned much of their source material, often used cults as villainous foils.  Belief can be a strong and terrifying phenomenon, and there aren't too many stories that explore that. Robert Anton Wilson once said "Belief is the death of Intelligence". Nietzsche said the foundation of Belief is "blindness and intoxication, and an eternal song over the waves in which Reason is drowned". Anyone who can manipulate Belief could be a terrifying an...

The more into this Batman villains blog thing (I'm not really sure what this is) I've gone, the more I realized there are so many evil dudes in this rogues gallery. There aren't very many women though. Aside from the big 3 ( Catwoman , Poison Ivy , and Harley Quinn ), Batman's female adversaries appear to be next generation versions of older male villains (like Clayface , or the Ventriloquist ), assassins from the League of Assassins ( Talia , Cheshire, Lady Vic, Lady Shiva ) or henchmen (henchwomen?) for male villains, which is how Harley Quinn started (Query and Echo, Dollhouse, Lark, Fright), or throwaway villains that either get killed off, or taken advantage of by other male villains.   This post features the Magpie, whom I believe has been misused and done wrong. Created in 1986 by John Byrne, Magpie debuted in Man of Steel #3 , and was the first villain to be apprehended by the Superman/Batman team up. However, she continued to be a villain primarily for...

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...