“Professor Hugo Strange”

Another racist cover, thankfully unrelated to this issue’s contents. And a few firsts: Batman doesn’t kill anyone! And Hugo Strange, one of Batman’s recurring foes in his first appearance.

(Batman Wiki also suggests Jerry Robinson may have participated in the art, which is the first mention of this I’ve seen yet.)

This one starts with Batman witnessing a drive-by.

I don’t know why, but Batman’s design, expression, and poses continually radiate cuteness to me. Lego Batman was onto something with its portrayal.

If I leave no other legacy, please let it be this:

Batman is a grumpy kitty.

More pink backgrounds (which rules), and a rare look of genuine empathy on Batman’s face as he hears the dying G-Man’s cryptic last words.

GRUMPY KITTY.

Also, Batman: framed for murder!

The police decide to shoot first and ask questions later. How unrealistic *cough cough* ahem. Does kinda look like Bruce is stealing this guy’s wallet.

Our villain! Hugo Strange.

Who I am having trouble seeing as anyone but Dr. Venture.

A lot of this issue involves Bruce kitted in his immaculate suit while smoking in his armchair going, “Hmmmmm.”

While Dr. Strange gets pissy elsewhere in town.

Hugo Strange has blanketed the city in a “queer fog.”

Hugo Strange said happy pride.

Also, living for these pinks!

Batman’s recurring weird hunchy meatman creep pose really freaks me out.

The only time he smiles is when he’s beating the shit out of people. And he’s doing quips this whole issue!

Honestly, this “panther”-like dude hitting these goons like a “cyclone” while totally making light of the situation is pretty scary. Idk? Actually, this is the first moment I’ve felt like, oh, he’s a genuine boogey-man. He WILL hurt you. And so far he has no real code of conduct, though we will see him spare the villain at issue’s end – one of the first moves towards Bruce’s famous prohibition on killing his foes. He does turn Doctor Death over to the police in an earlier issue as well, I guess. But he’s killed someone or let someone die in most issues so far?

This panel gets in on a technicality, since he only uses it to summon the police, but he’s got a gun AGAIN.

There are some really lovely atmospheric panels in this issue too that transcend the rest of the book, imo.

The mysterious silhouettes are iconic to me. Kind of haunting. They capture the as yet un-sublimated essence of the character to be and start to give him mythological proportions.

But also, GRUMPY KITTY. There are weird recurring segments in these issues, including: Batman looking like you took his mousey away when he suddenly gets the lights shone on him.

“GRRR!” – The Batman

And how he gets blackjacked AGAIN! Batman has suffered so much head trauma in such a short amount of time. It seems the greatest threat to Batman is being bludgeoned from behind.

Then, as usual, he gets tied up and something dastardly and evil is going to happen to h-

Ummm!!!

Apparently, the “B” in BDSM stands for Batman.

Hugo Strange is a total freak! Also, he’s way larger than he looks in his first panel. He’s spent the whole issue smashing things, whipping Batman, and choking people out while laughing maniacally.

Through the combination of his “steel” muscles, gas pellets, and jiu jitsu moves, Batman makes short work of Strange and his crew. And this time, he doesn’t kill him! He hogties him and throws him in prison, where Strange vows vengeance.

And that’s an oath he will keep a dozen times over. He will come back soon in Batman #1, and as mentioned above, he’s the first real member of Batman’s “Rogues Gallery,” his recurring stable of villains.

This starts the precedent of Batman locking up his enemies only for them to escape time and time again. It’s this rhythm that starts to move Batman, in my mind, from strict realism into some kind of exteriorized and mythic psychodrama, with Batman’s enemies springing into existence as weird reflections of his own psyche (a la ‘A Serious House on Serious Earth’ or Synder’s ‘Black Mirror’).

I don’t find myself focusing much on the actual plot of some of the early issues because they are so often mundane, rote and stock. Here we do get a neat ‘weird science’ element, as Hugo Strange has captured a scientist who is capable of creating a fog to blanket the whole city. But the fog’s purpose is to make it harder for the police to stop bank robberies.

Part of what will effect the shift from realism to myth, maybe paradoxically, is a greater emphasis on character and relationship. The Rogues Gallery is, after all, predicated on persistent relationship, in which individual storylines are cumulative and accrete to form histories between Batman and his adversaries that overflow any particular issues or events.

So, the most interesting part here is not the fog or the robberies but Strange’s vow of revenge, which will have its return in future issues, and Batman’s complicity in creating and maintaining cycles, even/especially when this is predicated on a commitment to a kind of mercy, which is nonetheless carceral and not rehabilitative. It is his inability to kill his foes and thus end cycles of their return that most implies a dependent interrelation between Batman and his rogues: that they are part of the same entity, reflections of one another. Batman’s existence causes their own. Neither can be destroyed. And maybe this is the central moral crisis at the heart of the character, a more existential issue than social or political ones, which are folded into the former. Is Batman himself The Shadow of Gotham (and not in the sense that Bob Kane ripped off The Shadow for issue #27, side eyes emoji) who in turn creates a funhouse parade of further shadows? Can Batman himself be healed?

I don’t know! I’m dumb and baby. Certainly this will all coalesce years down the line as I read hundreds of new issues.

In the meantime, let us savor the simpler pleasures, such as whatever this is.

Originally tweeted by Weird Batman of the Golden Age (@GoldenAgeBats) on June 14, 2022.