The Twelve Days of Who's Who! Part Ten: From KGBeast/NKVDemon to Poison Ivy (1990-1993)

[about_faces]

One thing I neglected to mention in the last post is to give credit to the DC-Whos-Who Tumblr feed, where I've found the majority of these images. If you like character profiles and great art, I HIGHLY recommend checking scouring through his entires. There is so much greatness to be found there, and far beyond just the Bat-Villains

Comments

[martin_l_gore]

Vic Freeze looks like something out of Masters of the Universe, a living breathing bad 80's action figure. While Mignola's TAS re-design is all sorts of wonderful, editorial mandate or strange artistic preferences made him wear Arnolds super-buff robot suit from Batman&Robin in the comics through most of the 00's... What I'm ranting about is that Vic, in addition to being in a really miserable spot concerning his wife, hasn't had an easy time with clothing either. Also, King Snake is so blatantly an attempt to create "Ra's Al Ghul, but for Robin." Shame on you, Mr. Dixon.

[about_faces]

Seriously! Does anybody know if Freeze actually WORE that outfit in the comics before his death in Robin II, or were they all just going by his action figure design?

Also, King Snake is so blatantly an attempt to create "Ra's Al Ghul, but for Robin." Shame on you, Mr. Dixon.

Ohhhhhhhhhhhhhhh, now suddenly everything becomes clear. Saddest part is, Dixon later proved that he was quite capable of writing a solid Ra's, particularly in that Birds of Prey story where he tried to marry Dinah. I'm quite fond of that silly story, particularly with the light it sheds on Ra's and Talia's relationship.

[abqreviews]

Finally, a profile that remembers that 'The Terror' was a seperate film from the one that featured Clayface.

That also has to be the single best drawing of Penguin I've ever seen.

I like Badger's art, but you're right. They probably thought profiling two characters would be enough for a single profile, and it wasn't.

Also, here's a great way to use the "impostor" Hatter; team him up with the one-shot Golden Age villain Pied Piper from Detective Comics #143. This Piper was not obsessed with the folktale or music, but with (smoking) pipes, just like how the 'impostor" Hatter was obsessed with hats and not Lewis Caroll. Then Jervis and Hartley Rathaway can team up to beat them.

[about_faces]

It probably helps that Alan Grant himself heavily referenced The Terror in the Mud Pack storyline, which was the clearest look we've seen at that film since, what, the Golden Age? I forget how much we saw of the film in their Secret Origins issue.

[psychopathicus]

The problem with that is that that's an AWFULLY limiting obsession for a villain to have, especially in this day and age. Hats, OK, people still wear hats, but PIPES? You don't see too many people with pipes these days, unless they're as a part of drug paraphernalia. Even back when pipe-smoking was still a common affair, I can see WHY that version of the Pied Piper was a one-shot affair - there isn't a lot to go on with a pipe-themed villain besides 'hey! He steals pipes!' I mean, hats at least have lots of metaphors and so forth which you can base crimes around - 'hold your hats', 'knock such-and-such into a cocked hat', etc. Besides 'put that in your pipe and smoke it', I don't think pipes have ANY. It'd basically wind up being a Hatter-themed story with the Piper kind of hanging around him whining 'can't we do something involving pipes?'

[surrealname]

i say again, that what kevin maguire does is so impressive that facial similarities not bother me. facial expressions are fucking hard to draw, especially facial expressions with the subtlety or expressiveness that maguire's have.

[about_faces]

This is very true and important to point out.

[surrealname]

which is why i did it.

[about_faces]

And thus I commend you.

[lego_joker]

For your viewing pleasure:

[about_faces]

Thank you! Perfect! Geez, you'd think that somebody would have posted that somewhere by now.

Also, it's not nice to make fun of sleep-deprived parents who are working tirelessly for provide you with scans and insightful, typo-ridden commentary and it's fixed thank you.

[surrealname]

well, this flies directly in the face of my theory that mr. freeze is the only bat-rogue the joker is afraid of.

[surrealname]

thank goodness this is no longer canon. i don't like it when canon can completely undo all my best ideas.

[anonymous]

Huh, so the Clayface look that Karlo created was actually just a character he played in another movie? Now that makes me curious. What was the plot of that film? If he wore a slouch hat and a clay mask, it reminds me of MYSTERY OF THE WAX MUESUEM (remade as HOUSE OF WAX with Vincent Price)

And yeah, that wasn't a very good plan, was it? "I know, to stop a remake of my film, I will dress myself as yet another character that I am linked to!" Was he hoping to frame someone?
-Nobody

[abqreviews]

Yeah, those are all questions I'd love to see answers to, especially what the character of Clayface was in the film. I like the MYSTERY OF THE WAX MUSEUM idea. What we see of 'The Terror' itself in the original story appears to be a Hunchback of Notre Dame-style story, only with knife murders

[psychopathicus]

Actually, from the little I've seen of him, I'd say Karlo was fairly proud of his horror roles - he was, after all, a fairly blatant ripoff of Boris Karloff as far as his name went, who had no problem at all being typecast as a horror actor. If I were to guess (and it IS a guess, since I haven't read the relevant story and can't double-check), I'd say that Clayface was one of Karlo's FIRST roles, and he therefore felt that it was an appropriate disguise to be used on a mission of vengeance. (That and the fact that he was, you know, kind of crazy.)

[abqreviews]

Eh, I'm just guessing. There's so little background for him that it's fun to speculate.

> I'd say that Clayface was one of Karlo's FIRST roles, and he therefore felt that it was an appropriate disguise to be used on a mission of vengeance.

That has potential as well. Perhaps he adopted it not just because it was one of his first roles, but also possibly because the original Clayface film had ended up lost and was something only hardcore fans and film historians would remember.

I just like the idea of him being embarassed by his horror roles initially because it would explain why he cared so much for them to kill over. I mean, if he felt they were all he'd be remembered for, maybe he felt he'd finally embrace them....then he embraced them a little too much.

>a fairly blatant ripoff of Boris Karloff as far as his name went.

I'd prefer to see Karlo used as an amalgamation of all the classic horror stars, except Lugosi, because having Karlo be a drug addict would be too trite.