Could this be the new Batman Villain? Should it be?
Chris Nolan’s series of gritty Batman movies have been kept in a surprising shroud of secrecy- nobody knowing who the next villain will be until the film is basically released… and with the more recent confirmation that it will NOT be The Riddler- everyone is speculating on who it will and who is SHOULD be.
We were emailed this picture today and it had everyone here at the Big Shiny Robot! scrambling to find out if it were real or fan made… 20 seconds later we discovered it was fan made. BUT- this IS the guy who I’ve said the next villain should be Black Mask since before the The Dark Knight was out of theaters.
Black Mask is one of the least known Batman villains in all the “common knowledge” of Batman villains- which I am sure is something that could endear him to Nolan’s direction of the series… but, not only that- he is one of the most powerful villains Batman has had to deal with in the comics… no super strength, no super gadgets, but brains. Black Mask is the antithesis of Batman in the sense that Roman Sionis is a Billionaire’s son, who’s parents died in a horrible “accident”… except… Sionis, not a random act of criminal violence, killed his parents…. blah blah blah and a few more incidents that drive him mad and Sionis winds up carving a death mask out of his father’s ebony coffin and then uses his new found aptitude for crime, he builds a powerful gang and decides (because of a grudge Sionis had with Bruce Wayne) to target Bruce personally and begins taking down Wayne Tech, one executive at a time.
Batman ends up saving this guy’s life- but, in the course of it (of course) Black mask becomes permanently disfigured and permanently becomes Black Mask.
There is really only one other appearance of note for Black Mask in Batman’s world… the one that I can see making the movie The Dark Knight Rises: Black Mask becomes the king of Gotham’s underbelly by being the first and only villain to unite all the crime lords and super villains in a war against the Bat, this plunges the city into chaos and darkness as Black Mask uses the media to wage a psychological war against the city and its mysterious protector.
The set up is there: The Joker has taken out most of the crime bosses, Two-Face/Harvey Dent is dead and Gotham City hates Batman… somebody needs to step in and organize the underworld and use this to their advantage, right? Setting it up so Batman can “rise” and save the city from its own implosion.
I’ve always seen Black Mask as the Yin to Batman’s Yang, more than the Joker. The Joker is an embodiment of Bruce’s fears- and a device used to push the Dark Knight to the very limits of his choices… The Joker isn’t his opposite, or his equal- the Joker is his cancer- an evil that will be with him forever- an “incurable” blight and a constant threat. All by Batman’s own choosing (he could have ‘let him die’ like Ra’s Al Ghul on many occasions but for some reason its not okay for the Joker but is for a ninja with a noble goal)
While- (and this is just my opinion) I see Black Mask as what Bruce could have become if he had made a different choice after his parent’s murder… to me- Black Mask (Batman) is an infinitely more scary prospect. Someone with the Bat’s power and drive, but focused on making crime happen. Black Mask is sadistic to boot (another perfect reason he’d fit into Nolan’s vision) He uses fear and brute force to control the criminals, the same way Batman uses it to defeat them… Incidentally- this is what made Jason Todd a scary Red Hood. (although, if the bat would have just let him kill the Joker, that blight would have been “cured” and opened the door for a new wave of original villains… sorry- but the Joker is a crutch.)
What do you guy’s think? I know we’ve asked this question before- but the Riddler is out so we won’t be seeing Hush. Who is gonna be the next villain? WHY are they going to be the next villain?