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One benefit to Batman villains is that they can serve a whole spectrum of genres. The Penguin can be both a corrupt businessman and a horny sewer creature. The Joker can be both a silly lunatic and a haunting metaphor for domestic terrorism. And there are few better examples of this than Black Mask, the Gotham City gangster who is both a notable crime boss and a leering horror character thanks to his malice and his ghoulish, well, black mask. Sadly, he's never quite risen to the level of the A List, as Gotham's rogue's gallery is a fairly crowded one.
But if any series is going to change that, it's Absolute Batman, which reinvents Black Mask as a being of not just hyper ruthlessness but anarchy. He's the perfect arch-villain for this new Batman to take on, not because he's the Dark Knight's antithesis, but because his warped ideology is a funhouse mirror to everything this Batman stands for.
Created in the mid '80s by Doug Moench and Tom Mandrake (a perfect era for his birthplace, considering how many Batman villains were being readjusted to fit a grittier tone,) Roman Sionis aka Black Mask has been a leading man before, but never quite THE man. As the head of the False Face Society, his presence in Gotham was deadly from the onset. Other people in his position – guys like Carmine Falcone and Salvatore Maroni – were effective rulers of their little empires, but always seemed bound by at least the facade of the honor system. They had broad criminal families to live up to. Meanwhile, Sionis' relationship with his own family was strained, and when he rose to power, he cared little for any sort of code. Murder and disfigurement followed in copious fashion.
Black Mask has appeared in assorted adaptations in other mediums, something that's typically the symbol of a character's growing mainstream recognition. He shows up in 2004's The Batman cartoon as a cruel gangster, one of the only villains in the show who's openly willing to kill his underlings if they annoy him. He’s also played by a scene-chewing Ewan McGregor in Birds of Prey, who grants him immense narcissism and sadistic tendencies. However, in the grand scheme of Batman villains, few would nudge Black Mask above the second raters. Psychopathic gangster? Eh, that's also the Joker. Unhinged leader of a gang? In Gotham, you just have to throw a rock to find one of those.
Luckily, Absolute Batman has cleared the way for Black Mask to shine, mainly by turning Batman's array of antagonists from Batfoes to Batfriends. The would-be Riddler, Two-Face, Penguin, Catwoman and Killer Croc are all hang-out buddies with Bruce (for now). Thus Black Mask and his "Party Animals" have room to move in and claim the streets for themselves. They're a particularly vicious group, but it's all in the spirit of their leader, a man who only seems to desire reasonless cruelty until we learn his motivation in Absolute Batman #5.
Having used his seemingly bottomless well of men, weapons and brutality to beat Batman to a pulp and send him off to lick his wounds, Black Mask announces that the offer he gave Batman (accept $200 million and look the other way from whatever Black Mask is doing) is pretty much open to the people of Gotham. This city is corrupt to the core, layered with politicians, enforcers and wealthy folk that have no consideration for law, especially when it doesn't benefit them. So if Gotham doesn't value you, then why should you value Gotham? Take from the city all you like, in whatever manner you like.
It seems like the opposite of Batman's mantra, until you realize that Absolute has offered him his own reinvention. In Scott Snyder"s new tale, this Batman is fairly blue-collar, and a common man of Gotham like he's rarely been before. And his mission, so far, has been to reshape himself and then reshape Gotham and punish those that would do it harm. A few different life choices, and there's a chance that Bruce Wayne would hear Black Mask and see it as a real call to action.
All great Batman villains have been a reflection of Batman himself. They take some aspect of his personality or his quest, twist it, and then present it back to him, turning them into what is arguably the most personal collection of hero-villain relationships in all of superhero comics. Black Mask has done this before, from his relationship with his wealth and in particular his wealthy parents, to the simple use of a black mask to harness fear as a weapon.
But Absolute Batman assures us that there is something a little deeper at play here. In one corner, you have Black Mask, who is convinced that Gotham is so tired of its own callousness that it would be willing to rip itself apart in a revolution. On the other, you have Batman, who believes that he is a one-man revolution himself. Only one issue left until we find out who emerges on top.
Absolute Batman 1–5 are all out now from DC. The final part of the current arc is published on March 12.
Check out our interviews with the creative teams of Absolute Wonder Woman and Absolute Superman.
