#The Underworld United (Gotham Rogues)

[thedupshadove]

Okay, I'm making this a separate post instead of a reblog, but everybody go read this first.

With the concept of a Good Joker thoroughly laid out, I of course couldn't stop myself from thinking of how other members of the Rogues Gallery could be converted into a makeshift Rebel Alliance combating Gotham's own Dark Lord. So far, I've got...

The Penguin: Jettison the Old Money background and instead build Good Penguin around the mold of what TVTropes calls a Neighborhood-Friendly Gangster. Anyone investigating the crime patterns in Gotham City will discover that, while the section under his control (it needs a pithy name: The Narrows? The Reach?) is home to a lot of drug trade, it's also the only place in the city where the mysterious Bat-Man, and all the random murders and traumatized abductees that follow in his wake, Does. Not. Go. He's put a lot of effort into making sure of that. His arc will be about moving past insular protection of his tiny little polity and starting to use his resources to make broader alliances and actually take down The Bat, rather than keeping him at bay.

The Riddler: Basically the Paul Dano Riddler if his ideology was more than a smokescreen (and also maybe had a different sense of style). Master hacker, amateur investigator, beginning to dabble in ideological cybercrime when the Alliance starts to form. Passionate about uncovering and disseminating truth, his White Whale is tracing the Bat back to his lair.

Catwoman: I mean, they've made her into Robin Hood In Leather before; why fuck with what works? She can be the one from one of Gotham's blue-blooded families, and while she hasn't put the secret identity together, she has seen enough of Bruce Wayne's nastiness up close that she might hate him even more than she hates The Bat. Bruce, meanwhile, is sure that it's only a matter of time before the two of them get married.

And with the Joker as described in the original post, that's all four members of the United Underworld taken care of, but of course, Batman's list of foes is so much longer than that.

Anybody got ideas for more?

[ash-crane101]

“Don’t piss off any of the rogues, unless you want to end up with either lasting trauma or worst case scenario, dead.”

“Gas masks here are VERY high quality and VERY affordable, and they will be your best friend during gas attacks. I personally recommend Wayne Enterprises’s gas masks. I also recommend you keep that mask on your person every day, since you never know when the next chemical attack will happen here.”

“If a man covered in question marks asks you a riddle, please don’t respond. That is most likely my stepfather, Edward, AKA the riddler.”(Ooc but I ship scriddler so riddler is Ash and their Siblings’ stepdad in this RP)

“Check whose territory you’re in consistently. Red hood’s men are great suppliers for that, and they can alert you to territory changes.”

“Please leave gifts for the bat family somewhere where they can see who’s it meant for. I Recommend leaving them on a rooftop on their respective patrol routes. Also, if you want to not induce confusion between the bat family, make sure to include the name of the member. Also I really recommend giving the youngest of the Corvid-themed members of the batfamily horror shit. I know they have a really big collection of it considering they’re also autistic and… also are my 3rd roommate. Don’t ask how I know that.”

“Confront crazy with more crazy. I once saw that someone weaponized an old banana and charged at the dude that was robbing him/her/them/any. That person ended up with a wallet and no banana.”@gothamarchivist

“Please at least stop by the coffee shops once during your stay in this less-than-wonderful city. Trust me, the coffee’s better than the amount of crime here. Plus you might even see a batfamily member chugging down on a late-night latte due to their horrendous sleep schedules.”

“Harming plants almost always equal death by my aunt Pamala.”

“Please get your errands done by at least the high school start times here. Traffic gets horrendous after that here.”

“The bat’s hands are rated E for Everyone. Nobody is immune from justice in these parts.”

“Please don’t say you love a rogue when you’re in one of Gotham’s barns and nobles. Most likely you’ll end up being caught lacking by a nearby batfamily member or an officer.”

“Here in Gotham, we’re big on any kinda pride. Hell, THE BRUCE WAYNE got seen in a pride suit during a presentation of Wayne Enterprises’s built-in binder t-shirt once. Managed to snag one of those shirts during Gotham’s Walmarts’ pride sale(it was on sale for 5 bucks and I had 5 bucks to spend) since Wayne Enterprises shit always leaks over to Walmarts across the United States.”

“You might as well thank the entire criminal underworld here for cheapening the rent. And possibly the batfamily for accidentally flying through closed windows from time-to-time. Also, Bruce Wayne knows a shit ton of martial arts and is probably a black belt in karate. He’s also probably at the height of human strength naturally. Meaning that he doesn’t need no bodyguard to protect him. Motherfucker won’t start shit but he will end it.”

“rich kids outside of Gotham get taught sword-fighting with safety precautions in place, armed with epees, all that safety stuff. Notice how I mentioned outside of Gotham. Because I know the Bat’s current robin is a rich kid and he got taught sword-fighting with no safety precautions, armed with a katana, no safety stuff to even protect him from accidentally stabbing himself with that damn blade during sword-fighting lessons. Also, the kid, Damien, was raised by his mom in the league until he got sent to live with his dad. No wonder the kid is regularly caught armed with either an extremely sharp blade intending to kill somebody on his patrols or somehow got an exotic animal or animals into the manor that shouldn’t even BE INSIDE THE MANOR.”

“Only a few of the batfam have not attempted to kill anybody. Namely Batman because he ain’t got the balls to kill Joker. I’m starting to think the Bat’s cheating on Catwoman with that fucking clown!!”

“Don’t be surprised if you hear at least a teen say something about my father’s toxin being effectively Ghost weed.”

“Nobody gives a fuck here. We all deal with petty crime to the point where we’re free of fucks to give. Even the customer service workers here don’t even have smiles and don’t take any Karen’s (or Susan’s) shit.” (I genuinely didn’t mean to offend any non-entitled Karens or Susans because of this comment, I was just poking fun at the fact that people automatically default to Karen or Susan when they refer to an entitled lady they don’t know the name of).

“You get drinking water out of our waterways, you boil that shit and wait for it to cool for it to be drinkable. Unless you want to either laugh to death or scream and shit yourself. The more chemically inclined rogues put shit in the water here.”

-💀🖤Ash

Ooc tags:

okay people what are the 'surviving gotham' 101 strategies??

I've barely survived my first weekend here

[jewishjanetandco]

get a room

[dominoed-daredoll]

[forevercloudnine]

what if the riddler was a female character? do you think fem riddler would be interesting?

This is EXACTLY the kind of question that Batman: The Drowned should have answered for me, but unfortunately fem!Bruce was too busy stabbing fem!Aquaman to death with her own trident and getting Gotham wiped off the face of the planet in reprisal. Like yes, #girlpower, but I would have really just preferred several group shot panels of Batman's entire genderbent rogues gallery.

But assuming this ask is more inquiring as to what would have happened if Riddler was created as a female character... interesting question!

Riddler only had three appearances before being adapted and arguably codified as an "A-list" villain in the 1966 television series, Detective Comics #140, #142, and Batman #171 (the last of which came out in 1965, and served as the basis for the show's pilot). I think it's likely that a female Riddler would still have been picked up for the show, since Catwoman had only had four appearances in the 1950's and still managed! Given how many female villains the show invented for itself (not to mention its compulsion to have a prominent woman hostage or henchgirl or both in every single episode), I think it was pretty desperate to get some attractive actresses on screen for the audience to look at.

Personally I think Riddler being a woman would at the very least have improved the movie (which is the only Batman '66 media I've seen all of), since it would have split the United Underworld 50/50 down the gender line. I'm guessing a female Riddler would have crushed on Batman as much as every other woman who existed in his presence on this show, though possibly on the grounds of seeing him as her intellectual equal? I feel like she still would have been stuck in the pre-00's Poison Ivy territory of obsessive unrequited attraction.

She definitely would have been a part of the Gotham City Sirens... like, actually a part of the GCS, not just a side character there to get put thrown around for the laughs because of Paul Dini enjoys writing Riddler and got removed from Detective Comics.

And I hate to say it, but unfortunately she probably would have permanently reformed after Dini's run (assuming he still would have made her a private detective). Ivy's gotten a handful of good villainy moments since the New 52 reboot, but at this point she's really only an anti-villain at best. Also unfortunate, but I don't think a female Riddler would have ever gotten to wear a suit, and also in the 90's she would have 100% been put in a question mark boob window version of Sue Storm's 90's costume:

[dominoed-daredoll]

[dominoed-daredoll]

[iconuk01]

Way back in 1990, there was an odd Detective Comics story by JOhn Ostrander and Flint Henry about an unauthorised Batman comic being written in the DCU, which sort of addresses, in part, one of the ideas you have.

Since they knew nothing about who or what Batman really was the comic within a comic is... odder than you might think. (There’s an “A” plot which I won’t go in to)

A demon from Hell seeks repentance and to be reunited with God, but is told that to do that, he must roam th Earth, purging evil as he once inspired it, creating a balance, and he can only do it if he bonds with a willing mortal.

He finds one in Simon Petrarch, a former rogue and mercenary, who seeks meaning in his life... and so they unite to create the scourge of the underworld know as the Batman, a supernatural defender, though a dangerous one often out of control until Petrarch can tame the demon as they face a dangerous opponent, a demonic concept of destruction and chaos called the Joker who brings toys to life as twisted monsters.

The Batman is losing though, and is captured by the Joker.. so the Powers That Be take action and approach an otherwise perfectly normal seven year old (who is a big Batman fan) to help his hero, by asking HIM to merge with another entity too, but not a demon...

So as the Joker prepares to do something fairly horrible to Bamtna, he is interrupted...

So it seems that the citizens of Gotham (or at least the authors of the unathorised Batman comic on Earth-1) might see Robin as an ACTUAL guardian angel.

The Joker though, discovers that "The Robin” also has a human side and, in one of the most disturbing pages I think I’ve ever seen in a mainstream Batman comic, Batman finds what the Joker has done to the seven year old kid who dared be Robin.

Is it weird that I more saw Harley and Tim as foils?

I don’t really see how? But feel free to lay it out for me anon. 

[dominoed-daredoll]

Flashback to Barbara being willing to singlehandedly throw hands at Hugo Strange after meeting him face-to-face once.

[dominoed-daredoll]

Batgirl is putting up with none of your shit, Penguin.

[dominoed-daredoll]

[dominoed-daredoll]

[dominoed-daredoll]

[dominoed-daredoll]

[dominoed-daredoll]

[dominoed-daredoll]