Detective Comics (1990) # 610

By Mark Rodriguez

Like many people, I grew up with the Adam West Batman show and thought he was just as silly in the comics, which to be fair he was for a while. Then the Micheal Keaton Batman movie came out with a much more serious Batman and a much more murderous Joker. Even as a kid, I was curious if Batman was like West or Keaton so I finally went to the local grocery store and picked up a copy of Batman and Detective comics. It turns out both of theme part 2s of an already ongoing story. So here is part 1 of a story I bought. Part 2 would be the first ever issue Detective Comics I ever bought.

"Snow and Ice Part One: Ode to a Penguin" opens with Batman watching over a funeral as a priest read the eulogy as several people, police and Commissioner Gordon watch. The grave has a statue of the Penguin being the priest. A reporter covers the story and comments on how several people might feel regarding the Penguin's passing. One of his criminal rivals, Rafael Santini is pleased, as this only strengthens his control over organized crime. Gordon breathes a sigh of relief as one thorn in his side has been removed. As for Batman, who has fought the Penguin countless times, the reporter can only assume he feels relief.

Gordon tells Batman he can't believe the Penguin is finally dead. It feels like a dream and at any moment, the Penguin will bust through his grave and blast everyone with one of his umbrellas. Batman feels suspicious, as he heard the Penguin died from a heart attack while working out at the prison gym. Gordon says that being overweight finally caught up to him. Batman says deaths can be faked and certain drugs exist. Gordon says both prison doctors examined him and there wasn't any doubt in their eyes. 

Batman says it was odd how quickly the lawyer turned up with the will within hours of Penguin's death. The burial site was already chosen and the memorial was already prepared. Gordon said he had to veto Two-Face and other Akrham inmates from trying to go out in style like the Penguin did. 

Batman approaches the funeral outright and opens the Penguin's casket. The priest is surprised and Batman apologizes, stating that bodies can be switches. Batman sees the Penguin, dead and lying in the casket. He closes it and apologizes it. The priest says despite being a murderer and thief, even the Penguin deserves some dignity in death.

The priest concludes the ceremony and says one last request from Cobblepot was everyone to squawk once like a bird over his grave. The guests turn their backs and leave. The priest is the only one to squawk. The funeral workers start burying the casket and the reporter concludes his news coverage as well.

Batman and Gordon part ways for the evening. Gordon says the Penguin left some money for a wake at the Gilded Cage in the Ritz. He'll check it out and sees what crawls out of the woodwork. Gordon says he might as well get a free drink, the only thing he'd ever get from the Penguin other than headaches. Batman says he'd get his drink checked for any poisons, which shocks Gordon. Geez Gordon, the face you made was as if you already had the drink.

Batman swings off, thinking about the priest saying that 'the Penguin deserved dignity in death'. He can't believe that the Penguin is finally gone and it reminds everyone of their own mortality. Batman ponders that he won't miss the Penguin's brand of mayhem. He'd rather have the Penguin dead than having any other injured or crippled security guards or bank clerks.

One face Batman didn't recognize was an old man at the funeral, so he follows him. He looks through the window and sees the man tend to a lot of books and bird statues. Batman figures he's an ornithologist. Penguin knew a lot about birds, so it wouldn't be surprising that he'd make a new contacts in the field. Batman thinks there's nothing more to see and he has to swing off as crime doesn't take time out to mourn.

Now completely alone and, the old man goes to the bookcase and moves a certain book. The bookcase opens up and reveals a hidden room. The room is full of all types of umbrellas and guns. The man takes a swig from his bottle, pondering on the Penguin being dead. He then tosses the bottle towards the umbrellas.

That night at the cemetery, two thugs, Tony and Knuckles dig up the Penguin's grave. Tony is creeped out. Knuckles teases him about being scared of all the people he murdered would come back to get him. Tony says he didn't kill that many people and they were all in self defense.. at least one of them was. They dig up the Penguin's casket and open it, preparing to use the secret words they were told to rehearse.

Tony say 'OK boss, It's time to hatch out' but nothing happens. He says it again and then Knuckles chimes in but the Penguin doesn't move. Knuckles thinks they've been tricked and the boss is going to kill them over this. Tony says he can't kill them if he's pretty much dead already. They ponder between putting him back in the casket or to take him with him. They decide to bring the Penguin back with them as they plan to organize a jailbreak. One of them carries the Penguin off while the other buries the casket back up. Something flies into Knuckle's face, making him freak out. Tony tells him to relax, since it wasn't a ghost, it was just a bat.

Elsewhere, Batman stops two street thugs busting up a phone booth. One of the thugs says they didn't mean any harm, and they were just bored. Batman says they didn't think of the people that might need that phone. There are people whose lives might depend on that one call to the police, fire department or doctor. The other thug apologizes. Batman says in the real world sorry isn't enough. Just then a police car shows up. Batman swings off and says if they think life on the street is boring, wait until they taste juvenile hall.

 

Over at Gotham Penitentiary, the Ventriloquist and Scareface are playing cards with their goons Billy and Rhino. Billy tells Scarface that the message has been sent and things are set for the following day. He asks about the secrecy and Scarface says to mind his business and keep running errands without getting in trouble.

The gangs sees a helicopter flying past their window and Rhino wonders if the Santinis came to bust them out. Scarface says that nobody better find out about his plans. He tells Rhino that if he mentions the Santinis again he'll be fitted for cement shoes.

In the chopper, the pilot tells Tony and Knuckles to let him go and he won't tell anyone what they did. Tony keeps the pilot at gunpoint while Knuckles tosses a grappling hook towards one of the jail cells. A criminal known as Kadaver is awaiting his own death as he sees the grappling hook pull the bars out of his cell. They toss a rope ladder at him and Kadaver makes his escape. The police swarm the helicopter and getting ready to shoot. Just then the co-pilot is thrown out of the chopper and towards the cops.

Elsewhere, Batman visits Gordon at the Ritz Hotel for the Penguin's event. Batman says the villain was too greedy to give anything away for free in life, and asks why he do so in death. The person holding the ceremony makes a speech where he mentions that many people might have hated the Penguin, but his one true friends were always birds, especially the one he named himself after. He decided to donate the money had left to the Penguin Fund. As the main raises the curtain, something goes wrong and industrial fans start blowing snow and ice into everybody. Just then they hears some squawking, which shocks Batman and Gordon.

Back to the jailbreak, Knuckles calls for Kadaver to climb into the helicopter but he refuses. The suicidal villain loves dangling over the nightly sky as the police bullets whizz past him. Knuckles pulls the ladder up to finally get him into the chopper. Kadaver asks why they set him free and Tony says the phrase they used didn't work. Kadaver says he gave them the wrong phrase on purpose, for he knew the Penguin wouldn't keep his promise and break him free afterwards. 

Knuckles aims his gun at Kadaver and tells him to cooperate or they'll push him out of the chopper. Kadaver delights in the fact at dying from such a fall, but agrees to help them if they give him a gun. Knuckles refuses and Kadaver says the Penguin will just stay in that state. Tony says if Kadaver tries anything, he'll just shoot the pilot and everyone will go down. Knuckles gives Cadaver his gun. 

Kadaver leans in and whispers something in the Penguin's ear which will remain his secret for now. Nothing happens at first but soon the Penguin opens his eyes. The Penguin suddenly jumps up with a squawk sound.

Back the Ritz, a real life penguin steps out among the snow and ice holding a card in its mouth. Batman checks it out and it says subscribe to the Penguin Fund. Other penguins waddle around handing cards to all the guests. Rafael Santini is one of the guests and he seems delighted to see the cards. Santini donates five thousand to the people collecting for the charity. He doesn't care about the birds, but he says it's worth it knowing that the Penguin isn't around anymore. He tells his men to chip in too. The charity workers approach Gordon and Batman. Gordon chips in ten bucks since it is for a good cause.

One of Santini's thugs says five thousand is a lot to throw away for some birds. Santini says he can afford it. He also says if Scarface can keep up his end of the deal the following day, he'll soon be the richest man in Gotham.

Batman swings off thinking it makes sense the Penguin would want to help the birds. He always showed more feelings towards birds than he did his fellow humans. Batman perches himself among some gargoyles and can't shake the feeling that something doesn't feel right. He ponders the meaning of snow, ice and a penguin.

My Thoughts- 

This one is kind of tough to review since I still remember how the following issue went and know where the story goes. This one was pretty much all set up, though it was to get a few glimpses of how people reacted to one of the city's most popular villains being dead. At this point of the series the Penguin was still a random sorta-costumed super villain pulling off crazy capers. If they think he was bad guy now, give it a few years when he becomes a full on crime boss.

Scareface made an appearance and I remember around this general time, he kinda appeared a lot in the background in several issues. Like he never ran into Batman directly, but he was always scheming or setting up other crimes that Batman doesn't see since he's dealing with whoever the main villain of the issue happens to be. It was my first time encountering the character, so I was confused on if the dummy was alive or not, until he appearances on the Animated Series explained his backstory to me a lot better.

The one thing that stood out to me was Batman being very... public. While he was definitely darker and more serious than the Adam West show, I still found it to be kinda Adam West-ish for him to just be at the funeral and later on at the Ritz Hotel. Even back in the early 90's, I always thought Batman was supposed to be more of an urban legend and not make obvious public appearances. Part of what makes Batman scary is people not knowing exactly what he is. Here it's pretty clear to people, particularly crime bosses like Santini that Batman is just a guy in a Halloween costume.

There was a lot to set up here, and a lot of moving parts here and there, so there wasn't really any time for any action. The most we got was Batman lecturing some thugs about messing up phone booths. I mean what if Clark Kent was visiting Gotham and needed to use one? I would have like a short fight scene, or maybe even a short flashback of a previous fight with the Penguin. I guess I chose a very odd time to hop into Batman comics because the first issue I ever read with the Penguin was one about his alleged death.

The other villain we have here is Kadaver... who is very nuts and suicidal. He seems to monologue and describe the ways he's like to go out as if it were poetry. He even had a candlelit vigil to himself in his prison cell. I'm surprised he wasn't in Arkham instead of regular jail. 

Pretty interesting issue, but the real memories will hit me in part 2, the first ever Detective Comics issue I ever bought back when I was a kid. I think the old drugstore is still around but I heard they stopped selling comics decades ago. As for this one issue, I honestly forgot if I got this on either from Hipcomic or one of the many longboxes at the several comic cons I have gone to over the years. Gotta love those 'everything in his box is a dollar' type boxes, right? 

As for this issue's 90's ads, I found a few amusing ones. This issue had two different ads for wireless gaming controllers. I found it amusing because we kinda take those for granted now. It reminds me of how TVs have changed and the changes become so ingrained that buying a newer product is now expected to have the new feature. When TVs started being in color, they were called color TVs. Nowadays if you but  a TV it doesn't need to be called a color TV, you'd assume it came in color. Same with wireless remote TVs and now flat screen TVs. When it comes to game controllers, we rarely ever call them wireless controllers, we expect them to be like that by default.

 

While I never heard of Quickshot before, Acclaim has made several games back in the day for the NES and Genesis. Seeing this ad was kinda ironic as currently Acclaim is working on making a comeback. 

The other ad is one for the classic TurboGraphx-16. I only knew one kid that owned the console and a copy of Fighting Street (the first Street Fighter) back in the day. There was just something cool about this cool third option that wasn't a Nintendo or SEGA console.

 

Anyways, I'll soon cover the next issue, as Detective Comics # 611 is the first Batman comic I ever bought.