Batman #234

[cyberghostface]

In honor of the late Dennis O'Neil, here is his famous Batman #234 which reintroduced Two-Face after a lengthy absence.

Comments

[zachbeacon]

I didn't realize the whole "Harvey fixes his face only for it to be ruined again" thing went back so far. Just how many times has that happened? He must know some amazing plastic surgeons.

Also, weird that he keeps messing up the same side of his face You'd think it would be a coin flip.

[crinos]

I actually read the very first Two face story a while back.

After Harvey got scarred, he heard there was a plastic surgeon there that could fix him, but that he was imprisioned in a Nazi concentration camp (Seriously). So Harvey flipped a coin to see whether he would wait until after the war and see if the guy was available to fix his face, or if he would embrace his freakishness and embark on a career of super villainy. Naturally we know how it turned out.

[zachbeacon]

Was this from the early era of WW2 where media like Casablanca treated the camps as "just" prisons? If so, I'm inclined to give it a pass since a lot of people didn't know better.

If it was from later on and they still wrote that ...yikes.

Would have been nice if it had landed good side up and he went over to save the guy, though. Criminals vs Nazis is a favorite trope of mine. We know the Joker would be willing to help.

[cricharddavies]

The first story was published in 'Tec #68, midway through 1942. A year later, Harvey's face was repaired by a completely different plastic surgeon, so that particular thread got dropped in a hurry.

[crinos]

August 1942. So it was after Pearl Harbor, but before D Day, so yeah, I don't think John Q Public in the states actually knew just what the Nazi's were up to yet.

[mazway_75]

Hell, even Allied intelligence brushed off reports of the camps as hysterical stuff from escapees. It came down to them just not able to believe a 20th century civilization could do something like that. It was a more innocent time.....

[jkcarrier]

O'Neil is credited (quite rightly) with moving Batman away from the Adam West "camp" style and into the modern era. But the plot of this story sounds like something straight out of the tv show: Two-Face steals a giant parade balloon, so he can use it to raise the sunken pirate ship and get the lost treasure.But it's the tone and presentation (and of course, Adams' art) that makes it feel like something new and different.

I also like that he refers to Two-Face as "OUR old enemy", indicating that he considers Alfred part of the team.