BATMAN #256 & #257

"CATWOMAN'S CIRCUS CAPER!" | "HAIL EMPEROR PENGUIN!"
Story: Denny O'Neil | Art: Irv Novick & Dick Giordano | Edited by: Julius Schwartz

We interrupt our look at Archie Goodwin's year as writer/editor of DETECTIVE COMICS to check in with a couple issues of its sister title which were released during that same span (for the record, these two issues were published immediately after Neal Adams' final bat-story, "Moon of the Wolf", which we looked at a few weeks back). For the most part, BATMAN is written by Dennis O'Neil at this point, and features various appearances from the classic rogues' gallery -- including the first 1970s showings of Catwoman and Penguin in these two installments.

Occasionally, when reading a solo Denny O'Neil Batman outing (by which I mean "with any artist other than Neal Adams"), I feel like O'Neil regresses back to the Silver Age in some ways. Which isn't to say he didn't do that now and then with Adams -- see the BRAVE AND THE BOLD installment "Red Water, Crimson Death" from a while back -- but it's just way more apparent when Adams isn't there to help temper him. We've seen it in some of the early League of Assassins tales with Bob Brown, and now we see it here. "Catwoman's Circus Caper!" is the feline femme fatale's reintroduction to Batman's world after years of absence. But rather than getting something along the lines of the moody and atmospheric "Half an Evil" or the dark and chilling "Joker's Five-Way Revenge", which reintroduced Two-Face and the Joker respectively, Catwoman makes her grand reappearance in a story that would've been right at home during the Bat-mania of the sixties.

The story begins for no apparent reason in the Batcave, where Batman has returned after sometime abroad in pursuit of criminals. The only explanation given for the cave's use here is that Bruce has asked Alfred to open up Wayne Manor so he can spend some time recuperating there after this latest mission. But when the Caped Crusader reads a letter from Dick Grayson informing his mentor that he's run off to join the circus, Batman departs to check on his ward.

---

"An old enemy... and a chillingly new kind of danger... these what face the dread--Batman.

The smell of sawdust mingles with the feral odor of wild beasts... and all is still except for the soft sound of an animal snarl!

This is the circus--a place of laughter, of merriment... now becomes the haunt of a death that lingers in the air like a malevolent ghost!

Follow the Batman and his young partner-in-peril Robin as they follow a tortured trail of treachery to... Catwoman's Circus Caper!"

---

Our hero finds Robin investigating the death of a young trapeze artist -- something Dick read about in the papers, and which hit close to home since his own parents were murdered during their trapeze act. To facilitate his investigation, Robin becomes the circus's newest trapeze performer. But when someone tries to kill Robin mid-act as well, Batman comes to the rescue. Naturally, since this is a Denny O'Neil-written story featuring Robin, the Teen Wonder is quickly sidelined so Batman can do all the investigative legwork on his own. The killer is eventually unmasked and our story comes to an end.

...Oh, what's that? You're trying to figure out why Catwoman is on the cover? Me too!

Kidding. She's here as a red herring. We're meant to believe she was involved in the young performer's death when it turns out she's been masquerading as the circus's star lion tamer, but it turns out she just wants to liberate the lions and is as unexpectedly mixed up in the whole ordeal as anybody else. Oh, and she wears kind of an ugly new costume, to boot. Overall, this probably was not the best way to reintroduce a villainess who hadn't been seen in several years. (Notably, someone in editorial must not have liked this Catwoman costume either, because before long -- and lasting well into the eighties -- she'll be back in what was, at this time, her best known look: the purple dress/green cape combo.)

The next story, however, fares a bit better with its villain. At least, the Penguin actually is the villain and not a red herring or decoy (though there is another surprise participant in the tale, which we'll get to momentarily). "Hail Emperor Penguin!" sees the portly fiend kidnap a young king during his tour of Hudson University. Naturally this means Robin is involved again, and for once O'Neil lets him participate in the action all the way through, as Batman's equal and partner.

Batman somehow deduces that Penguin must be holding King Peeble in his own castle (some mumbo-jumbo about Penguin fancying himself royalty), so our heroes scale a sheer cliff and storm the place to rescue the young man. But Penguin gets the better of the Dynamic Duo and when a mysterious serving girl tries to intervene, Penguin hangs all three of them from the cliff to become eagle chow. But our heroes extricate themselves, defeat the Penguin, and save the day.

Again, it's a fairly pedestrian "Silver Age-esque" story, but I like the twist in this one: the serving girl is (gasp!) Talia in disguise, and she came to King Peeble's palace to purloin enough wealth to restart her father's organization and free him from prison. Batman lets her go in the end, deciding that her aid in capturing Penguin cancels out the crime she came to commit, and the star-crossed lovers part ways once more.

Mind you, don't think too hard about why Talia needs a cash infusion to resurrect the League of Assassins. After their climactic duel in the desert, Batman arrest Ra's al Ghul and Ra's al Ghul alone, then left. You'd think an organization of the League's size and scope could survive losing its CEO, but apparently not. Batman cut off the head and the entire shebang collapsed somehow. It does't make a lot of sense, but if that's what O'Neil says happened, then so be it.

It should be noted that "Hail Emperor Penguin!" appeared in THE GREATEST BATMAN STORIES EVER TOLD vol. 2, a collection which featured only Penguin and Catwoman-centric stories, as it was released to coincide with BATMAN RETURNS' debut in theaters in 1992. ("Catwoman's Circus Caper!", on the other hand, has never been reprinted anywhere that I'm aware of. I actually bought it off Comixology for a mere 99 cents since I figured we should look at Catwoman's Bronze Age debut one way or another.)

Next week we'll check in on Archie Goodwin again for his final DETECTIVE COMICS epic, teaming Batman with the Manhunter!