DETECTIVE COMICS #411 & BATMAN #232

"INTO THE DEN OF THE DEATH DEALERS!"
Story by: Denny O'Neil | Art by: Bob Brown & Dick Giordano

"DAUGHTER OF THE DEMON"
Story by: Denny O'Neil | Art by: Neal Adams & Dick Giordano | Edited by: Julius Schwartz

Note: Screenshots below come from BATMAN ILLUSTRATED BY NEAL ADAMS VOLUME 2 and are not representative of these stories' original colors (the covers are presented as published, however).

I know I had read the name "Ra's al Ghul" before my first exposure to him as a character -- because I wondered for a few years how his name was pronounced. Then, one fateful day in 1994, BATMAN: THE ANIMATED SERIES introduced me to the criminal mastermind called The Demon's Head, and told me the correct pronunciation -- which is, of course "Raysh al Gool". I don't know what the BATMAN BEGINS people were thinking when they had everyone calling him "Roz".

Of course, I still don't know the honest-to-goodness right way to say it; maybe the ANIMATED SERIES folks were wrong and Christopher Nolan got it right. But to me, for the rest of my life, I'll keep on saying "Raysh".

Anyway. Thanks to his sparse appearances on THE ANIMATED SERIES, specifically his debut in "The Demon's Quest" and his cameo in "Off Balance", which preceded it, Ra's al Ghul quickly became one of my favorite Batman villains. It's no surprise; I've always loved "mastermind" types more than any other sort of villain (see my love of Mister Sinister and the original Hobgoblin over at Marvel) -- plus, racist though it is, I've long been interested in the "Yellow Peril" trope. And, while Arabic by birth, al Ghul essentially is exactly that sort of character

But I'm getting ahead of myself. Before we meet the Demon's Head, we need an introduction to his beautiful daughter, Talia!

DETECTIVE COMICS #405 & #406

"THE FIRST OF THE ASSASSINS!" | "YOUR SERVANT OF DEATH -- DR. DARRK!"
Story: Denny O'Neil | Art: Bob Brown & Frank Giacoia

DC has released a trade paperback collection titled BATMAN: TALES OF THE DEMON multiple times since the nineties, though the stories in that book were collected even earlier, via a Baxter Paper mini-series called THE SAGA OF RA'S AL GHUL. And in every one of these numerous releases, the powers-that-be, in their great wisdom, have opted to omit the stories from DETECTIVE COMICS #405 and 406.

Now, while not necessarily essential to the Ra's al Ghul storyline, their omission has long felt questionable to me. They introduce both the concept of the League of Assassins, which will play a role in the upcoming al Ghul saga, as well as Doctor Darrk, the League's leader who will feature in the first appearance of Ra's's daughter, Talia.

All of the above is my way of noting that, while nearly every one of the stories I'm covering for this cherry-picked look at Batman in the Seventies is reprinted in full color in some collection or another, for these two tales I have been forced to use the black-and-white "Essential"-style SHOWCASE PRESENTS BATMAN volume 5. Not that I object; a lot of this vintage Batman material looks nice in black-and-white. But I felt it was worth noting.