So You Think You Know... SCARECROW

First appearing in World’s Finest Comics #3 in 1941, “the Scarecrow” – criminal alias for Dr. Jonathan Crane, professor specializing in the psychology of fear – is one of Batman’s oldest villains. Though he appeared only a few times in his first three decades, his presence grew throughout the 1970s and 1980s. By the 1990s, he was a regularly recurring member of Batman’s “Rogues Gallery,” thanks in part to animated Batman television series. He achieved stardom in the 2000s and 2010s as the only villain to appear in all three films of the Christopher Nolan Dark Knight trilogy, as a central villain in the Arkham video game series, as one of the earliest featured villains in the Gotham television series, and as a playable character in the Injustice 2 video game – not to mention his presence in the LEGO Batman franchise and multiple crossover appearances in the Scooby-Doo! franchise. Prominent in many seminal DC relaunches and events and in multiple celebrated series and story arcs - including “Crisis on Infinite Earths” (1986), The Long Halloween (1996), “No Man’s Land” (1999), Hush (2002), War Games (2004), “Blackest Night” (2009), “Brightest Day” (2010), “Flashpoint” (2011), The New 52 (2011), Arkham Knight (2015), Rebirth (2016), and Infinite Frontier (2021) – the Scarecrow is one of Batman’s most enduring enemies. Scarecrow is, however, much more than a merely memorable malefactor; he is also a menacing manifestation of Batman’s own methods. Superheroes depend on villains to externalize their internal struggles with responsibilities, to characterize the other (darker) half of their social identity, to push the boundaries of their abilities and values, and to represent a threat to, or critique of, the civic, pro-social, ideals that superheroes embody. Scarecrow, because of childhood trauma, uses fear to commit crime, just as Batman, because of childhood trauma, uses fear to combat crime. In this, the Scarecrow epitomizes the popular “one bad day” interpretation of the distinction between a hero and a villain – an idea that is particularly prominent within the Batman Universe, having originated in Batman: The Killing Joke (1988) and now being titularly featured in a comics series focused on Batman villains. While superheroes are often perceived as civic models of right feeling and action and embodiments of national identities, their nemeses are thought to be a threat to those ideals, a representation of deviance from society, or a criticism of social norms. The supervillain is the individual threat to the superhero’s collective good. The Scarecrow, whose expertise in psychology represents sociological problems and whose personal vendettas challenge communal welfare, characterizes this relationship. As such, this book will explore and highlight the ways in which Scarecrow, and thus the figure of the supervillain, is more than a plot device or foil for the advancement of the hero’s story. He is a representation of individual and collective anxieties, cultural histories, and social attitudes.