Batcave Trophy Origins: The Monk's Hood

Have ever looked at really obscure Batcave Trophy pictures and noticed a Red Rag like thing? No? Okay. Have you ever wondered who Batman's first super-powered villain he fought was? Good.

Today we'll look at the trophy origins of the Monk's Hood on display in the trophy room:

And to answer where it came from, and who the first super-powered villain of Batman was, we'll look at Detective Comics #31 by Bob Kane and Bill Finger.

Pretty cool cover I gotta say. Unfortunately, I don't have availability to the issue right now, so I'll scrap together what I can.

The Monk was a Vampire. Yep. Furthermore he turns into a wolf instead of a bat, and can control other wolves. So essentially, he's a Vampire WereWolf.

The Basis of his scheme is he uses mind persuasion (not quite mind control) to lure people to Hungary. I say to Hungary because that's where his castle is, and his powers can effect you from across a continent. So right off the Bat (Buh-Dum-Tss) you can tell this guy is dangerous.

 When you would arrive at his castle, he feeds you to his Wolves. And that's it. Why he didn't just persuade a few guys to steal a dump truck and a few thousand pounds of Dog Food to be delivered to him is beyond me.

Yes he looks ludicrous, but he's dangerous. Like I said, he was able to persuade people from across continents, so that means he is able to get in the head of The Bat-Man:

"...Go on nice dates, howl at the moon, eat people, you get the gist of things. It's a pretty sweet gig."

I would talk about the entire story arc, but naw. Too lazy I don't want to spoil it for you. At the end of the story, The Monk calls in his wolves and traps Batman in a cellar with them:

"Well Good Morning, Pooches!"

...More like they're trapped in there with Batman.

So Batman escapes the pit, but The Monk isn't around anywhere. Because he went to bed. I'm actually laughing as I write this. If "He went to bed" doesn't scream evil, I don't know what does.

Anyways, Batman kills him in his sleep:

He's a vampire, so it doesn't really count as murder in my book

Notice when he not-kills the Monk, The Monk is not wearing his Hood. So pretty much we can assume as Batman was leaving he found the Hood hanging on a coat rack and was like "Well that's a waste of a perfectly nice trophy"

OR

When The Monk briefly returned in the 70's, Batman beat him again and then took the Hood that time in Detective Comics #515 (I haven't read it).

And thus:

Arguably, you could say this was Batman's first trophy, but my golden age senses tell me that there was probably a story about Batman's first trophy.

In the 2000's Matt Wagner re-did the story to fit into New Earth continuity during a story called "Batman And The Mad Monk", which takes place after Batman Year One.

So that's that; The Monk's Hood.

See you whenever I feel like posting next!