Scarecrow is one of Gotham City’s most iconic villains. Beneath the scarecrow’s mask lies a boundless obsession with fear. His fascination with fear makes him an out-of-the-ordinary rival in the Batman villain gallery.
SCARECROW’S BACKGROUND
Created by Bill Finger and Bob Kane, The Scarecrow makes his first appearance in the World’s Finest comics in 1941.
Jonathan Crane was a psychology professor who lost his mind after being fired after conducting an experiment on the psychology of fear in one of his classes. He performed this experiment to prove his theories since Crane was obsessed with phobias and fear in general.
Due to a harsh childhood in which he was intimidated by his physicality and his passion for studies, Crane develops a kind of obsession with taking revenge through fear. This trauma was never overcome and his withdrawn character mutated into an unscrupulous soul who enjoyed the power that gave him. He applied this to his experiments in a brutal and terrifying way on people in an attempt to learn how to overcome the inferiority that had plagued the early years of his life.
When he was expelled from the university after performing this experiment, Crane took on the identity of the Scarecrow and acquired a specialized fear-inducing gas that makes a person’s deepest phobia become a terrifying reality.
WORKING AT ARKHAM ASYLUM
It was at this time that Jonathan Crane began working at Arkham Asylum as a psychiatrist. He vowed to overcome his fears by studying the psychology and biochemistry of phobias and the nature of fear.
As he specialized in psycho-pharmacology. Crane carried out drug smuggling and other criminal acts to enable his work. The worst of all was to perform cruel experiments with his patients to test his drugs and experiment with their fears beyond all medical limits.
He proclaims himself to be “The Master of Fear“, and is quite obsessed with using an experimental variety of toxins along with psychological tactics to exploit the fears and phobias of his victims and adversaries, especially those of Batman.
SCARECROW’S EXPERIMENTS
His experiments consist of giving his victims a toxin so that they live out their worst phobias and fears. We might think that being a specialist, these practices would be controlled so that the patient would experience a gradual progression, but nothing is further from the truth. His amoral character and his thirst for knowledge fueled by his childhood trauma makes Crane exceed all limits, even enjoying these treatments in his strive for knowledge.
Arkham Asylum may have allowed him to perfect his technique, but it didn’t start here. No, his beginnings with experimentation on patients began with his teaching work.
Crane had already started performing these experiments when he got his psychiatric license. At that time, he began to experiment with schoolboys. Later, thanks to him getting a position as a teacher, the young adults were perfect candidates to carry out his formulas and theories.
Later when he got the job at Arkham Asylum, Scarecrow began to apply his fear experiments to his patients and that’s when his advancement started to grow significantly.
In these experiments the patients were treated in an insane and cruel way. The Scarecrow performed these tortures on them to test his methods and drugs, but he also enjoyed the suffering of his patients. For him it was one more way to test the knowledge he had acquired thanks to his studies.
Despite the recriminations of his professional colleagues. Crane believed in more inhumane medicine because of his character. It would seem there was no doubt in his mind that what he was doing was wrong, hence we could consider him a villain.
After this perfection of his drugs, the Scarecrow began to use his toxins on his victims to make them see their greatest phobias and fears and leave them vulnerable to his attacks. That’s when the Scarecrow could use his fighting method called “Violent Dance” which consists of a kind of Kung Fu and boxing to finish off his enemies.
HIS BIGGEST FEAR: BATMAN
It is to be expected that this villain who specialized in the fears of the people had his own fear that tormented his soul. This fear was intended for the one who was willing to disrupt his plans: Batman.
The Dark Knight is what the Scarecrow fears the most and curiously the one who was closest to becoming a reality. For Batman, the Scarecrow is a danger to society and stopping him was a top priority, for his threat was very real and very imminent.
INTERESTING FACTS
- His surname was inspired by Ichabod Crane, the main character of “The Legend of the Sleepy Hollow“.
- The first time I used the fear toxin was in Batman #189 (it was published on December 6, 1966). 25 years after the first appearance of the Scarecrow!!
That’s all for today gothamites. Soon we will have news about the Scarecrow in Batman Miniature Game, so stay tuned to our social networks!
