The DC Comics universe contains many diverse stories, but there is one aspect that appears in nearly every one of them. The element of darkness gives DC heroes their genesis story and gives them a personality that no fan can get enough of. Hello everyone, and welcome back to another Marvelous Videos origin video. If you are a DC fan, you already know how awesome this video is going to be. A DC Universe supervillain with a history that is surprisingly too grim to handle.
So, how could a supervillain with a dull past possibly become a great supervillain, right? Sadness, anguish, and suffering must accompany them on their journey to becoming who they have decided to be. The story of Black Mask, a brutal Gotham mob boss, is told in today’s video. His most recent role in the 2020 picture Harley Quinn: Birds of Prey has made an indelible impact on his resume. However, unlike Ewan McGregor’s superb looks, Batman’s adversary Black Mask is not particularly attractive. Well, he does not have to be when he can just don his iconic skull mask and run a criminal enterprise.
On one hand, we have our superhero Batman, who has a tragic background, and on the other, we have Black Mask, who has a past that is much worse than Batman’s loss and misery. We have a DC villain who is crazier than the Joker and deadlier than Ras Al Ghul, and who first appeared in Batman #386 in 1985. There are connections between the storylines of Batman and Black Mask, which were created by Doug Moench and Tom Mandrake. So, without further ado, let us go right into the video and explore what makes Black Mask such a dark persona.
Roman Sionis AKA Black Mask Origin
The story of how he turned into the Black Mask is a bizarre one. When a child is born, the first impression they have is said to last forever in their subconscious. Now, for most kids, the first thing they usually see is the face of a surgeon being passed over to the mother. Sadly, for our soon-to-be supervillain, the first thing he saw was a guy in a green surgical mask dropping him headfirst to the ground. Yeah, the doctor literally dropped the kid.
Born as Roman Sionis, he belonged to a wealthy family who was pretty great friends with the Wayne family. So, we know that Bruce Wayne is sure to enter his life since both of them are about the same age. Since childhood, Roman was exposed to the various invisible masks the adults wear on a daily basis.
His parents were accustomed to wearing masks all the time while entertaining their social circle. They expected Roman to like the basic kid things, watching cartoon films, going to vacation homes. And that is how Roman understood how to put on a fake expression himself. As the years went by, his father’s empire kept growing larger and larger.
Roman was soon able to work his way up to being the vice president of Janus Cosmetics. That is when he got bewitched by the beauty of a model named Circe. A hint of darkness started being visible in him when his parents disapproved of Roman being with the model. Well, he then put on another mask to show his parents that he had accepted their decision of firing the woman. Roman executed what he wanted in the deadliest way possible.
As it turns out, soon after the conversation there was a fire at his home when he was with Circe. A fire that grew from suspicious origins and both his mother and father died. It was the perfect alibi possible for Roman to be with Circe when this unfortunate incident occurred. Maybe not as unfortunate as you might think.
It worked just like Roman wanted it to and then came the new president of Janus Cosmetics, Roman Sionis. Not so surprisingly the first thing he did right after being president, was cover an entire room with handmade masks made by primitives. Like the ones we wear on Halloween, he had all kinds of masks. He then introduced a brand new idea for his company with the introduction of a new line of products, tangible and visible like masks and not just the cosmetics for the face. The new Janus Face Paint cosmetics came into existence.
Well, he played the boss card which soon led him to be the face of the disaster for Janus Cosmetics. A desperate Roman was now ready to offer as much bonus as it needed to the person who would come up with something revolutionary for the brand. Waterproof makeup products were introduced, but not having them chemically tested cost Roman Sionis everything he ever had in the company. And then after having a ton of lawsuits against them, the Wayne foundation came to the rescue.
Sionis hated his name more than anything. And with that, he hated his father because that is where the name came from. In madness, he went to the Sionis crypt and before he could open it, he was hit by a lightning bolt, opening the door and pushing him away headfirst to a stone. Another hit to the head, he took it as his rebirth and smashed his father’s casket, and went away with a broken piece of it. To the world, Roman Sionis then disappeared with a lot of cash, a gun, all of his masks from his old apartment, and the defective chemical used in the waterproof makeup.
As it turns out, Sionis had turned his parents grave into his own den. The mother’s casket had two masks, waiting to be worn by the first ones of an army which will be created by Black Mask. The army of Black Mask destroys one identity and creates another when you wear the mask. Sionis had now completely given his face away to his mask. He had plans to turn all of Gotham into the army of Black Mask. Building the false face society of Gotham. After growing his army, Black Mask went after the life of the new chairman of the board of Janus Cosmetics. Death by wearing a mask is how fashionable a death Black Mask is created.
Batman had become aware of Black Mask’s existence. And after this murder, he knew for a fact that Black Mask was Roman Sionis because he killed the chairman by using the mixture of banned Janus Cosmetics. The motive at this point was obvious he was after the lives of the executives appointed by the Wayne foundation. Batman of course always has excellent plans right! So, he came up with a masquerade event, where everyone was supposed to be in masks, at the Wayne Manor.
The night begins with Bruce and Alfred trying to figure out which masquerader could be Roman Sionis. We see Circe’s actual face when someone forcefully removes her mask. It is all muscles as if the skin was peeled off. Perhaps, the result of the waterproof makeup is an unfortunate event. Alfred has suspicions about six people, but they don’t know that Black Mask is not wearing his original mask this fine night.
Roman soon misleads Wayne outside and then happens the real encounter between the two, with Roman threatening to kill Bruce. Unfortunately, Bruce cannot go after Roman as Bruce. So, he lets Robin take the lead while he prepares to wear his mask, Batman. They find out that Roman is living in his family crypt.
Well, looks like Black Mask’s army was waiting just for Batman and Robin to arrive. The members of the false face society of Gotham, rise and attack both the heroes. And as Batman goes after Black Mask, he makes a run for it. Chasing him with the Batmobile, Batman and Robin have no idea where he is headed.
It is the Sionis family estate, that Roman abandoned ever since he became Black Mask. It looks like his grudge against Bruce Wayne is set deep inside his mind because he has always succeeded as Black Mask but he lost to Bruce as Roman Sionis. Black Mask has come to this place to kill the little Roman Sionis forever by burning all his things.
Batman and Robin have defeated all of the false face society of Gotham and when Black Mask sees this, he plunges into the fire, face down, his mask blacker than ever when Batman pulls him out of the fire. With a distorted appearance, it looks like Black Mask has successfully masked himself and killed Roman Sionis forever. Driving himself, even more, closer to madness and the hunger for power.
What Makes Black Mask So Dangerous
Now that we have uncovered what events led Roman Sionis to abandon the life in which he was born and choose to become the most dangerous gangster in Gotham city as Black Mask, let us figure out how exactly is he this dangerous.
As Roman Sionis, he clearly failed to become the businessman that his father once was, but as it turns out, as Black Mask, he sure succeeded in organizing, managing, and leading by far the biggest criminal empire in Gotham city. We can surely call him the greatest criminal mastermind for being such an expert in crime that even Batman would find it difficult to bring him down.
All over Gotham he is very well known for being cruel and ruthless when it comes to torture, which he considers to be an art form. He takes great pleasure in torturing his enemies in whatever way necessary to extract information from them and well, for the very act of torturing brings him pleasure. A sadistic man indeed. He is skilled in physical as well as mental torture, so if you are his enemy, it is best to stay clear from him because the damage he will do, will mentally stay with you forever.
With abilities like this, it will not come as a surprise if he had excellent physical strength. The very proof of his fighting skills and the combat level he can go to is that his strength is literally as equal as our heroes Nightwing, The Red Hood, Robin, Catwoman, and even Batman. Probably because of such a high level of power, for a time, Black Mask actually pretended to be the Dark Knight himself.
And on top of that, his acting abilities were so impressive that he was able to convince loads of people that he was, in fact, Batman. So many people became his victims and were killed as a result of his vengeance for Batman. And Joker was actually able to take him down, knowing right away that Roman was not the real Batman.
Thank heavens, Batman’s reputation did not get affected. After all, the world knows Batman would never kill anybody. But this stunt clearly shows just how cunning and terrifying Black Mask can be. But that is not where the tricks from his mind end. Black Mask gradually started to think that doing business in Gotham was getting quite tough. But, of course, being the mob boss that he is, instead of giving up his life of crime, he decided to relocate his criminal empire to Bludhaven for some time.
His plans, however, were stopped faster than he had hoped, by our hero the Nightwing. The defeat of Black Mask was just so embarrassing that he settled back into Gotham and continued his crimes as if nothing had actually happened. Looks like it does not matter how clever Black Mask might be at times, if you mess with the likes of Batman and his family, it will never end well for you.
Threatening Versions Of Black Mask In Various Forms Of Media
On television, Black Mask appeared in The Batman animated series that aired in 2004. This version of him, as a strong and powerful crime lord with a massive organization of minions, has a skull-like face, which is exactly similar to his counterpart in “No Man’s Land.” He also has no fingerprints or any identifying traits for that matter, which makes him difficult to identify.
In Batman: The Brave and the Bold, Black Mask appears alongside the False Facers and is voiced by John DiMaggio. His physical appearance is a hybrid of his original and the modern version.
This version of him wears a mask that moves the lips but not the teeth. He is much more muscular and physically intimidating than his canon counterpart, who were generally ordinary and slim. Here, in an effort to destroy half of Gotham, Black Mask reprograms Batman’s Bat-Robots to steal deadly explosives, only to be stopped by the Dark Knight, as predicted.
Todd Stashwick plays Richard Sionis in the FOX TV drama Gotham, which predates his appearance in the comic books. Sionis is the CEO of a huge finance organization in the first season, which also houses a hidden and violent organized combat ring.
Sionis puts employees against one another in fights to the death in order to attain more executive positions within the firm, all while being broadcast to the city’s elite. When Detective James Gordon starts investigating the fight ring, Sionis, wearing a black mask, makes an attempt to murder Gordon but of course, is knocked unconscious and imprisoned.
Black Mask is also portrayed by Peter Outerbridge in the second season of The CW’s Batwoman. This version of him, rather than having a skull-like face, wears a skull mask and is shown to have a link with Safiyah Sohail.
He is the CEO of Janus Cosmetics as well as the head of the False Face Society. He blames the Crows and the previous Batwoman for the murder of his daughter Circe Sionis on the same day when Alice led a mass breakout at Arkham Asylum, where Circe was imprisoned.
Now, coming to the films, elements of Black Mask’s origin, such as his cosmetic industry background and how he accidentally ended up producing a lethal face cream, were included in the 2004 film adaption of Catwoman for the role of Sharon Stone.
Wade Williams voices Black Mask in the animated feature film Batman: Under the Red Hood in 2010. This version portrays the first criminal lord who took full control of Gotham City. As a violent turf war develops when the mysterious Red Hood tries to depose Black Mask, the crime lord is finally forced to take the help of the Joker and break him out of Arkham Asylum in order to recruit him to murder the Red Hood. In the epilogue, Batman captures the Joker and the Red Hood flees, and Black Mask is waiting for his trial due to his supposed role in the Joker’s escape.
And at last, the brilliant Ewan McGregor plays the character of Black Mask in the DC Extended Universe. We first get a hint at his character with his first reference in the Extended Universe in Justice League the 2017 film. A billboard for his company, Janus Cosmetics can clearly be seen on Gotham City’s skyline. So, it was sure at this point that now we are going to see more of Black Mask in future films.
Black Mask finally makes his live-action debut in the DC Extended Universe in 2020 with the film Birds of Prey and the fantabulous emancipation of one Harley Quinn. With Harley Quinn as the main character, Roman Sionis serves as the film’s main antagonist.
Roman Beauvais Sionis is an egotistical, skull-masked crime lord who poses as the charming founder of Gotham’s popular nightclub, the “Black Mask Club.” After being cut off from the family’s riches after damaging their business, Roman strives to become the city’s most powerful kingpin in order to overpower his father.
He decides to get the entire Bertinelli criminal family murdered, although one family member, Helena, survives the killing, in order to get a diamond that is embedded with the account numbers to their money.
Now with that, we have come to the end of another origin video with Marvelous Videos. We hope you enjoyed watching it, as much as we enjoyed making it for you. Make sure to drop a like and hit that subscribe button on your way out. Until then everyone, stay safe, take care, and see you in the next video. Have a great day ahead!