Did you ever think you would get to watch a villain who suffers from a mental illness that essentially compels her to commit crimes? So, DC introduced Magpie, a villain who is obviously influenced by Catwoman. Despite being a lesser-known character, she plays a significant role in the history of the confrontations between Batman and Superman.
Her name, in fact, has a striking resemblance to the types of crimes she commits. Without further ado, let us watch the movie and learn everything there is to know about Magpie, from her mental state to her role in the DC universe.
Her love for shiny things and her descent into a world of crime
John Byrne, an American author of British descent best known for his work on Marvel Comics’ X-Men and Fantastic Four, developed the character of Margaret Pye. Margaret Pye had a fascination with shiny objects as a young child. She had such a strong passion for acquiring anything dazzling that she felt it was her birthright. Everyone around her began to mock her because of her strange fixation and gave her the moniker “Magpie,” which is a direct allusion to the bird with the same name that is notorious for collecting shiny objects.
Now, as she grew older, she realized that her love for shiny things was not as simple as diamonds being a woman’s best friend because her obsession kept increasing. In fact, she wanted to make it her lifestyle, so she decided to get a job as a curator at the Gotham City Museum of Antiquities. She always dreamed of being surrounded by shiny objects, and this job gave her that life. However, she soon realized that she would never be able to own the antiques around her since she was just an employee.
As a result, her love and obsession turned into intense jealousy, and she needed to do more than just look at the antiques. So, she did a one-eighty, completely turned her life around, and became a thief known as Magpie. Of course, no one would have thought that she would actually adopt even the personality of the bird. Since she was already an employee at the Gotham City Museum, she had access to all the shiny artifacts that were constantly on display. So, she decided to build exact replicas of those artifacts, and when the time was right, she would replace them with the original objects.
Magpie had no guilt over doing this because she genuinely believed that she was not stealing but just taking the things that belonged only to her. Initially, she worked alone, but the task of stealing and managing a safe escape was starting to get difficult for her. So, she soon hired a group of gangsters in order to conduct the crime even more smoothly. Now, if you think she is only a criminal that steals, then you are quite wrong because she can also kill people when it comes down to that. In fact, in her group of thugs, whoever managed to piss her off or did not complete their task as she wanted them to, would get brutally murdered at her hands without a second thought.
Beware the Batman brought this twisted psychopath into the animated world
The 2013 animated television series, Beware the Batman, which was produced by Warner Bros. Animation and DC Entertainment, brought a different version of Magpie before us. She made her first appearance in the second episode of the first season of the series. In this version, her name is Margaret Sorrow. She has dissociative identity disorder and is a kleptomaniac. The character of Magpie is voiced by Grey DeLisle Griffin.
Now, while she was at Blackgate Penitentiary as a prisoner, a doctor named Joe Braxton was a part of a research team that conducted special experiments inside the prison. So, Joe along with a psychotherapist named Bethanie Ravencroft, performed certain experiments on Magpie’s brain using a device that looked like a helmet. After this experiment, Magpie lost all of her memories, including her identity as Magpie, the criminal.
She entirely forgot everything about her life and who she was. So, they gave herself a new identity and a new name Cassie. Later on, her life got even more complicated because she knew she had a past but had no idea about it. As a result, she decided to take revenge on Braxton and Ravencroft for doing that to her. In reality, they did not fry her brain and erase all of her memories because somehow, fragments of her past self as Magpie had seeped deep into her subconscious mind.
Soon her subconscious mind acted up and she found herself at Dr. Bethanie Ravencroft’s clinic. Now since she has to take her revenge, she decides to work for Dr. Ravencroft as a receptionist. Apparently, even though Magpie has no recollection of previously being a criminal, her personality as a kleptomaniac has stayed with her even after the brainwashing. So, after finding the device that destroyed her life, she steals it to do the same to Joe Braxton.
Eventually, she is successful in wiping Braxton’s mind but, in the process, gets caught by Batman. The two confront each other, and upon noticing Batman’s dark and gloomy outfit, she makes an argument that perhaps they are both similar in a way. Just like Batman, Magpie’s uniform also features all things black and is based upon a bird. So, she tries to create a connection between herself and the crime-fighting vigilante but Batman does not fall for her trick.
He soon realizes that Magpie is Cassie and she has no memory of being Margaret Sorrow who vanished from the Blackgate Penitentiary five years ago. He tries to tell her that he will help her, but Magpie is quite adamant and does not need anybody’s help. The two engage in a fight and Magpie manages to knock Batman unconscious. She then straps him to an operating table and gets ready with the helmet to wipe out his memories as well. After he wakes up, Magpie places the helmet on his head and leaves to go after Dr. Ravencroft.
After finding her, Magpie threatens her to restore her memories but Dr. Ravencroft has no idea of her past. Just when Magpie is about to kill the doctor, Batman arrives and stops her. He informs her of her previous identity as Margaret Sorrow and tells her that she is suffering from split personality since she has two different personalities in one body. He also tells her that the experiment was supposed to get rid of the bad part of her personality, but it has now resurfaced in the form of Magpie.
She is unable to process all of this and attacks both the doctor and Batman once again before running away. Magpie finds out that Batman has destroyed the helmet, and along with that, she loses all hope of ever getting her memories as Margaret Sorrow, back. She tries to fight Batman but he defeats her and police commissioner Gordon arrests her. Later on in the series, this version of Magpie also ends up developing a romantic attachment with Batman because he would often visit her at the Blackgate Penitentiary.
Her dark past in Arkham Asylum
In the comic books, Magpie was eventually caught by the team of superheroes and became the first-ever criminal to be imprisoned by the team of Batman and Superman who had to join forces and work together in order to put her behind bars. She was then committed to Arkham Asylum and all of her shiny possessions were taken away. The loss of her shiny items came as a shock to her, and she actually had a mental breakdown. We then see her story in the six-part mini-series known as “Arkham Asylum: Living Hell.”
At Arkham, Magpie is in a joint cell with Poison Ivy. Another inmate known as Doodlebug, who is a deranged artist, is in possession of a shiny item that is a long, shank-shaped piece of mirror. Now, because of Magpie’s unhealthy obsession and current lack of ownership of anything shiny, she decides to take it from him. Doodlebug of course has no issues giving it to her, but he asks for sex in exchange, and surprisingly, Magpie is perfectly okay to comply with this deal.
In fact, she soon starts prostituting herself even to the prison guards and other inmates in order to get shiny trinkets from them. Her cellmate Poison Ivy finds this behavior of Magpie to be sickening. Now, sometime later, a riot breaks out at Arkham Asylum, and while some of the prisoners manage to escape, the others get left behind after most of the riot is put down. During this entire chaos, Poison Ivy and Magpie, who now seem to be sharing a common goal, begin digging a tunnel beneath Arkham so that they can try and escape.
However, this ended quite badly for the duo because their tunnel led them to one of the cellars at Arkham instead of the outside world. Now, accidentally, Poison Ivy ended up breaking a room that was sealed in order to contain the Skarva, the Seven Lords of Torture. This brought demons from hell into the living world. Since Magpie and Poison Ivy were in close proximity to the Skarva, the two got possessed by different demons and their bodies started to change into hideous monstrous versions of themselves.
With this deadly threat looming over Arkham Asylum, a prisoner known as Warren White, or the Great White Shark, is able to persuade the master of the demons to send them back to where they came from – that is, hell. As a result of this, both Magpie and Poison Ivy are released from possession, and they go back to their original forms.
The deranged thief also appeared in the Gotham TV series
The character of Magpie gets adapted in a live-action version for the first time in the Gotham TV series. She is played by Sarah Schenkkan, and in this version, she is the stealthy jewel thief of Gotham City. On one of her missions to steal some valuables, she noticed that another thief managed to rob the place before she could. So, she decided to follow this person, and it led her to the base of operations that belonged to Oswald Chesterfield Cobblepot, a fierce crime lord in Gotham City who is famously known as the Penguin.
Magpie begins taking a look around the place in the most discreet manner and stumbles upon the Penguin’s private collection of treasure. Now, since her favorite things are the shiny items, her eyes fall upon two sparkly Russifer Diamonds. It is no secret that Magpie is a bit psychotic at this point, so she ends up naming her new diamond Charlotte. She chooses to take the diamonds with her, but she notices that one of them is a secret explosive device.
Before she can safely leave Mr. Cobblepot, a.k.a. the Penguin’s base, she is caught red-handed by him and it does not look good for her. But since she is in possession of the diamond that explodes, she uses it as a diversion and manages to escape when the blast occurs. Now, later on, Mr. Cobblepot joins forces with another super villain Selina Kyle, also known as Cat woman, in order to track down Magpie.
Soon enough, the two villains are able to locate the workshop of Magpie, where she creates her fake jewels. They attack her, and she is completely caught off guard. She engages in a battle with them and manages to push away the Penguin so that she can escape. However, Cat Woman does not let that happen and immediately captures Magpie. But Magpie breaks free and grabs a watch from her collection of stolen items.
Before escaping from her workshop, she tells them that the things in her office could blow up at any time, and if they stay, they are sure to die. This gives her enough time to run away and save her life. But it is an inherent quality in Magpie that she cannot stay away from stealing shiny things for long. So, she soon goes back to the Penguin’s base in order to steal his secret treasure.
Only this time, she is unaware that the Penguin has laid down a trap for her. So, during her escapade, she ends up grabbing a trap and is shot on the spot. When Mr. Cobblepot and Cat woman arrive, she begs them to set her free, but the Penguin laughs it off and shoots her dead. Much like her other versions, even in this one, Magpie is shown as a compulsive thief.
What makes her so potent even without superpowers?
Despite the lack of superpowers, Magpie is a formidable enemy for both Batman and Superman since they had to work together to catch her. She is a master of gadgets and has the ability to build precise duplicates of anything that she steals. She is also able to create deadly weapons and booby traps in the form of her stolen artifacts to trick her enemies.
And as if that was not enough, she is an excellently skilled gymnast and great at hand-to-hand combat. She is also capable of creating airborne poisons, explosives, and razor blades that shoot from her costume. In fact, in Beware the Batman, Magpie’s version also had the ability to shoot razor claws from her hands.
The character of Margaret Pye is sure to remind the fans of Cat woman due to the similarity in their costumes and build. Magpie is definitely a great villain as she challenges Batman to go beyond his limits if he wants to defeat her. DC did a great job introducing her into the universe because her mental health condition as a kleptomaniac gives the fans a new perspective on the villain and her struggles in dealing with the irresistible urges. Magpie’s character certainly has the potential to be explored even more and it would be fun if we got to watch her in a modern version.
Well, guys, that is all for today; we hope you enjoyed watching this video as much as we enjoyed making it for you. Have a fantastic day ahead!