Do you consider yourself a true Batman comic book fan? Then you must be aware of the clandestine Court of Owls! While it’s hard to suppose that a die-hard comic book reader would be unaware of this secret order, we don’t want to take any chances. It is a well-known truth that comic novels prefer to center around secret organizations; in the case of Gotham, the city has its own dark organization, the Court of Owls.
Court of Owls is seen relying on the skills of its highly trained assassins, better known as Talons, to do their bidding, from removing rivals to shushing troublemakers and even going to the length of effecting changes inside the city. Let’s get right into today’s topic now that we’ve covered the basics.
William Cobb is the most infamous Talon in the world, as well as an extremely skilled assassin. The character initially appeared in the second issue of the series, Batman Volume 2, created by Scott Snyder and Greg Capullo.
So get ready for today’s film, in which we’ll look into the beginnings of this fearsome and accomplished assassin, who claims to have assassinated multiple members of the Wayne family, including Alan Wayne, Bruce Wayne’s great-great-grandfather.
You’d better be prepared!
Looking Back At His Origin
To begin with, William Cobb was never really a child of Gotham. After all to be a child of the city, one had to be a member of Gotham’s high society, a haut monde formed and defined best by the quartet – Alan Wayne, Edward Elliot, Frederic Cobblepot and Burton Crowne. Coming back to William, he was born to a middle class family and his father was an ironworker, one who spent the maximum years of his life building bridges.
Now it so happened that William’s father was constructing industrialist Cameron Kane’s commissioned bridge when it collapsed. The young boy lost his father to the mishap and life became even more harder for William.
The family could not support themselves and it led to William resorting to street performances as a juggler in the hopes of making some money. As for his mother, she started working at a textile plant. But even with her earning less money, she did not approve of her son putting up a show on the street to earn money and therefore, she gave him a red light. But if only that stopped William, who continued nonetheless juggling in secret. He would also quietly put his earnings inside his mother’s purse.
Days passed by and one day while juggling, he chanced upon a thief pick pocketing a man who was observing him in action. Using the very baseball that he was juggling with, William stepped in and knocked the thief down before he could escape. Of course, the man was grateful and he went to the extent of offering William a job at his circus. His mother agreed too when the owner of the circus approached her.
Post his arrival in the circus, William was given knives to work with so as to lure more audience and it goes without saying that with time, to watch him perform with knives was something that’s out of the world. He was magnificent. He started travelling with the circus all throughout the country and the more he travelled, the more he was loved and he eventually became celebrated.
With William coming back to his home town for a show, he fell in love with Amelia, a daughter of one of Gotham’s elite. The duo was madly in love with each other, so much so that they wanted to take the next step and get married. But Amelia’s father being one of the members of Gotham’s high society was against the whole thing and for obvious reasons.
The way Burton Crowne saw things, only two kinds of people existed for him, it was either the rich or the poor and that there was no room for anyone in between. Obviously, he was against the whole dating thing of his daughter and went to the extent of even prohibiting William from seeing his daughter. But fate had its share of plans for William and Amelia and soon the latter was expecting a child.
Coming back to William, he was not only overwhelmed with distress but also a bit befuddled at the same time. It was probably around that time when the director of the circus, Nathaniel Haly gave him an opportunity, a new position to be precise. Here’s where the twist comes – this whole time, the public was oblivious to the fact that Haly’s Circus upskilled, coached and eventually sold their talented young performers in discreet to the Court of Owls to act as their breed of deadly assassins, ones that are thoroughly devoted to the Court.
Post accepting the offer, William had the metallic alloy Electrum implanted in his mouth as a tooth, thereby getting regenerative abilities. Further making use of his talents from the circus and the Court’s training, he soon became one of the finest Talons that the Court had to offer removing every bit of an obstacle that fell on the Court’s way. Some time passed by and William ended up bursting into Amelia’s house and doing the inevitable – stealing their newborn baby. After handing his son to Nathaniel Haly, he tells him, “Raise him with Haly in secret, Nathaniel. Prepare him for the legacy. My son, the gray son of Gotham”.
In case you did not know this, the baby would later become John Grayson’s father and Dick Grayson’s grandfather, which makes William Cobb, the great grandfather of Dick Grayson.
As A Member Of the Talons
While the complete origin story of the Court still has not been disclosed, it is fair to say that this mysterious organization has been around literally for centuries now functioning in almost total secrecy. In fact, they were first mentioned in a nursery rhyme that spoke of how the Court discreetly kept a watch of everything happening in Gotham and that anyone who dared to go against them was simply put to death sending Talons after them.
Now, this brings us to a few important questions, the first one being – where is the Court getting the Talons from? We are aware of Haly’s Circus, how with each generation a fresh batch of trained acrobatic young performers was sold to the Court but what we don’t know is what happens to them after the Court takes them or in other words, how do they become a Talon.
Apparently, they are broken down physically, then mentally, and then rebuilt as super-soldier level assassins to serve the Court dedicatedly. Next comes another significant and parallel question. We are aware that Talons are sort of immortal as they can be brought back to life post their deaths and at will but with the Court of Owls having their line of succession, it is normal for someone to ask what stops the same man from becoming the talon over and over again. Well, it turns out that the ones training to become a talon have to prove that they are worthy of the title by engaging themselves in a battle with their predecessor and more importantly, defeating them.
Next, don’t be surprised when we tell you that some members of the Court cannot be categorized under humans. To be honest, there are some who are more like a hybrid between a human and an owl further boasting distorted attributes and strange behavioral patterns. Every member is seen donning terrifying-looking owl masks and in case you did not know, they are very particular about their uniforms too.
Speaking of William Cobb, the star Talon of the Court, he was sent to take out Batman. While he initially got defeated by the Dark Knight in a rooftop battle, William was able to incapacitate Batman the second time during an ambush in the sewers. He was held hostage by the Court for over a week and was not even given food. The only type of water available was the drugged water from a fountain that drove Batman crazy and made him endure disturbing hallucinations. Soon came the day when the Court sentenced him to death.
While William ended up thrashing him brutally, Batman making full use of the last bit of strength left within somehow managed to break himself free and beats William unconscious. Next, he triggers an explosion and manages to escape from there. As for William, the members of the Court rated him unfit and made up their minds to dispose of him because it is quite unlikely on the part of William to ever recover from the fact that Batman thrashed him left, right and center.
With his body found later drifting in the Gotham river, the body was brought to the Batcave for examination. It was after Batman took off the outfit of the Talon that he was revealed to be William Cobb, the great-grandfather of Dick Grayson! To those of you thinking that he was dead, he was not. Apparently, his body was kept in a form of stasis – neither living nor dead and very much capable of awakening if and when the Court demanded.
William Cobb As A Member Of The Suicide Squad
Amongst the very few people who have been able to fool Task Force X commanding officer, Amanda Waller, William Cobb definitely tops the list. Post William’s abduction from the Arkham Asylum, he was recruited into the Task Force X. Of course, William was hell bent on escaping; so much so that he went to the extent of scheming with Rick Flag along with a horde of former Squad members to go against Waller and ambush her. Not only did he put up an act of insanity but also displayed an ineptitude to talk so as to draw every bit of suspicion away from him. Don’t be surprised when we say that his performance did convince Waller.
A special mention has to be given to Culebra, one who was assigned with the task of guaranteeing that William’s insanity did not have any impact on the missions. William developed a close bond with Culebra and with the latter killed during a particular mission to Hell; William avenged her death having on display his concern for her.
What Makes Him So Powerful?
Okay, first things first, anybody who is blessed with the power of Electrum enhancement cannot be taken lightly. We have mentioned this before and we are mentioning this again, remember the part where we told you that William had Electrum implanted in his body?
Well, this chemical compound is also partially made up of Dionesium, a naturally occurring liquid metal that is capable of reviving dead tissues, can trigger an inexplicable healing ability and of course, bring the dead back from the grave. This thereby gives William the power of immortality, the power to regenerate himself even from fatal injuries, and gives him superhuman strength, speed, and durability.
For someone who is an equal match to both Batman as well as Nightwing and by that we are solely stressing the fact ‘blow for blow’, you do get a fair idea of who we are dealing with here, right? Here’s someone who is highly skilled in martial arts, acrobatics, demolitions, spying, swordsmanship, great with knives, is a master tactician, is stealthy, and brags an arsenal of bladed weapons.
Just think no more and accept the fact that he is dead and there are no second thoughts about it.