It Took Over 40 Years For Batman's First Movie Villain To Appear In Comics (For Good Reasons)

Comics historians know this well, but Batman made his first appearance in Detective Comics #27, first published in May 1939 (although released to the public in March). He wasn't exactly as we know him today, however, as some of the Batman's personal details would take a few issues to fill out. Detective Comics began selling remarkably well when Batman's teenage sidekick Robin was introduced. From there, writers began introducing Batman's rogue's gallery of villains. The Joker first appeared in Batman's first solo comic in 1940. The Penguin, Two-Face, and the Riddler showed up in issues of Detective Comics throughout the 1940s.

Batman made his first leap to the big screen in 1943 with a Columbia Pictures serial starring Lewis Wilson as Batman/Bruce Wayne, and Douglas Croft as Robin/Dick Grayson. In the serial, Batman was a contracted government employee, hired to investigate Japanese espionage following the bombing of Pearl Harbor in 1941. It seems that the uncle of Batman's girlfriend Linda (Shirley Patterson) has been abducted by a notorious underground ring of Japanese criminals. The ring was led by the evil Dr. Daka (J. Carrol Naish), a supervillain with access to high-tech weapons like a radioactive ray gun, and a neural implant that lets him turn people into zombie slaves. Batman, meanwhile, just had a regular car. Dr. Daka's headquarters were located in an active fun house ride located in Gotham City's Little Tokyo. 

It should immediately be noted that Dr. Daka was very much a racist caricature. He was a Japanese character played by a white man, and he spoke with a stereotyped Japanese accent. The character was an effective-enough off-the-rack gangster, but the 1943 serial is hard to watch for modern audiences because of the racist makeup. 

However embarrassing, Dr. Daka is an unfortunate part of Batman history, being the first supervillain the Caped Crusader ever fought on the big screen. After the serial, Dr. Daka was kind of swept under the rug for decades. In 1985, however, DC Comics tried to revive the character ... naturally in a less racist form. 

It should be noted that racist Japanese stereotypes were common in American media throughout the 1940s. Japanese characters were often depicted as cartoon villains in films and on TV as a means of getting cultural revenge for Pearl Harbor. America's wartime enemies tend to loom large over our fantasy entertainments. Dr. Daka was merely one racist character to emerge from an unfortunately racist trend. Once World War II ended, however, the stereotypes — while still very much present — became less popular with comic book readers. "Batman" writers began shifting focus away from "yellow peril" tactics, and toward other cultural villains like Russians. 

In 1985, however, DC Comics writers Roy Thomas and Arvell Jones included Dr. Daka, now called Prince Daka, into their book "All-Star Squadron." Prince Daka only appeared in issued #42 and #43 of the book, published in February and March. These issues of "All-Star Squadron" took place in 1942, technically making them a prequel to the Columbia theatrical serial. Prince Daka, like the version from the 1943 movie, was a Japanese super agent, sent to America to steal weapons and commit general acts of anti-American malfeasance. In the comics, he was after a magical widget called the Gravity Rod, and enlisted the aid of other Japanese villains like Kung, Tsunami, and Sumo the Samurai to help. 

The 1985 comic was partly a revival of the character, but was clearly also being wielded to show readers how much DC Comics villains had evolved since 1943. They used to be outsize characters with theatrical motivations. This was a stark contrast to Batman comics of the mid-1980s, which were taking a turn for the dark and angsty. 

The 1985 appearance was going to be the last time readers would hear of Dr. Daka for 35 additional years. Writers, it seems, need a few decades to think about what they might want to do with the character. In 2020, however, a new version of the character was introduced in "Crimes of Passion" #1. "Crimes of Passion" was a retro-style comic book, made to look like the salacious EC romance comics of the 1950s. One of the stories involved Batman's girlfriend Linda, the character from the 1943 serial, and her dealings with a bitter hypnotist named Tito Daka. 

Steve Orlando and Greg Smallwood wrote the Tito Daka story, and it skewed more into the direction of camp than serious drama. Tito Daka hypnotized the denizens of an assisted living facility, forcing them to re-write their wills and leave all their money to him. He was no longer Japanese, but a tuxedo-wearing magician-type. Later in the story, he would hypnotize Linda to shoot Batman. Batman shook her out of her hypnosis by taking off his bat mask. He then punched out Tito Daka. 

And that's that for the character, at least for now. He has only made three appearances in Batman history. He will always be the first on-screen supervillain that Batman fought, and he will always have his roots in racist caricature. Can the character be salvaged for a modern audience? After the two tries listed above, it may be safe to say that Dr. Daka can be retired. Batman has plenty of other villains he can fight.