I'm surprised I've never seen this comic brought up

I vaguely remember it feeling like an extended version of his Joker's Asylum issue

>>88329419
That felt way too edgelord to me

>>88329317
Eh. I felt it was trying too hard and is part of this annoying trend in cape comics for elements of villains' backstories to become grimmer and darker as they're exaggerated over time - like, the Riddler's dad went from Gaiman's gag about him tormenting young Eddie with riddles with no answers, to him being an emotionally unavailable figure, to him beating Eddie with his belt everytime he thought he lied SEE THAT'S WHY HE COMPULSIVELY RIDDLES WOW SO DEEP.

With Oswald Cobblepot, it went from:
>Batman sunday comics: Penguin is/was a mama's boy.
>Alan Grant: young Oswald carried around an umbrella because his dad died of pneumonia and his doting mother overprotected him, leading to him being tormented by bullies, leading to him being a bitter vengeful fuck.
>Gregg Hurwitz: OOOOH AND ALSO HIS DAD BEAT HIM AND THAT'S WHY HE TRICKED HIM INTO BEATING HIM IN THE RAIN ONE DAY FOR SO LONG HE GOT PNEUMONIA SO OSWALD INDIRECTLY MURDERED HIM BECAUSE HE'S ALL MESSED UP Y'KNOW, oh and also the umbrella.

That and the whole thing with the snowglobe and his weird Oedipal complex... it just seemed like gilding the lily. Even the Joker's Asylum issue >>88329419
by Jason Aaron, was just an incompatible retelling of Alan Grant's "The Killing Peck", and it was already darker and edgier in its foreshadowing of Oswald's cruelty. I've always felt that stuff was needless, like kid Victor Fries being a psycho who froze animals in blocks of ice in his back shed. We already know these guys will become villains later, it's supposed to be tragic, not just OOH LOOK AT HOW FUCKIN' TORMENTED AND TWISTED THEY ARE!

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>>88331599
Oh, and lastly, I was super-fucking salty that the last issue's cover promised Pengy playing with a life-sized toy Batmecha, and instead turned this comic into a house of LIES.

>>88331599
I get what you're saying, but I feel like it works for the penguin. I think that Joker's Asylum issue went too far/was too on the nose about it, but I feel like it makes total sense that a kid like Oswald would become really fucked up. Batman's rogues have always been fucked up in the head (there's a reason that they get locked up in Arkham) and it doesn't seem ill-fitting to me that they would have a bad childhood that contributed to that.

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>>88331865
But that's my point, Penguin already HAD a story about his bad childhood contributing to his issues - and I felt it was better executed and didn't rely on the hoary old cliche of the one-dimensional abusive dad. Instead, it has the cliche of the one-dimensional abusive bully, but that feels less forced - one look at them and you KNOW that Penguin or Riddler or Scarecrow were picked on in school. But Pain & Prejudiced was cliche in other ways too - there've been a LOT of "Oswald falls for a woman" stories that try to ply the audience's sympahthy, and none of them relied on the old "blind woman who is blissfully ignorant of her lover's deformity" cliche that was old when Kirby did it with Alicia Masters. And Pain & Prejudice had the gall to drag this plot out over six issues and end it with a "twist" that an ACTUAL blind person would see coming a mile away. I really wanted to like this comic, man, but there're so many better, less insistently dark Penguin stories out there... including one by John Ostrander which I'll storytime right the fuck now.

>>88331599
>beating Eddie with his belt everytime he thought he lied SEE THAT'S WHY HE COMPULSIVELY RIDDLES WOW SO DEEP.
Dixon's Riddler origin from Detective Comics Annual #8 continues to be one of my all time Riddler stories.

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>>88332729
Me too. I really like the idea that the worst thing Eddie's parents ever did was ignore him, or fight with each other over whose fault he was - they never gave him any attention, negative or otherwise.

>>88329317
Pain and Prejudice starts out great but falters a lot towards the end. The exploration of his childhood was really interesting for a while, but like >>88331599 says, it got pretty grimdark pretty fast. I feel like writers want to shake Oswald of the Silver Age campiness that he still has a reputation for with a lot of the public, but do so by going much too far in the other direction.

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This story also introduced, in the modern era, the idea of Penguin going quasi-straight.

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>>88333017
One of the other ways they combat that reputation is by having Batman talk him up, as here - but this is one of the better-written examples of that.

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>>88333064
I'm astounded this never showed up during the entire election

>>88333189
I think I get what he's saying here.

As far as criminals go the Riddler, Joker, Scarecrow, and Two Face are all insane, but the Penguin's a legit crimelord. He's better at being a crimelord than all the mafiosos who operate out of Gotham. If he didn't regularly get in the Batman's way he could be Kingpin levels of powerful.

At least that's how I'm reading it.

>>88333643
>electronic jammer
>tape recorder
Damn. I was wondering why that white noise relaxation machine was so loud.

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>>88333328
that art tho

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I want an Archie-style Gotham Academy annual about Penguin's prep school years.

>>88333523
>He's better at being a crimelord than all the mafiosos who operate out of Gotham.
Including Black Mask?

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>>88334172
I think so. Whenever he isn't written by Winick, Black Mask is either a crazed cult leader or just plain crazy.

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>>88334252

>>88334172
To me, the big difference between Black Mask and The Penguin is that Oswald does it because he wants to see himself as powerful and respected; it's all about the power. Black Mask just wants money. He's much more utilitarian, and that's why he'll much more willingly deal with shady shit.

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>Penguin is a cuck

>>88334579
Nah this is just playing with the idea of Beuce Wayne being the man Penguin wishes he could be. What exactly motivates The Penguin has consistently changed over the past 70 years, and this is one that keeps popping up.

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this my favorite Oswald story
sorry in advance for interrupting story time

>>88334816
This one was even edgier than OP's.

>>88329317
I bring it up every time someone needs some Penguin recommendations.

Love it, got it as soon as available in trade.

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And THAT is why he's smarter than Batman.

>>88335001
I forgot how stupid Tim's hair was during this era.

>>88329317
>>88331599
>>88332431
>>88333017
I basically like the parts of this story that aren't about his childhood.

Batman using the signature finishing move of Shat Fu.

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>>88335212
Rats, forgot to attach picture.

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And that's that.

>>88335523

Thanks, that was a great Story Time! Never read this comic before.

>>88335400
This isn't even trying to hide being a rip off of Dirty Harry

>>88335523
I thought it was pretty good, but while Pain and Prejudice went too far on the Grimdark side, I felt that this was too far in the other direction towards cartoonish Burgess Meredith.

Also the art was really bad.

>>88336317
Eh, counting the shells is a pretty common story trope. It's nowhere near as execrable as Matt Wagner's Riddler one-shot that was published around the same time, that copies the "You're nothing but a common thief!" "I'm an EXCEPTIONAL thief!" exchange verbatim from Die Hard.

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Since I'm still up, I'll storytime the other story mentioned, Alan Grant's The Killing Peck from Secret Origins Special '89.

>>88336650
Has the Secret Origins issue ever been reprinted aside from Riddler's story at the end of WHTTCC?

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>>88336812
I don't think so, no.

>>88336812
You can get the original for like a dollar on ebay

>>88331701
this

>>88329317

This is pretty interesting

How is the rest of Alan Grant's work on Batman by the way?

He is one of those names that occasionally get mentioned whenever there is talk of old Batman stories.

>>88343210
Some people will tell you that Alan Grant's run is perfect and everyone else since has bee terrible. Personally I feel like the early part of his run on 'Tec was really good, but the quality declined over time. Stories like the Ratcatcher and Ventriloquist ones were top.