The most important woman in Batman’s life

That was the theme of Batman #208, one of DC’s 80-page giants. Lots of these reprint issues had themes: Flash’s most treacherous traps, the Dynamic Duo’s adventures in time and space, an all-Luthor Superman giant. This one, however, was a little bit different.

Most annuals were all reprint. This one opens with E. Nelson Bridwell and Gil Kane giving us a framing sequence.As you may already know, Mrs. Chilton isn’t blowing smoke at us. As she explains, after the Waynes died, Bruce’s Uncle Philip assumed guardianship of their orphan son. As he traveled a lot, Mrs. Chilton became primary caregiver.
And yes, she has figured out  that he’s Batman. Which leads to the reveal of why she’s number one —I didn’t read this story until I got to it recently in my Silver Age reread. If I’d read it at the time it came out (during my lost years for comics reading), I don’t know that I’d have realized how remarkable it was.

Up to this point nobody had ever brought up what happened to Bruce after that night in Crime Alley. Who raised him. Who cared for him. We’d learned about his college years (Batman #96) but nothing in between.

That made this a significant retcon. It’s the second time Bridwell had used an annual to fill in a bit of untold history, the first being his origin for the Legion of Superheroes in Superboy #147.

That origin, with a little retooling, stayed canon even after the Crisis. Mrs. Chilton didn’t do quite so well. She stayed canon through 1980, appearing in Untold Legend of the Batman. Other than the flashback there, she never reappeared pre-Crisis. Post-Crisis, Alfred and Dr. Leslie Tompkins became Bruce’s caregivers.

It’s a shame Mrs. Chilton wasn’t used more. Heck, if they’d introduced her a few years earlier, she’d have been more interesting pitching in while Alfred was dead than Aunt Harriet ever was.

I knew about Mrs. Chilton’s story before I opened the comic on the DC app. What I didn’t know was that the framing sequence is only part of the new material in the book. Bridwell, a comics nerd with an encyclopedic knowledge (of many other things too), has done an exhaustive job. We see Vicki Vale, Catwoman, Batgirl, Poison Ivy, Batwoman, Det. Patricia Powell and even Marcia Monroe, the socialite who became Batman’s sweetheart in Brave and the Bold #64.

That covers the Silver Age Batman but what about the Golden Age? Bridwell gets into that too. Outside of Catwoman there were two romantic interests from that era: Julie Madison, who was Bruce’s fiancee at one point, and Linda Page, a socialite turned nurse.

Here’s Julie near the end of her time in the series, as redrawn  by Gil Kane.

(For anyone who’s curious this was also the debut of Basil Karlo, the original Clayface)

Never having heard of Julie or Linda, I would have been fascinated to learn about them. I’d also have been fascinated to see the first appearance of Catwoman.

I’d been reflecting recently on how none of the Bat annuals used stories from the Golden Age — it’s all 1950s stuff. This has me wondering whether there’s some technical reason they couldn’t reprint them and therefore had to have the stories redrawn in #208. Then again, Flash’s annuals had multiple stories with the Golden Age Flash and Johnny Quick so … I got nothing. Thoughts?

While using the Golden Age material reflects Bridwell’s desire to cover all of Batman’s women, I wonder if there’s not more to it. As I mentioned recently, this is around the time DC began running text pages about its Golden Age characters. Not just obvious subjects of interest, such as the Justice Society but obscure figures such as Tarantula (I couldn’t find the page I read but if you scroll down that CBR thread, you’ll see it). DC’s starting to notice nerdy fans like me were interested in that stuff and reacting accordingly.

Either way, this issue was cooler than I expected.

#SFWApro. All #208 art (and B&B cover) by Gil Kane, cover by Nicholas Cardy. Superboy cover by Curt Swan.