While no job in Gotham City offers worse conditions than being a henchman, working in local politics comes remarkably close. Seriously, even House of Cards’ Frank Underwood would be scared of this place. As if it wasn’t bad enough that politicians are under constant threat, they are often threatened in the most preposterous ways…
The Batman Adventures #28
Hell, when he was City Council Chairman, Rupert Thorne was even attacked by the ghost of a quack psychiatrist:
Detective Comics #476
The most dangerous position, by far, is being the actual mayor. Looking back, whenever Mayor Hamilton Hill showed up in Batman: The Animated Series, it was usually to be kidnapped, to have his son’s birthday party attacked by a psychotic clown, to get strapped to the hands of a tower clock, or to be replaced by an evil robot. Still, compared to his counterparts in the comics, he got off lightly.
Famously, the mayor in The Dark Knight Returns had the worst day of his career when he agreed to meet with the leader of a gang of rebel mutants:
The Dark Knight Returns #2
It shouldn’t be surprising that Commissioner Gordon also watches the mayor die (in a car explosion) in the terrible mini-series The Cult, since – as I’ve mentioned before – that comic goes a very long way to mimic Frank Miller’s classic. In fact, it’s not just the mayor…
The Cult #2
…with typical lack of restraint, throughout The Cult the mayor’s potential successors also get slaughtered in horrific ways!
So far, you could reasonably chuck it all to 1980s’ excess, but it didn’t stop there. In 1991, Mayor Julius Lieberman was eviscerated by a predator:
Batman versus Predator #2
Yes, one of those predators.
By contrast, Mayor Armand Krol managed to outlive his term, although not by much. After losing reelection in 1995, his subsequent bid for the governorship was cut short when he died in the second outbreak of the Clench virus, unleashed into the city by the eco-villain Ra’s al Ghul. Krol’s successor, Marion Grange, did not have it easy either, what with dealing with the Clench epidemic, a wave of suicides and riots due to mass ontological despair in 1997 (caused by a passing Godwave, whatever that is), an earthquake, and the descent of the city into anarchy as the federal government cut off access to Gotham. Mayor Grange died shot by a sniper, unlucky ‘till the end… the bullet was actually meant for Bruce Wayne, but she got in the way!
By then, killing off the mayor had practically become a city tradition. In his excellent ‘Made of Wood’ story arc, Ed Brubaker retroactively established that in the late 1940s Mayor Thorndike had been beaten to death by an enemy of the original Green Lantern. Mayors in alternate realities – from Master of the Future to Earth One – met deadly fates as well. It became a staple of Batman comics:
Gotham Knights #18
I know what you are thinking: Commissioner Gordon always seems to be there. Much like Jessica Fletcher in Murder, She Wrote, he’s an obvious yet overlooked suspect, right? After all, most of these mayors did try to fire him at one point or another… Well, in Gordon’s defense, even after he retired and was replaced by Commissioner Michael Akins, things didn’t improve. In this panel, Akins is the guy giving the statement, Mayor Daniel Danforth Dickerson III is the one on the floor:
