Hero/Villain of the week!

A villain and unrepentant crook through and through, he has thrown down with The Flash on many occasions.  His heart is as cold as his icy stare, just don’t call him Mr. Freeze.  He hates being mistaken for Mr Freeze.  Often referred to as “the man who mastered absolute zero”, he was relentless in his attempts to take down his enemies.  For all of you who haven’t guessed, our Hero/Villain of the week is none other than the Flash’s arch-nemesis (dating back to the glory days with the great Barry Allen) Captain Cold!  He can be, and often is, considered a very sympathetic villain in the DC comics universe.  Make no mistake about it though, he can be a cold hearted killer (pun intended).  The villainous Captain Cold, a.k.a Leonard Snart, first appeared a whole two years before Mr Freeze appeared in the pages of DC comics (Snart first appeared in ‘57, Freeze in ‘59), it is Freeze that is commonly considered as the master of cold and ice.  This fact infuriates Snart, so don’t mistake him for Freeze, or you’ll find yourself suspended in a block of ice!  Here is what we know about Captain Cold:

Leonard Snart was raised by an abusive father, but he occasionally found rare solace in the company of his grandfather (who drove an ice truck).  When his grandfather died, he found that he couldn’t handle the abuse anymore, so he turned to a life of crime.  He began his criminal career shortly after Barry Allen’s debut as the Flash, and he quickly become one of Allen’s most fiercest foes.  He began working on an experimental handgun to interfere with the Flash’s super speed, but an accident cause the gun to be irradiated,  turning the gun into his trademark cold guns, which can freeze moisture in the air to create ice slicks, shatter metal, and/or entomb people in blocks of ice, leaving them in a state of suspended animation.  He donned a parka and special goggles used to minimize the flashes of his guns (and, in later years, used to monitor local police band frequencies), and thus Captain Cold was born!  

Cold set off on a string of non-lethal crimes throughout Central and Keystone cities, robbing banks and the like.  But he loved matching wits with the Flash, and got his greatest pleasures from his encounters with Barry Allen.  But, as most all of us here know, Allen died a heroic death during the Infinite Earths crisis.  The death of his arch-enemy led Snart to leave the world of crime and he worked briefly as a bounty hunter with his sister Lisa (the Golden Glider).  Cold has tasted what seemed like sure success, and more than his fair share of bitter defeat, once even losing his eternal soul, only to have Wally West (the Flash) save him and bring him back to the land of the living.  Snart repaid this kindness by becoming a member of Wally West’s rogues gallery.  From time to time though, you’ll find a touch of humanity in the character.  He once helped an amnesiac Wally West defeat Mister Element (though one could argue that Cold wanted the honor of defeating the Flash all for himself). He also secretly arranged a funeral for Captain Boomerang, another member of the Flash’s rogues gallery.

Captain Cold was named the leader of the Flash’s rogues gallery, due to his experience, age, and skills.  Cold takes his position as head of the Rogues very seriously. He has a no-drugs rule (he brutally beat the Mirror Master for his cocaine habit).  He is known to dock pay for senseless violence, and will kill only on certain occasions (he once killed the Top for setting the newer rogues against him and his set of rogues).  Captain Cold truly is one of the most under-rated villains in the history of DC comics, as he is the arch-nemesis and number one foe of the Flash, yet he remains virtually unknown.  I hold out hope that one day, when they finally make that Flash film, they’ll give Captain Cold some much needed screen time, and that (as opposed to his tv appearances) will gain him the notoriety he deserves.

If you want to check out the best appearances of the character, I would recommend you pick up the seven issue limited run “Salvation Run” or the three issue mini-series, “Final Crisis:  Rogues’ Revenge,” which took place after the events of “Salvation Run.”  The stories, while featuring other villains, heavily involve Captain Cold, and they are great.  In “Salvation Run,”  the majority of the DC Universe’s supervillains, both major ones and newer or more obscure ones, have been captured by the Suicide Squad and imprisoned on a distant planet. The story features the villains splitting into alliances and trying to either find a way to escape their prison, or choosing to rule the planet “Salvation” on which they have landed.  It’s a pretty interesting sample of villains, and a very well written story.  ”Final Crisis:  Rogues’ Revenge”  features the Rogues(fresh off their escape from planet Salvation) on a quest for vengeance, in which they will break the number one rule for the Rogues; “Never kill a speedster.”  Referring to the Flash, of course!  In the series, Captain Cold proclaimed that after they banded together to kill the Flash, the group would be disbanded forever.

I’ve been a staunch supporter of Captain Cold.  He’s a great villain.  I’ll even go so far as to say that he is a better “ice based” villain than Mr Freeze!  There are more than just a few similarities between Cold and Freeze, and many comic nubes have either confused Cold for Freeze, or worse yet… call Cold a rip-off of Mr Freeze, and that’s just not true!  I’ve always been a fan of the character because of that touch of humanity that you typically don’t find in any arch-nemesis’.  He couldn’t be confused as a hero, at any point in the character’s history, but that little touch of heart often serves to mask his true intentions and/or feelings, adding a whole new layer to the character’s complexity.  One dimensional villains are fun, for a second, but they get boring fast.  Not Cold.  He remains fresh, and one of the villains I would be excited by, even after years of seeing him appear on the pages of DC comics.  Captain Cold is the definition of the characters I sought out to feature with this post; he is wicked cool, complex, and long running yet almost completely unknown.  So go out and show some respect to the master of absolute zero!  If ever an unknown character was deserving, it would be him.