Batman #181

Batman #181 (1966)
by Robert Kanigher & Sheldon Moldoff
cover by Carmine Infantino

When it comes to Batman female villains, it’s easy to group together Catwoman and Poison Ivy.
But while the former debuted all the way back to 1940’s Batman #1, Ivy wouldn’t show up until 26 years later.

She certainly doesn’t waste any time getting busy: she’s already kissing Batman in the teaser page!

We begin with Bruce Wayne visiting an art exhibit which displays the portraits of the greatest female supervillains: Dragonfly, Silken Spider and Tiger Moth.
I guess Catwoman didn’t make the cut.

As far as I can tell, none of these three women make another Silver Age appearance.
They have a couple of minor appearances in modern Batman stories, though I haven’t read them so I don’t know if they only have cameos.

Poison Ivy makes her appearance to declare that SHE is really Public Enemy #1 and people should pay attention to HER and to none of these nobodies.

Batman has his priorities straight.

This gets the attention of the paparazzi, and Poison Ivy uses her tricks to sabotage them.

That’s the greatest difference between Ivy’s first appearance and her eventual development: when she started, she had NOTHING to do with plants except her name.

Batman changes into his costume to follow her, even if he’s blind… which of course doesn’t prevent him from knocking out his opponents.
Kudos to the story for not making the obvious “blind as a bat” joke.

Bruce Wayne made SUCH an impression on Poison Ivy that she’s unsure whether to hit on him or on Batman!

Batman is even distracted by her hotness!

Poison Ivy’s way to clear out the competition is to write fake letters to the other supervillains, and they all fall for it. So I guess we have a reason why they didn’t show up again.

Then again, Batman ALSO agrees to the challenge. I would ask why exactly does he accept instead of sending the police… except Poison Ivy hasn’t done much so far.
I guess her only crime shown is hiring the goons to beat up Batman, but that must be hard to prove.

The three ladies are taken out when they accept a gift from Poison Ivy.
If those three idiots are Public Enemy #1, #2 and #3, I have to wonder if Gotham City really does need Batman.

Then Poison Ivy takes the opportunity to make Robin jealous.

Poison Ivy using poisoned lipstick will become a staple of the character, but this time it’s just chloroform.

Also she’s apparently Spider-Man.

But then Batman remembers he has weapons, so he captures her with extreme ease.

And that’s it!

Bonus: Carmine Infantino gave a few details about the reasons for her creation in a 2007 interview.

The only reason she came about was because of Catwoman on the Batman show. They wanted more female villains. What was the other one I did.. the Silver Fox! And then Batgirl. That show, because of it we were selling a million copies a month. But that show, when it died, so did the comic books. Because it was so corny, y’know, Pow! Zam! You couldn’t take Batman seriously for a while. So we had to rebuild him.
Carmine Infantino, 2007

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Historical significance: 4/10
Poison Ivy will become a major player in the Batman rogues gallery… but next to nothing from this story will carry over.

Silver Age-ness: 4/10
Not as egregious of other stories of the era, but the three random female criminals showing up out of nowhere despite supposedly being a big deal. Not to mention having an art exhibit dedicated to them.

 Does it stand the test of time? 0/10
It’s not inherently a bad story, but you’d have a hard time translating this to modern times; it’s quite simplistic and short, plus Poison Ivy herself is not very interesting and the other villains are a joke.
MAYBE if it was a real fight between the four supervillains to decide who’s the biggest public menace, but if almost feels like an afterthought in this story.
They could’ve gone in the other direction and played up Batman being seduced by Ivy and hesitating before capturing her, but Catwoman already fills that niche perfectly.

How close is this to the modern character? 2/10
Her looks stays consistent for decades; only in the 90s she starts to be depicted with green skin, and only more recently she changed her looks a few times.
She keeps the femme fatale gimmick, but it definitely fades in the background compared to her obsession about plants. She doesn’t even have a single plant-based gimmick here.
Nothing of her obsession with being considered “the queen of crime” remains, replaced with plant-based objectives that sometimes are sympathetic and sometimes plainly insane.

I don’t read much Batman these days, but I understand she’s by all intents and purposes an anti-hero at this point. Just like Catwoman and Harley Quinn… which means Batman no longer has ANY legitimate female supervillain.
I don’t mind any of the three no longer acting as a villain… it more or less works for all of them… but ALL of them getting the same treatment is a HUGE mistake in my opinion.