Batman #176

Issue Details

Synopsis

THE PARASOLS OF PLUNDER The Penguin has been released after promising to give up birds, as they had proved too much of a temptation to commit crime. He dutifully (and tearfully) releases most of his birds in the sight of Batman, but keeps the most valuable to sell. With the money from the sale, he starts an umbrella business. Batman pays a visit to the factory and, finding nothing suspicious about the umbrellas, asks instead how he's going to sell them at twice the price of the market leaders. The Penguin demonstrates that his are much better quality, and asks Batman for an endorsement. Batman turns him down, and the Penguin declares that Batman will endorse the umbrellas, whether he wants to or not. Bruce and Dick speculate about the Penguin's real motives back at Wayne Manor, when they see a newspaper article proclaiming the Penguin's 50,000 umbrella milestone. But they are interrupted by the Bat-Signal. As they leave to investigate, Penguin orders reporters and photographers to a certain street for one hour later. Commissioner Gordon presents Batman with some tantalizing clues that he interprets as an attempt to make secret contact. A helicopter that appears to carry the person who left the clues comes by later with a rope trailing. Batman grabs the rope, telling Robin to follow in the Bat-plane. But, after entering a street to narrow for Robin to pass, the rope is loosened and Batman is left to fall 25 stories. Fortunately, an umbrella has been dropped, that Batman can use to slow his descent. He lands among the press photographers and finds that the umbrella had a message written on it, endorsing the Penguin's umbrellas. The next morning, advertisements fill the papers and everyone is suddenly eager to buy the umbrellas. Then, when Bruce, Dick and a business partner leave the office in the rain (with Penguin umbrellas), everyone's watch goes wrong, except that of a man with no umbrella. Bruce determines that the steel in the umbrellas is magnetized and he and Dick change into Batman and Robin as all the umbrellas are drawn to a huge stainless steel statue, carrying the hapless owners up into the air. The Penguin comes by with a large truck, demanding all the people give him their valuables, or he'll cut the current and let everyone fall. Batman and Robin swing into action and, though they drive off the Penguin, Robin is captured. Batman gives chase and so the Penguin dumps Robin off an overpass to distract him. By the time Batman saved Robin, the Penguin had escaped. Later, Penguin tells his crooks that he's only just begun in the umbrella business. At his abandoned factory, Batman discovers that he's also made a batch of beach umbrellas that can be traced. Then, a week later in the Caribbean, the Penguin sets out his umbrellas for his "Umbrella Club", really his crooks in swimsuits. While preparing, the Bat-plane arrives to locate the Penguin and he starts earlier than planned, activating motors that make the umbrellas spin and kick up a sand cloud that allows the Penguin and his cronies (wearing gas masks) to loot unobserved and prevents the Bat-plane from landing safely. Batman goes up above the clouds and "seeds" the clouds with silver iodide to force them to rain, soaking the dust storm and prompting the Penguin to make a fast getaway in a row boat waiting nearby. Rather than risk his neck dropping on the Penguin, Batman scoops up a net full of fish and drops that on the Penguin instead. A flock of seagulls descend and the distraction allows Batman to safely apprehend the Penguin. They return him to prison where he despairs of ever learning that you can't beat the law. THE FOX, THE SHARK, AND THE VULTURE A new team of criminal inventors, the Fox, the Shark, and the Vulture call themselves the team. They use ingenious vehicles and devices in crimes they pull on land, sea, and in the air, and defy Batman and Robin to stop them. The Dynamic Duo deduce the pattern in which The Terrible Trio are committing their crimes, and they prepare a trap for them. The Trio unknowingly take the heroes to their secret lighthouse hideout, where the Dynamic Duo manage to capture the crooks before the police arrive to arrest them. THE ICE CRIMES OF MR. ZERO Mr. Zero, a new super-villain, begins pulling incredible robberies in Gotham with the help of his gang and his "ice gun", one barrel firing acetylene flame and the other emitting a fast-freezing gas. Batman and Robin try to stop one of his capers as his gang robs diamonds--"ice" in criminal slang-- from a jewelry exchange, but Mr. Zero freezes the street under the dynamic duo's skates and stops them. Later, in his lair, which is kept cold except for a warmed bench for his gang, he tells a new member of his group of the accident that befell his when he was saturated with the cold-gas solution used in his gun. He immediately lost the ability to breathe at room temperature, and had to dwell in an artificially cold environment, such as his refrigerated lair or his "air-conditioned" Mr. Zero costume. Batman and Robin try to stop a subsequent Mr. Zero robbery of a visiting prince and princess's diamonds, but their Batropes are frozen in mid-swing and, when the heroes attempt to use an ice-slide to reach Zero's getaway car, the frigid felon melts it. Batman and Robin attempt to follow Zero to his lair in Whirly-Bats, but Zero freezes their propellers, takes them prisoner, and freezes them in giant cakes of ice. Batman manages to rock his ice cake enough to smash it open, along with Robin's icy prison and a steam pipe as well. He manages to slug Zero before the villain, enveloped in a steam bath, can use his ice-gun. Seconds later, outside, Zero is gratified to find the steam-bath has restored his normalcy, and Batman hopes the law may be able to normalize his criminal mind as well. COMPLETE SUNDAY NEWSPAPER SYNDICATE STORY Catwoman decides to ruin Bruce Wayne's reputation by making him chase her across the country. The whole plan is conceived in order to allow the criminals of Gotham City act without restraints. After a lengthy chase across different cities of the United States, Batman and Robin finally captures Catwoman along with her accomplices on the city of Chicago.