Doctor Bedlam
69 years ago - Doctor Bedlam makes a major discovery of anti-life science, abandoning his body in favor of a life-essence he can transfer between android bodies
38 years ago - Doctor Bedlam hides on New Genesis to find a next generation mother box from the grounds of the Academy of Higher Consciousness, but is thwarted by Vykin the Brave when he bonds with the mother box.
9 years ago - Doctor Bedlam and Desaad compete for Darkseid's favor. He wins, and is sent to Earth to recapture Scott Free.
7 years ago - Doctor Bedlam's mission on Earth to recapture Scott Free is deemed a failure, and his task is given to Granny Goodness, who sends her Female Furies. He becomes an Earth-based crimelord.
4 years ago - Doctor Bedlam is taken back to Apokolips after the Parademon wave invasion to suffer Darkseid's wrath.
1 year ago - Doctor Bedlam is sent back to Earth, secretly monitored by Desaad as he joins the Legion of Doom.
Doctor Bedlam is a really fantastic idea for a comic book baddie. His abilities are such that he can never really be defeated permanently, and are structured around a concept that basically gives him an infinite army of super-punchable low-threat enemies that can absolutely swarm the hero like Putties. He's a mad scientist archetype who will continually set up elaborate death traps for a hero whose whole schtick is being a super escape artist. It's just a great dynamic setup by someone who absolutely gets how to tell a good comic story, and it shows.
Doctor Bedlam's Comic HistoryThe original Mister Miracle series featured several threat-of-the-month baddies challenging our hero. Doctor Bedlam debuted in the third issue, a disembodied 'mind-force' that possesses 'animate' automatons, and who was sent from Apokolips to, as he put it; "To subjugate and break the spirit of the young rebel who dared to reject the powers that ruled his world - and the great master I serve! The Great Darkseid himself!"
Bedlam was a recurring villain in the original Mister Miracle series, regularly trying and failing to defeat Scott. He would continue to appear occasionally among Darkseid's lieutenants but was never really presented as someone particularly threatening, so much as someone you had to defeat on your way to the actual threat. Notably, he also appeared in JLA/JSA Virtue and Vise in a story unrelated to the Fourth World, implying that at some point he had simply become a regular Earth criminal, albeit one with an army of Animates. |
Our Doctor Bedlam StoryThe villains of the Fourth World are some of the most innovative in DC's whole lexicon, but among them Doctor Bedlam probably doesn't get used as much as the others. I maintain that this is actually not because he's any less creative, but more because his power scaling is just very different. He's not meant to be a major world-threatening crisis, he's meant to be the catalyst of the latest in a series of elaborate traps. A premise-generator, if you will.
Our timeline for this character takes his comic story and runs with it, creating some more intrigue around his mission to capture Scott by saying that he was actually set up by Desaad to take a task he knew would prove impossible, that he is ultimately considered a failure and is basically abandoned. We decided to embrace his new status on Earth by having him join the Legion of Doom, where he is absolutely the perfect power level to become a great addition to threaten the heroes of Earth. |