A superhero's only as interesting as the villains he scraps with, which is why Batman is generally considered to be the best comic book character going. The Dark Knight's rogues gallery is almost as well known as the Caped Crusader himself, with everyone from The Joker and Two-Face to seemingly lower-tier characters like Mr Freeze recognisable to the world at large. It helps that the villains are almost as complex as the good guy, if not more so. That certainly helps in the case of Victor Fries, the cryogenics expert who accidentally becomes an ice-obsessed bad guy when his attempts to freeze his terminally ill wife so that she may be better treated with future medicine backfire massively. That's a compelling villain, not just a dude in a funny outfit who wants to conquer the world for no real reason (and also way more interesting than going for the rote daddy didn't tell him he loved him enough motivation, too). Couple that with a sweet gimmick and natty costume, and Mr Freeze is a winner. He may have fallen out of favour thanks to a certain Arnold Schwarzenegger performance, but he's been clawing back with turns in the Arkham games, for instance. He might be one of the best known Batman villains, but there's probably at least ten things you didn't know about Mr Freeze.
Tom Baker is the Comics Editor at WhatCulture! He's heard all the Doctor Who jokes, but not many about Randall and Hopkirk. He also blogs at http://communibearsilostate.wordpress.com/
