10 Things You Need To Know About Black Mask

The incident with the Court of Owls was not the first time that Jeremiah Arkham has been linked to the Black Mask.

In the previous continuity, during a time where Batman was thought to be dead and Dick Grayson had taken up the mantle, a new Black Mask appeared. This Black Mask seemed to have a fixation with Arkham, blowing up the asylum and forcing its inmates to work for him via explosive chips planted in their heads. When Jeremiah tried to rebuild the asylum, the Black Mask began sabotaging it to bring him down.

It was eventually revealed that this new Black Mask was none other the Jeremiah himself. Over his years interacting with patients as head of the asylum, the Joker and Hugo Strange had secretly been using a combination of chemicals and hypnotic suggestion to slowly drive Arkham insane, causing the Black Mask personality to manifest. Arkham had no memory of the times he turned into his criminal alter ego and didn't realise the truth until it was too late and the new personality had completely taken over.

Black Mask was eventually beaten by the new Batman and locked away in his own asylum.