11. Arnold Wesker a.k.a The Ventriloquist and Scarface
The original Ventriloquist is Arnold Wesker; a child of Gotham's mafia and a sufferer of
Dissociative Identity Disorder or Multiple Personality Disorder as you might have come to know it. After he's sent to Blackgate prison for murdering someone during a barfight he's introduced to Woody; a ventriloquist's dummy that was spookily carved from wood from the prisons deactivated gallows. When the dummy "convinces" him to kill his cellmate and escape and the ensuing fracas 'scars' Woody's face. And the rest, as they say, is history. From then on Wesker uses Woody, now Scarface, as an outlet for his rage and greed, despite often acting as though he's not in control of his actions, which of course often incurs the wrath of the Dark Knight. When Batman faces the not-so-dynamic-duo often Wesker is actually the secondary focus. He hides behind Scarface, allowing the puppet to do the talking ("you'll never get me, Gatman!"), even allowing himself to be degraded and belittled essentially by his own hand. So much so that when I first encountered the character I actually thought the dummy was possessed. There's something wonderfully zany, weirdly chilling and indefinably 'Batman' about The Ventriloquist and I'd just love to see how they tackled him on screen (I've got the scene from LotR: Return of the King in my head for some reason, where Gollum talks to Smeagol). Maybe The Ventriloquist is a little too zany to remain in keeping with Nolan's prescribed tone but hell, I'd call the decision to include him in the next movie bold, maybe even brave. If you ask me, the Batman movie property needs to evolve again, as it has each time a new director has gotten involved. And you can't get further than Bane than a fat guy with a demonic puppet can you?