Blackgate Penitentiary

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Blackgate Penitentiary is a fictional prison depicted in the DC Universe, traditionally located on a small island in the Gotham Bay, Gotham City. Batman: The Long Halloween suggests that it was preceded by Gotham State Penitentiary, which appeared often in pre-Crisis comics.

History

Blackgate Prison (later known as Blackgate Penitentiary) operated separately from Gotham Prison (later known as Gotham State Penitentiary). Both prisons are located in Gotham and while Blackgate is the main correctional facility used by writers today, Gotham State Penitentiary was the primary correctional facility used in the comics up until the early 1990s. According to modern continuity, in the late 1990s, Blackgate Prison is condemned by Amnesty International and forced to shut down. ^[1] When the prison eventually re-opens, it is officially known as "Blackgate Penitentiary". Because of its secure location on a secluded island, Blackgate begins to take prominence over Gotham State, until the latter becomes virtually unused.

Unlike Arkham Asylum, Blackgate is where sane criminals such as Penguin, Catman, David Cain, Monsoon, Ernie Chubb, KGBeast and various henchmen, mobsters, and mafia bosses are incarcerated when captured. The Joker, Two-Face, Clayface II (Matt Hagen), the Ventriloquist, Mr. Zsasz, Firefly, Calendar Man and Rupert Thorne are some criminals that have done time in both Arkham Asylum and in Blackgate Penitentiary.

There are instances where inmates from Arkham Asylum are temporarily moved to Blackgate, like when Bane destroys the original Arkham building in Batman #491. All of the Arkham inmates are incarcerated in Blackgate until the new Arkham structure is built and opened in Batman #521.

There is a one-shot about a breakout happening in the prison entitled Batman: Blackgate. The prisoners in the story are Cluemaster, Steeljacket, Ratcatcher, The Trigger Twins, Dragoncat, Gunhawk, Czonka (The Baffler), Actuary, and others. Several of these villains are also featured in the Cataclysm storyline when an earthquake and the resulting tidal waves damage the prison and open up a land bridge to Gotham. This allows the majority of the inmates of Blackgate to escape.

Known Inmates

• Actuary
• Bane
• Billy (one of The Ventriloquist's henchmen) ^[2]
• Black Spider
• Bonaventure Strake
• Bruce Wayne (when he is falsely convicted of murdering Vesper Fairchild)
• Calendar Man
• Catman
• Charles "Rhino" Daley
• Clayface (Basil Karlo)
• Clayface II (Matt Hagen)
• Cluemaster
• The Cypher (Avery Twombey)
• Dalton Perry
• David Cain
• Dean "Hungry" Fahy
• Dr. Fang
• Dr. Phosphorus
• Dragoncat
• Electrocutioner (Lester Buchinsky)
• Ernie Chubb
• Eustace Marker
• Faceless (Joseph Zedno)
• Firebug
• Firefly
• Gunhawk
• Henry Etchison
• Hsui Cheung
• Jan Brodie
• Jared Manx
• John McCone
• The Joker (in The Joker: Devil's Advocate the Joker is sentenced to death row in Blackgate before eventually returning to Arkham Asylum)
• KGBeast
• Lady Spellbinder
• Monsoon
• Mortimer Kadaver
• Mister Polka-Dot (Abner Krill)
• Mr. Freeze
• Mugsy (Rhino's partner, henchmen of Arnold Wesker)
• Mr. Zsasz
• The Penguin
• Professor Ivo (Anthony Ivo) ^[3]
• Ratcatcher
• Rupert Thorne
• Sasha Bordeaux (when she is falsely convicted of involvement in Vesper Fairchild's murder)
• Skeets ^[4]
• Stanislaus Johns
• Steeljacket
• Ten-Eyed Man
• Titus Samuel Czonka (Czonk AKA The Headbanger AKA The Baffler)
• Tony Zucco
• The Trigger Twins
• Two-Face
• The Ventriloquist
• Vincent "The Shark" Starkey
• Weasel (Chet Grimes)
• William Guillory
• Wrath II
• Zeke ^[5]

Other media

Television

• In Batman: The Animated Series, this prison is called Stonegate Penitentiary. It was built as a plan by Bruce Wayne and Harvey Dent to build a better, safer Gotham. Criminals like the Penguin, Poison Ivy (later deemed insane and relocated to Arkham Asylum), Bane, the Ventriloquist (briefly, he spent most of his time behind bars in Arkham), Clock King, Rupert Thorne, Roland Daggett, Sidney "The Squid" Debris, and Baby Doll were sentenced to Stonegate. In "I Am The Night", a gangster called Jimmy "Jazzman" Peake was imprisoned here to await trial since Gotham City Prison was full at the time.

• In the Batman: The Brave and the Bold episode "Night of the Huntress, Blackgate Penitentiary is featured as Blackgate Prison. Babyface breaks into Blackgate Prison to free Skeleton Keys, Tweedledum and Tweedledee, Polecat Perkins, and Hammer Toes. Black Manta, Clock King, Cavalier, Doctor Polaris, False-Face, Felix Faust, Fun Haus, Kite Man, Scarecrow, Shark, Top, and characters from the 60's Batman series (Archer, Egghead, King Tut and Mad Hatter) are shown as inmates trying to break out during Babyface's raid.

Film

• Blackgate Penitentiary is referenced in the "Field Test" portion of Batman: Gotham Knight. After stopping a gang war between Sal Maroni and the Russian at the docks, Batman restrains them and tells the Russian to keep the docks and for Sal to stay in the slum as he also quotes "That's the arrangement 'til I can get something on you. And then you can fight over who gets the top bunk in Blackgate. Got it?!"

Novels

• In the novel Batman: The Ultimate Evil, author Andrew Vachss refers to a "Hellgate Prison".

Video games

• The backstory of Batman: Arkham Asylum mentions that a fire at Blackgate has forced many of the inmates to be temporarily housed at Arkham Asylum. In truth, the event was engineered by the Joker in order to get his army of henchmen into Arkham for his master plan that involves the Titan Compound that he in one of his alias manipulated Dr. Penny Young into making.

References