The Brave & The Bold #254 - Batman and Mr Scarlet - homage to Marvel Team-Up #73

Latest Golden Age Team-Up Project commission - The Brave & The Bold issue #254, teaming Batman with Mr Scarlet, adapted from Keith Pollard and Bob McLeod's cover to Marvel Team-Up #73, as reimagined by Bambos Georgiou.

1941 - and gang bosses ask a criminal mastermind to organise the disposal of two men who pose a threat to their plans: the Batman, long-time scourge of evil, and District Attorney Brian Butler! Dr Clever takes the job - and determines to use just one scheme to achieve his aim. Firstly, he'll have a second-storey-man disguised as Batman carry out a robbery, and arrange for photos to be taken which will demonstrate his guilt - and then, once Batman is arrested and charged, Dr Clever will enure that the truth of Batman's innocence is revealed, and DA Butler will be forced to quit when it becomes apparent that he has prosecuted an innocent man!

A few days later, and Gotham society is abuzz with news of the daring theft of jewels belonging to the late mother of Bruce Wayne - and when photographs of Batman breaking into Wayne Manor, and leaving with what is clearly the jewel case, are anonymously mailed to the Gotham Gazette, the police have no choice, and put out a warrant for Batman's arrest! Knowing that he's innocent, the Gotham Guardian hands himself in to the police, but has to subject himself to being briefly incarcerated.

As Dr Clever had planned, District Attorney Brian Butler is in charge of the case, and asks to interview Batman, not convinced of his guilt - and when the two are alone, Batman directs Butler's attention to another page in the incriminating edition of the Gazette, which shows the attendees at a charity gala held on the same night. Butler can't see the relevance of the pictures - until Batman takes a great risk, and removes his cowl, revealing himself to be Bruce Wayne, who was present (and photographed) at the charity event, and therefore could not have carried out the crime.

Realising that Batman has entrusted him with a great secret, Butler reciprocates by revealing one of his own - that he is the novice mystery-man Mr Scarlet! Batman keeps to himself the fact that he was already aware of Butler's secret identity, and the two shake hands and agree to work together to track down whoever has tried to frame Batman. Butler calls a press conference and dismisses all charges, on the basis of new information which he can't share with the press - and once the DA has donned his costume, the two heroes race to Wayne Manor in search of clues!

Traces of mud left by the robber's footwear direct Batman to a specific area of town, and the two heroes are soon perched on the roof of a seedy bar, where they overhear a known criminal boasting about his recent payday and his role in getting Batman jailed! As the crook leaves, somewhat the worse for drink, he's confronted by both Batman and Mr Scarlet, and quickly confesses that he'd been hired by criminal genius Dr Clever to steal the Wayne jewels while disguised as Batman - and can't wait to spill the beans as to the whereabouts of Dr Clever's hideout!

Handing the criminal over to the police, the two heroes speed off in the Batmobile to the site of the hideout, and start to climb the sheer cliff, atop which Dr Clever is working. However, the evil genius is monitoring them, by remote cameras, and triggers a series of traps built into the cliff-face, knocking Batman flying, and sending a huge electrical charge though a metal plate as Mr Scarlet touches it! Batman catches himself as he falls, using a bat-rope hurled around a tree at the top of the cliff, and swings to help Mr Scarlet, knocking him away from the electrically-charged trap, and then catching his fellow hero before he can fall to his death!

Both heroes scramble to the top of the cliff and burst in on the hidden headquarters of Dr Clever, but are attacked by a mechanical guardsman - and by the time they have disabled it, the villain has escaped in a nearby autogyro. Nevertheless, Mr Scarlet discovers enough evidence to arrest the crime bosses who hired Dr Clever amongst the papers left in the hideout - and looks forward, as Brian Butler, to seeing them in court. Batman speculates that Dr Clever's reputation as a mastermind may be dented as a result of his failure - but will warn the other members of the JSA, and any other heroes he encounters, that the villain may strike again (which he will, in his first recorded adventure, when he battles Johnny Quick in More Fun Comics #74).

Batman teams up with another Golden Age hero - next time!

Side note: in Mr Scarlet's first adventure, in Wow Comics #1, it's strongly implied that Brian Butler is active in Gotham City, so I assumed for the purposes of this story that he was also a DA there, possibly working alongside Harvey "Apollo" Kent, who would go on to become Two-Face.