Comic Book Transfusion: Alfred and the Joker
Truly one of the most bizarre comic book transfusion stories ever, this one comes from The Brave and the Bold #141, “Pay or Die!”
Two Gotham City businessmen mysteriously explode, and the Batman is quickly on the case. He determines that both businessmen had defaulted on loans from a new loan shark in town, the mysterious Mr. Longreen. Using his famed detective skills, and the help of a seamstress with poor English,Batman realizes that the reclusive Longreen is none other than his arch enemy, the Joker.
Despite his vaunted investigative skills, the Batman has no clue where the Joker’s hideout is, so he enlists Alfred, his faithful butler. Alfred puts the word out on the street that he is badly in need of a loan and soon Mr. Longreen comes calling. He brings Alfred to his lair in an abandoned funeral home and provides him with the cash he needs — Alfred will just have to repay the load whenever asked, plus interest. The two of them drink a toast of wine to their business arrangement.
Upon Alfred’s return to Wayne Manor, Batman performs an extensive physical, but can find no evidence of explosives. Things start to go sour the very next day, when the Joker calls Alfred, demanding the payment of interest on his loan. Then he calls again, demanding payment of interest on the interest.
Finally, Batman is able to deduce the full nature of the Joker’s plot: he has adulterated the wine with specially timed chemical explosives so that whoever he drinks a toast with will explode a day or two later. The Joker remains safe because he took an antidote before he drank the tainted wine.
Just as the Joker and his henchmen are chortling about the butler’s impending demise, Alfred crashes in through the window and grabs the Joker, proclaiming that if he explodes, he’ll take the Joker with him. But wait! It’s only the Batman pretending to be Alfred, and now that he has the Joker in custody, he forces him to give Alfred a transfusion so that the antidote will protect Alfred as well. No more loans, no more explosions, and the Joker is off to Arkham (and as far as I know, Alfred never repaid the money, so he still has $50,000 of the Joker’s loot).
I know this story exists in the anything-can-happen world of Earth-B (a place where continuity — and often the laws of science –are ignored), but it seems to me there are some serious flaws in both the Joker’s and Batman’s plans:
1. How did the Joker know how to time his explosives? How did he know when — and if — his clients were going to default? The story tells us that one of the businessmen had been paying off the loan for six months before he finally defaulted. Did he have explosives in his blood the whole time? Or maybe he received a gift bottle of wine in the mail (except that the story states that the Joker always drank with his victim)? I’d think it was done by remote detonation if it weren’t for the Joker looking totally panicked when he sees Alfred in his lair, knowing that Alfred is going to explode in just a few minutes.
2. Transfusing the Joker’s “chemically tainted blood” into innocent Alfred seems cruel and unusual punishment for years of loyal — if at time sarcastic — service. Better hope the Joker is the same, or nearly the same, blood type as Alfred. And better hope the antidote is still in the Joker’s blood stream and still functions after the transfusion. Why not just get the Joker to reveal where the antidote is, and give that to Alfred?
Other Comic Book Transfusions
September 18th, 2008 at 11:50 pm
“Relax, Alfred, The transfusion of chemical-tainted blood from this deformed psychotic will probably stop you from exploding. Why no, I wasn’t going to sterilize the needle- why do you ask?”
September 19th, 2008 at 5:36 am
This story ties in with the classic “Dreadful Birthday, Dear Joker” story in Batman #321 (reprinted in The Greatest Joker Stories Ever Told).
In that tale, the Joker captures various people who have crossed him and ties to giant explosive candles atop a giant birthday cake. One of the people he captures is Alfred Pennyworth, and this story is the only reason I can think of that he would want to take revenge on Bruce Wayne’s butler.
September 19th, 2008 at 8:28 am
Obligatory Comic Book Rationale that shows I pur WAY too much thought into these things:
The Joker has injected himself with a substance that is slowly broken down by the body and secreted. In the presence of this substance, the explosive chemicals cannot be triggered. Only a small amount is neccessary to keep them in their inert state, an ammount small enough to be gained by simply being in the same room or coming in physical contact with someone who is secreting the substance. So as long as the victims continue to meet Mr. Longreen on a regular basis, they remain safe. But if they ever go past a certain window, the chemicals are “triggered”, intiating a fatal explosion. At that point even coming in contact with a secreter isn’t enough to stop the reaction. But a large dose of the substance will counteract it.
Batman, with his not very modest detective skills, had already deduced that this secreting stabilizer was the only mechanism by which the Joker could possibly be causing the explosives. So he knew that the Joker would have the antidote “on hand”. And knowing that Alfred was going to explode any second, resorted to the most expedient method for getting it out of the Joker and into Alfred.
And probably gave his a complete transfusion of synthetic blood afterwards to clean him out. (What was that? Why not do that first? Sorry old chum, I am too modest to explain…)
And why am I so sure that Grant Morrison has read this comic book?
September 19th, 2008 at 9:01 am
This human bomb gag was recently done with much brio on ‘The Venture Brothers’…symptoms leading to the explosion included ravenous hunger, hiccups, finally followed by the growth of a luxurious full beard!
September 19th, 2008 at 6:23 pm
I think when the Joker offers you a glass of wine, you pretend to be teetotal.
September 20th, 2008 at 2:14 pm
@Anonymous – The Joker being who he is, I suspect you’d be taking the wine one way or another, even if he has to strap you down and give it to you as an enema (which is apparently a way to get drunk quickly, but also very dangerous because you can dump a lot of alcohol into your system at once. Alcohol poisoning in minutes rather than hours.)
September 22nd, 2008 at 8:09 am
@Sean Duggan: Since you’re apparently interested in comic books and you already know the relevant factoid, you’re probably already aware of this, but Warren Ellis used that in an issue of Fell. I couldn’t say which one.
November 27th, 2008 at 5:39 pm
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