10 Lame Batman Villains I Dare The Gotham Writers To Use

4. Ten-Eyed Man

The 70s were good to Batman in general, and not many of his truly lame villains come from that era. Ten-Eyed Man was the exception that proved that rule.

Meet Philip Reardon, an ex-military man turned security guard after he returned from Vietnam. While trying to foil a robbery, he was caught in an explosion that left both him and Batman blinded. In our hero’s case, it as only temporary, plus he had his wonderful toys to work around his lack of eyesight. Reardon turned to a mob boss for help, and his faith paid off in experimental surgery that routed his optic nerves through his fingertips for some reason. I’m not even making that up.

Despite the writers of that time playing him up as a formidable threat (“He can see in a 360-degree radius just by pointing his hands in other directions!”), the Ten-Eyed Man was pretty hard to take seriously. It didn’t help that he ended up in a costume that looked like this:

After just a few appearances, Reardon was killed off by shadow demons during Crisis on Infinite Earths, probably offended that his gimmick was so sorry.

Grant Morrison kind of, sort of made a cooler version of the Ten-Eyed Man during his run on Batman, but even then, he was defeated by Bruce Wayne simply splashing his fingers with hot oil. I’m thinking Gotham should just steer clear.

Next: No. 3: Polka-Dot Man