"What killed the dinosaurs? The Ice Age!" were the words haunting many Batman fans, when the death of a franchise called 'Batman and Robin' was released in 1997. Ever since, the notion of putting Victor Fries in a Batman film became humorous let alone making him the primary antagonist of a film. All because of the poor direction of Joel Schumacher and the terrible puns delivered via the Governor Himself, Arnold Schwarzenegger. However Freeze has many qualities within his character and thanks to comics having many incarnations of their characters there are a number of directions that can be taken.
Character Directions
As many comic book fans know the primary reason why Victor undertakes his criminal activities is because of the cryogenic state that his wife Nora is currently in. She is his motivation and that is what drives his actions. However there are different directions that writers and a director could take with this character, below I will discuss the different routes and the advantages and disadvantages of each
The Loving 'Innocent' Husband
This direction involves a very conscious Victor, one who does the things he does because of desperation and his deep love for Nora. He sees that this is the only direction in order to bring the love of his life, Nora back from a cryogenic state. He does not want to do the things he does however he has no choice. The best value of this dynamic is that a line could be drawn for the mentality of Victor. Once he crosses it, it may be very hard to come back from that state of mind, such as murder. This could add a lot of dynamic and character development to freeze, especially he were to appear over multiple films, perhaps becoming even more unsympathetic and dangerous or if he were able to make a U-turn and helping Batman in a future film rather than being an antagonist. Another route that could be taken with this play on the character is having him as a Secondary antagonist, one who only works for the main antagonist to provide funding for his research or has Nora and uses her to blackmail, Freeze into committing crimes, such as Black Mask or Penguin. However I would much prefer Mr Freeze to be the main antagonist and to have deep personal struggles of guilt.
The 'Cold' and Unsympathetic Husband Who Would Do Anything For His Wife
This direction of Victor is the polar opposite of the above, possibly one that the previous could morph into. This Fries is one that will do anything for his wife including killing without a single thought of sympathy or regression. This Freeze story wise could have a vendetta on his hands (I will delve deeper on this more in the relevance section'. This Freeze cares for Nora however feels a jealously that others can be with their loved ones and he cannot. This aggression comes through his actions and his lack of sympathy. He truly becomes as 'cold' in the inside as he does on his exterior. A deciding fact in a story arc would be if Nora was truly taken from him, his wrath would be extreme and he would be coming for whoever was responsible. Maybe someone will be set up such as Batman.
The Obsessed 'Husband'
A great twist within a story would be the one that the new 52 Batman Annual threw at us, which is that Nora is not Fries's wife, Nora was born in 1943 despite her appearance, she was diagnosed with a heart condition at 23 and was engaged to a lawyer, her family decided on a controversial and new treatment, she was cryogenically frozen. Victor was one of the cryogenic scientists who inherited the responsibility to cure her, he then became psychopathically obsessed with her proclaiming she was the love of his life and it was his life's work to cure her. The whole Freeze-Nora Dynamic is a Farce one to truly show why Victor belongs in Arkham Asylum. One that would truly shock many fans and would head into very dark territory. This would be a great twist and revelation that Batman could discover that would even shock him, making it his responsibility to keep him away from her.
The incarnation of the character may even be best with a combination of the above, perhaps these paths could be the shades of his character development.
Relevance to the Story
Great villains, aren't just 'villains' they have relevance to the story that is being told. Below are few ideas on just how Victor Fries could be relevant to the story
- Victor Fries used to work in Wayne Enterprises, perhaps he has a vendetta against Mr Wayne or Lucius Fox like in the New 52 by going against regulations and the book which forces Wayne to Fire him, The 3rd direction would be the best route to take with this
- Follow the steps of Batman:Subzero (One of my favourite Batman stories) Freeze takes someone close to Bruce perhaps Alfred or Gordan maybe identical to the film Babara (if Robin/Nightwing is within this film universe) to take revenge on him or simply in desperation with nothing personal to Bruce.
- Making him the secondary antagonist with Nora being taken by someone like Black Mask or Penguin or perhaps he does it for the money to fund the research to cure her
In conclusion there are many different paths that a writer could take Fries down character wise, however it depends on the direction and tone of the film and how relevant Freeze really is. In my opinion Freeze could be involved in the second film of the rebooted series as a more personal story, but he must not overshadow Batman's story and development. He must also be smart and not hold a city for ransom for money, when he has millions of dollars worth of diamonds for his suit... Oh Joel Anyway...
Thanks for reading below is some of the terrible somewhat funny freeze puns enjoy