The fourth one-shot announced featuring one of Gotham City's most notorious criminals, Batman - One Bad Day: Mr. Freeze will feature Mr. Freeze without his iconic containment suit. This is part of a slew of announcements coming from a variety of fan-favorite creators who will each be tackling one of Batman's greatest villains in eight planned one-shots with the hashtag #BatmanOneBadDay.
Dr. Victor Fries was first introduced by Bob Kane, Sheldon Moldoff, and Dick Dillin in Batman #121 with the story "The Ice Crimes of Mr. Zero." Originally more of a joke/gimmick villain known as Mr. Zero, Mr. Freeze received a completely revamped and tragic backstory in the Batman: The Animated Series episode "Heart of Ice" written by Paul Dini, which transitioned into the comic books as well thanks to the powerful storytelling. In his new origin, the doctor freezes his wife, Nora, in order to find a cure for her illness. He is then involved in a tragic accident that made it so his body could only survive in subzero temperatures, requiring him to wear a special cryo-suit.
In a tweet, X-Men and Deadpool scribe Gerry Duggan promoted his Substack post that revealed he would be working with artist Matteo Scalera (Black Science, Batman Beyond 2.0) on the Batman: One Bad Day Mr. Freeze one-shot. They will be joined by Eisner Award-winning colorist David Stewart (The Walking Dead). Duggan says the story is "meant to be the meanest, baddest, best Mr. Freeze tale ever told." These are pretty bold words considering some of the previous Mr. Freeze comic book stories, but the story definitely takes a unique approach. Apparently, it will be a flashback to a winter that was so cold, Mr. Freeze was capable of threatening Gotham City without needing his special containment suit.
Duggan's Substack post mentions that he previously collaborated with Scott Snyder on the Batman #34 story, which also features art from Scalera. That was a punch-to-the-gut type of story that definitely played up the darker elements of Gotham, which shouldn't be surprising considering Duggan managed to write some pretty dark stuff even in his more comedic titles like Deadpool. Hopefully, he can bring that same type of storytelling to this iconic character, who is definitely privy to plenty of tragedy in his life.
While little is known about these Batman: One Bad Day one-shots beyond the surface level information of which villains will be features, creative teams, and Twitter posts worth of story summaries, all the one-shots imply that they share Joker's "one bad day" belief established in Batman: The Killing Joke. Among the many iconic rogues' gallery characters readers will be able to enjoy are Two-Face, Penguin, Riddler, Bane, Ra's al Ghul, Catwoman, and Clayface in standalone one-shots that are 64 pages long, each released in a different month. The Batman - One Bad Day: Mr. Freeze one-shot can be enjoyed by readers at the start of the holidays this November 2022.
Source: Gerry Duggan