Jack Ryder

* Biography
* Threat Assessment
* Trivia and Notes
* Gallery

## Biography

### Jack Ryder: 1975 - 2015

Jack Ryder’s parents were killed in a traffic accident while Jack was being babysat by a neighbor at the age of seven. Without any extended family to take him in, Jack became a product of Gotham’s less than reputable foster care program. While his records remain sealed, I managed to discover that Jack was something of a hellion growing up, with charges ranging from trespassing and theft to assault and voyeurism. It is no wonder that Jack spent time with nearly a dozen foster families before he would end up in Gotham’s Hall of Juvenile Detention.

At nineteen years old, Jack was released from the Juvenile Justice system after exposing a corruption racket to the news media. This was the start of Jack’s interest in journalism and exposing scandals. An out of court settlement also gave Jack the financial means to attend college which he did, at Gotham State University, majoring in journalism. After college, Jack got a job at the Gotham Gazette's mail room but also moonlighted as an on – air personality for a late-night radio show on Scott Media’s WGAZ station.

It was here that Ryder’s rants about the new Batman vigilante became popular and he soon found his employers at the Gazette bumping him up to the news floors. Jack saw no reason to give up his broadcasting career and continued to report scathing editorials about Batman by day and antagonize guests on his new radio talk show where he often would play devil’s advocate to such an extreme that guests would become flustered enough to openly discuss what Jack thought to be important issues. After Vicki Vale returned to the Gazette after being away for a number of years pursuing a television career, Jack and her began co-hosting a talk show series known as “Ryder v Vale” Which proved to be incredible popular.

More recently, for whatever reason, Jack had become obsessed with investigating the supernatural. His editor did not want to publish the material, but Jack ran a blog documenting his investigation under a false name. While Jack has recently deleted the page, nothing is ever really erased from the Internet, especially when your name is Barbara Gordon.

### The Creeper: 2015 - Present

As I mentioned in Jack’s previous entry, he had taken a journalistic interest in the paranormal. Which he kept a blog about that I recently uncovered after Jack’s attempts to delete it, Jack had become aware of a man by the name of Vincent Yatz. Through various paranormal contacts Jack had made, he discovered that this Yatz was visiting a number of occult hotspots throughout Gotham. Though Jack’s blog declares his intent for following Yatz was altruistic in nature, I suspect that Jack had hoped to learn something that would benefit him personally. Whatever the reason, Jack stalked this Vincent Yatz fellow for a number of weeks and had deduced the location of the man’s home.

One day, after Yatz had left his home as part of his daily routine, Jack creeped into the man’s house and began rummaging through the man’s residence until he found an occult library in the basement. Jack got sidetracked and eventually Yatz returned home while Jack was still in the basement, Jack quickly hid as Yatz came downstairs and before Jack’s eyes, Yatz cast off the illusion of an elderly gentleman and revealed himself to be none other than Felix Faust. Unaware of Jack’s presence, the sorcerer resumed a ritual that was the purpose for his presence in Gotham and had apparently taken him a number of months to prepare. It was at this point that Jack felt he had stepped into something he shouldn’t have and decided to make a run for it. However, in doing so, he alarmed Faust whose incantation was fumbled and had accidentally opened a rift to another dimension from which a single entity managed to escape, bonding itself with the fleeing Jack and endowing him with the ability to escape the crazed conjurer, leaping across Gotham’s skyline while laughing like a loon.

This was how the so called “Creeper” was born, a yellow-skinned, green-haired primal trickster that is part vigilante, part public nuisance. To this day, I am uncertain if Jack is even aware of the Creeper’s presence. I have heard rumor that Zatanna's Dark Justice is looking to recruit this weirdo. May God have mercy on us all if that rumor proves to be true.

## Threat Assessment

### Resources

* Accelerated Healing
* Enhanced Strength, Speed & Reflexes
* Superhuman Leaping Ability
* Hypnotic Gaze
* Pain Inducing Laughter
* Heightened Sense of Hearing
* Mystical Energy Blasts
* Limited Shapeshifting Ability
* Incredible Magical Resistance
* Complete and Utter Insanity

## Trivia and Notes

### Trivia

* Creeper's shapeshifting fits with the trickster motif, he change into animals that are associated with tricksters and he can also change his clothes for comical effect... even make slight alterations to his features.
* His cell phones keep exploding:
	+ Oracle fried his phone when during an interview with Bruce Wayne.
	+ Clark Kent used his heat vision to burn his phone when he wanted to show damage caused by supeheroes.
	+ James Wheeler burn his phone during a presentation of his powers.
* He endorsed Sebastian Hady during the election.
* He wrote an article about Izzy Bowin's connection to Hartley Rathaway. The article itself did nothing until it was picked up by G. Gordon Godfrey and blasted across the airwaves. This led to Izzy becoming a supervillain.
* Dian Belmont is his acquaintance.

### Notes

* Jack's address is a nod to his first comic book appearance: *Showcase #73*, in 1968, by Steve Ditko and Don Segall.
* His phones have a habit of exploding, so much so that it's become a Running Gag.

## Gallery

Jack Ryder.jpgJack RyderThe Creeper.jpgThe Creeper
## Oracle Files

Jack Ryder 1.jpgOracle Files: Jack Ryder 1Jack Ryder 2.jpgOracle Files: Jack Ryder 2

## Links and References

* Appearances of Jack Ryder

1. ↑ Oracle Files: Jack Ryder (1/2)
2. ↑ Oracle Files: Jack Ryder (2/2)
3. ↑ Oracle Files: Helena Bertinelli 3/3
4. ↑ Oracle Files: Catherine Cobert
5. ↑ VOX Box: The Planetour 1
6. ↑ Network Files: Izzy Bowin 2
7. ↑ Network Files: Dian Belmont