Peter Merkel

**Peter Merkel**, also known as **Rag Doll**, is a fictional character in comic books published by the American company DC Comics. He first appeared in *Flash Comics* #36 (December 1942), but his first appearance in *Swamp Thing* comics was in *Swamp Thing* Vol. 2, #46 (March 1986). He was created by Gardner Fox and Lou Ferstadt.

## History

Peter Merkel was born somewhere in the Midwest, and although he mainly lived between Keystone City and Opal City as an adult, in his youth his existence was quite nomadic. He was born with a rare, if not unique, condition: triple-jointedness, an even more flexible and plastic version of the rare but more usual double-jointedness. His father was a side-show barker, and Peter had been used to fairs and circus since he was a baby: as a young man, he joined a local carnival, where he exhibited as a weird dancer and, of course, as a contortionist. Somewhere in the early 1940s, the carnival went bankrupt, and Peter suddenly found himself jobless and penniless. Growing hungry and desperate, with no chance to find another job, Peter had the idea of a lifetime as he saw some workers delivering toys to a department store. Among the many different supplies, there were some rag dolls big enough for him to hide inside them: he did exactly this, and as disjointed and light-weighted as he was, the workers didn’t even notice the difference between him and the other toys. Once inside, he waited for the closing time, and then robbed the department store. This first theft went so smoothly and perfectly that Peter decided this would have become his living. He didn’t even throw away the rag doll “suit”, as such an unlikely look helped him in going unnoticed (nobody could ever suspect a simple doll). He robbed store after store, sometimes even larger targets like banks, and in a few years he became a living legend in the underworld: the mysterious Rag Doll was an infallible and uncatchable criminal, and other street thugs and simple thieves joined him, fascinated by his unusual style and eager to profit on his skills. Rag Doll let them all in, and formed a huge criminal activity, with himself as the undisputed leader.

From heist to heist, Rag Doll and his men arrived to Keystone City in 1943, targeting Geralda Cummins, a young and wealthy heiress. Cummins was holding a party in which every guest would have donated $10,000 (with the total being the prize for a treasure hunt game). Rag Doll was delivered as a present to the heiress, and listened to the details of the night game directly from the organizer, Joan Williams, who clearly couldn’t imagine that the doll was listening. That night, as the guests hunted for the first clue in the museum, Rag Doll sent his henchmen after them, while he planned to question Joan about the whereabouts of the treasure… but Joan was helped for her job by her boyfriend, The Flash, and Merkel had to wait. As his men made their move, Flash ran to the museum to stop them, and Rag Doll used this time to drug Joan and steal the clues from her, in order to find the treasure first. Merkel solved the first four clues without much difficulty, but was reached at the local aquarium by The Flash, who had solved them at super speed to catch him. The two fought, but Rag Doll surprised his adversary with his flexibility, and managed to throw the hero into a huge tank with a giant octopus inside. He then rushed to Cummins Estate, where he solved the last clue… bust just as he was about to claim the prize, he was reached by The Flash, who had freed himself from the octopus, and tied with his own flexible limbs. Arrested, he was imprisoned in the local jail, but he didn’t stay there for long, as his impossible body made regular cells unable to hold him. With his fame of uncatchable ruined, Rag Doll committed himself to defeat The Flash, and decided to stay in Keystone City until he had cleansed his reputation. This took him long enough, as thirty years later he was still there, trying to foil his historical foe. As the latter retired, Rag Doll found consolation in his replacement, a new Flash who was just as challenging an adversary as the original… and just as good a chance to reclaim his title.

Peter Merkel became a criminal out of necessity, but remained one simply because he enjoys it: always happy and joyful, he appears even creepier due to a childish attitude that makes him quite scary. As Rag Doll, his natural triple-jointedness makes him impossibly flexible, with his weird movements making him also an unforeseeable and unpredictable fighter; in his youth, he was agile enough to even dodge bullets, but as he grew old he developed other skills, and he’s now able to hypnotize people using his voice (he also regained his youth thanks to a pact with Neron). A charismatic leader and a master of stealth, despite his innocent look Rag Doll is a force to be reckoned with, a formidable thief who, with time, expanded his field of interests to other forms of crime…

## Powers and Abilities

### Powers

* **Body contortion**
* **Superhuman durability**
* **Enhanced strength**

### Abilities

* **Skilled acrobat**
* **Stealth/Infiltration**
* **Expert combatant**