Roman Sionis

**Roman Sionis** (ローマン・シオニス, *Rōman Sionisu*), also known as **Black Mask** (ブラックマスク, *Burakku Masuku*), is a fictional character and antagonist of the *DC* series. He is one of the first crime lords to seize complete control of Gotham City, and that he was born into a wealthy family, but was nonetheless raised by abusive, selfish, and neglectful parents. Finally reaching his breaking point, Roman set fire to his family mansion, completely burning it to the ground and murdering his parents at the same time. Left with their massive fortune, Roman embezzled his inheritance money and started numerous lucrative business ventures, which he eventually used as a front for illegal operations.

Carving a mask from the black wood of his father's coffin, Roman Sionis became known to the criminal underworld as a sadistic and vicious mass murderer and crime boss, using the mask as inspiration to create and recruit a massive gang known as the False Facers. However, over the years, Black Mask's power and control was diminished a great deal as other villains of the criminal underworld took over pieces of his fallen empire for their own designs, which started with Joker, the villain who destroyed his empire to begin with and took over his operations and henchmen.

During one of Black Mask's earlier intent plans to regain his lost power over the entire city, from within Arkham City, a massive prison that was built right in the heart of Gotham, took advantage of the gang wars to build up his own forces and made plans to escape from the prison in order to resume his criminal activities in Gotham and beyond. In the end, his schemes were eventually foiled, this time due to the timely interference of Batman, and the third Robin.

"*No one goes up against and arrests the Black Mask and lives. No one!*"

—Black Mask, to the TYGER Guards in Arkham City.

## Appearance & Biography

*Voice Actor*: Brian Bloom (English), Not Known (Japanese), Not Known (Arabic), Not Known (Brazilian), Not Known (Chinese), Not Known (Dutch), Not Known (Finnish), Not Known (French), Not Known (German), Not Known (Italian), Not Known (Hebrew), Not Known (Hungarian), Not Known (Korean), Not Known (Norwegian), Not Known (Poland), Not Known (Polish), Not Known (Portuguese), Not Known (Romanian), Not Known (Russian), Not Known (Serbian), Not Known (Spanish), Not Known (Swedish), Not Known (Thai), Not Known (Brazilian Portuguese), Not Known (European Spanish), Not Known (European Portuguese), Not Known (Latin American Spanish), Not Known (Latin Spanish)

### Biography

Following the suspicious death of his multi-millionaire parents in a fire, Roman Sionis inherited their fortune and then went on to bankrupt their company. Saved by a buyout by Bruce Wayne, Roman came to resent and hate Wayne. Fixated on the concept of masks, Roman carved one from his father's black coffin and sought revenge; his ensuing battle with the Dark Knight caused his mask to be burnt into his skin, remaking him as the Black Mask. Roman is now a feared gang leader and one of the most powerful mob bosses in Gotham, with a burning hatred of the Batman.

### Appearance

#### As Black Mask

* Hair Color: Brown
* Skin Color: Not Known
* Eye Color: Brown
* Age: Not Known
* Birthday: Not Known
* Height: 6' 1"
* Weight: 195 lbs.

### Attributes:

* Obsessed with masks.
* Harbors a hatred of Batman and Bruce Wayne.
* Face resembles a black skull.
* Feared and powerful mob boss.
* Skilled marksman, known for his double handguns.

## Relationships

### Friends/Allies

* False Facers
	+ Tattoo
	+ Tupeng
* Tiffany Ambrose
* Corrupt police
	+ Commissioner Grogan
	+ Arnold Flass
	+ Howard Branden
	+ Michael Wuertz
* Riddler
* Mister Hammer
* Firefly

### Neutral

* Commissioner Loeb
* Hugo Strange

### Rivals

* Joker
* Penguin
* Carmine Falcone
* Two-Face
* Rupert Thorne

### Enemies

* Justice League
	+ Superman
	+ Bat Family
		- Batman
		- Batgirl/Oracle
		- Robin/Red Robin
* Outsiders
	+ Red Hood
* Teen Titans
	+ Robin/Nightwing - Worst adversary.
	+ Robin
* Katana
* Catwoman
* GCPD
	+ Harvey Bullock
* Hamilton Hill

## Powers and Abilities

### Abilities

* **Criminology**:
* **Business Management**:
* **Swordsmanship**:
* **Tactical Analysis**:
* **Disguise**: Can Look Like Anyone
	+ '**Acting**:
* **Marksmanship**:
* **Intimidation**:
* **Leadership**:
* **Hand-to-Hand Combat** (Basic to Advanced): At first, Black Mask fights like a normal henchman. Although, Black Mask is able to fend off any attempts to quickly take him down like ground takedowns and combo takedowns.
* **Weaponry**:

### Weaknesses

* **Mental Illness**:
* **Beat Down**: Roman is able to avoid any attempts for an immediate takedown made by the hero but he cannot defend himself against the hero's beatdown move.
* **Pacemaker**: Roman has heart issues and requires a pacemaker to stay alive. It can be controlled remotely and, as demonstrated by Batman, can be used against him by rapidly accelerating his heart.

## History

### Past

#### *The Early Years and Masks of Society*

"*This city has a problem. Some freak who thinks he's a hero. Fortunately, there isn't a problem in the world that can't be solved with a little bit of money.*"

—Black Mask.
Roman Sionis' childhood was scarred with several incidents that left him in extreme pain, including being dropped on his head shortly after he was born in the hospital. His parents were always more concerned on how it would affect their public image however, rather than their son. As they always left their son behind to engage in social events in order to uphold their reputation, even if they despised those that they attended with, Roman developed an intense hatred for his parents, an aptitude toward the concept of masks, and believed that his parents were hypocrites who wore figurative masks in order to uphold their family image. Over the years, Roman collected various masks that made up a massive collection, which served him and his criminal activities years later.

Among the socialites that the Sionis' frequently engaged with were Thomas and Martha Wayne, with Roman forced to become friends with Bruce Wayne by his parents. As Roman knew his parents true feelings about the Waynes, he began to despise them all. Despite that, Roman was eventually able to complete his education and got a job at his father's massive company, Janus Cosmetics, where he met a beautiful young woman named Circe, whom he eventually fell in love with. However, his parents forbade him to see her due to Circe being of the lower class compared to them: that was the last straw for Roman. Roman then started a massive fire within his family mansion with his parents inside in order to finally be rid of them once and for all.

After Roman set fire to his family mansion and completely burned it to the ground and murdered his neglectful parents at the same time, he became rich in wealth, power lust, and tainted ambitions. With his parents out of the way, Roman took control of Janus Cosmetics and became engaged to Circe, with Roman believing that he may finally had a chance at being happy. However, Roman was not the business man that his father was and nearly bankrupted the company with several ill-conceived and rushed products, which left him no choice but to accept help from Bruce Wayne in exchange for giving up control of the company: that intensified Roman's hatred of Bruce even more. To make matters worse for Roman, Circe broke up with him in front of the entire company, which destroyed the last shreds of humanity that may have been left in him.

Roman then decided to take his business activities into the criminal elements in order to capitalize on Gotham's violent streets and criminal underworld. Still left with a massive fortune, Roman embezzled his inheritance money and started numerous lucrative business ventures, which he eventually used as a front for illegal operations in conjunction with his late father's corporation, which he managed to uphold control of with his newly formed and massive profits. After he carved a mask from the black wood of his father's coffin, Roman became known to the criminal underworld as Black Mask, a sadistic and vicious mass murderer and crime boss. Roman Sionis/Black Mask also was afflicted with paranoia, which was a large part of the reason that he was one of the more successful criminal kingpins.

Roman also was an old accomplice of the Falcone Crime Family, more specifically Carmine Falcone. At some point, Roman also encountered Carmine's son, Alberto Falcone, and offered him a private place to talk after Alberto made a statement about his family at Cucinotta's the night before. However, that later came back to haunt him when Alberto, who had a history of mental instability, made a threatening call to Roman late at night in his alternate persona.

#### Beginning of Crime Carrier

"*This time tomorrow, Gotham's gonna be mine.*"

—Black Mask.
Recruiting dozens of other thugs and murderers to form a group called "The False Facers", Black Mask led his gang into performing incredible and daring heists, using his family crypt as an initial base of operations to direct his affairs from. Black Mask and his organization gripped all of Gotham in a massive crime wave and murdered countless individuals who crossed him in the past, including Circe, who eventually committed suicide to avoid extensive torture that was done daily to her by Roman, as well as several Wayne Enterprises employees.

Consequently, Roman became extremely wealthy and powerful in a relatively short period of time, gaining the attention of Batman himself, as Roman bought and started several more businesses. By Batman's second year patrolling the streets of Gotham, Black Mask was by far the most powerful man and crime lord in the city, possessing immense wealth and resources and controlled Gotham's criminal underworld with his massive gangs.

Using his massive wealth and ties to the criminal underworld and hiring corrupt public officials, such as Officer Peter Grogan, and similarly bent cops, Black Mask also effectively and completely controlled the Gotham City Police Department, with the exception of Commissioner Gillian B. Loeb, Captain James Gordon and a few others, which allowed him to easily stay out of prison with any evidence against him mysteriously going missing and witnesses ending up dead. Additionally, judges, councilmen, and even guards at Blackgate Prison ended up on Roman's payroll, which effectively made Roman the true law who controlled Gotham with his criminal empire in a seat of supreme power.

To serve as a personal squad of enforcers for Black Mask within the GCPD, Commissioner Loeb initiated a SWAT team comprised of handpicked officers who used stolen equipment and gear in their "assignments"; the worst of the worst with Howard Branden as their trigger happy leader. This team served Black Mask and Loeb most loyally of all and stole weapons from the GCPD Evidence Locker and transferred them to Roman, helping the crime lord in selling drugs, expand his profits, eliminate evidence, frame other individuals for his crimes, kill witnesses, and turn a blind eye to his criminal activities. Serving their own interests at the same time, Loeb and Branden also used their connections to Black Mask and intimidated Gotham's citizens into handing over protection money, used the homeless to do their dirty work or suffer beatings, and secured their own financial situations with bribes.

While most police officers who did not take Roman's bribes or orders were horrifically tortured and murdered, Black Mask had other plans in mind for Captain Gordon. While Gordon was previously attacked by his fellow coworkers, including his partner, Arnold Flass, under the orders of Peter for not being a "team player", Black Mask believed that Gordon would be far more useful to their plans and cause if he was controlled instead, as his respectable public image would help to preserve the reputation of a thoroughly corrupt police department. To that end, Peter ordered Harvey Bullock, another honest officer who bordered against corruption as well, to become Gordon's partner in order to uncover information on Gordon that could be used to blackmail and effectively control him for their own designs.

In the meantime, Gillian had a task that kept him busy, out of Peter and Howard's operations, and focused on a task that would benefit Black Mask and the corrupt police department as a whole: capturing Batman. To that end, Gillian came in charge of a task force whose sole assignment was hunting down and capturing vigilantes, with Batman at the top of the list. This sparked conflict between Gillian, and Gordon and his daughter, Barbara, who both believed that Batman accomplished much more than the broken legal system in Gotham.

#### Smuggling with the Law

With Black Mask using sadistic torture, fear, and punishment in order to exert his control over his henchmen, enemies, and the entire city alike, and the entire GCPD and infrastructure serving as little more than a secondary gang for his forces, few stepped up against Black Mask, despite most believing of his involvement in the numerous crimes that he was alleged of, but never convicted of, committing. After he wiped out most of the competition and began to consolidate his power, Black Mask issued forth a crime wave with his gang and capitalized on his reign over the city. Forming a truce with other criminals within Gotham, including Oswald Cobblepot, also known as Penguin, who agreed to assist in his plans for his own purposes, Black Mask also sought to completely wipe out the entire Falcone Crime Family, one of his last remaining and competing adversaries.

Wearing a Black Mask when he lead his men, who also similarly wore masks in order to represent their personalities, as a disguise and part of his persona when he headed up his criminal activities, Black Mask was able to publicly run his company as Roman Sionis and kept himself from being connected to any crime, while he also used his businesses as a front for drug trafficking and other illegal operations. Roman's businesses primarily consisted of Janus Cosmetics, which he often used to conceal illegal chemicals and drugs that were sold onto the streets, and Sionis Industries, which fell into disrepair.

However, Roman still kept control over the Steel Mill, using it as a storage facility, and received shipments of illegal materials that were used in the construction of his drugs. Within the Steel Mill Warehouses, there was a secret passageway that led to a massive drug lab, where Roman made and shipped his drugs and also kept a private office and torture chamber, which he used to brutalize, intimidate, and slaughter his enemies and other who did not take his orders in order to further feed his sadistic appetites. Roman also kept stashes of his ill-gotten gains within the Steel Mill as a failsafe fortune for his illegal activities.

The remainder of his ill-gotten gains were stored within the Gotham Merchants Bank, yet another business that Roman owned and used as a secondary front to launder his ill-conceived fortune. Through his control of the Merchants Bank, Roman also embezzled city funds, which left many clients broke and homeless as Roman bought up numerous resources and miles worth of real estate throughout New and Old Gotham that served as secondary headquarters and safe houses. With Roman selling large quantities of drugs each week, most of Gotham's infrastructure on his payroll, and owning much of the real estate, Gotham became rifled with corruption, crime, and poverty, and many turned to a life of crime in order to support themselves.

Toward the start of a particularly snowy winter, Roman made his final plans to cement his control over the city and had Peter Grogan, now a Police Commissioner after Gillian died, become the next Mayor of Gotham. While Peter and Roman were originally enemies during Loeb's initial campaign for Mayor as he took bribes from the crime lord's competitors, the pair soon formed an alliance with Roman, who promised Peter that he would be rewarded handsomely as long he continued to follow his orders as Mayor. With Peter as his puppet Mayor, the entire GCPD under his complete control, and Gordon under careful surveillance, Black Mask would be the one and only law who governed Gotham.

In order to further Loeb's political ambitions, the GCPD took credit for the capture of a recent and brutal serial killer who planned his murders around holidays, known as Julian Day, who used the name, Calendar Man. The reality however, was that the killer was actually located and subdued by Batman. Manipulating Warden Martin Joseph at Blackgate Prison, Loeb was able to have Day deemed sane, even in spite of all the evidence pointing to the contrary, in order to arrange his execution on Christmas Eve as a form of twisted, yet poetic justice for the people of Gotham. This act, in conjunction with the falsified news articles, printed by corrupt journalists praising Loeb, would undoubtedly ensure in his victory with the political points he would gain and, with his victory, would usher in a city under the complete control of Roman Sionis/Black Mask.

#### Run in with Joker

While Black Mask was on the verge of ruling Gotham and seemed to be untouchable by any law, authority, or individual, Sionis' luck took a turn for the worse with the emergence of a psychopathic mass murderer and villain who called himself simply "Joker", who began to steal chemicals from Sionis' Steel Mill and constructed explosives as part of a much larger scheme. To that end, Roman had his henchmen follow the Joker to find out what he planned while he also moved his girlfriend, Tiffany Ambrose, to his safe house at Lacey Towers in Coventry when Joker spooked her.

However, Joker learned of Tiffany's location and began to stalk her, which resulted in Tiffany texting Roman for help. Unfortunately, Joker was able to break into the safe house, violently knocked out Tiffany, and tied her to the chandler in the living room. When Roman arrived at the safe house, he had one of his henchmen, Giovanni Luchese, disguised as himself enter the room while he snuck in the back in order to surprise Joker. The plan went horribly wrong as Joker shot and killed Luchese and violently beat Roman, despite the latter surprising the former. Joker then torched the room with a Molotov Cocktail incendiary device and forced Roman to shoot Tiffany through the heart. After he abducted Roman, Joker tortured him over the course of several days and learned every detail about his life, which he then used to disguise himself as Black Mask for his own plans.

## Synopsis

### *Batman*

#### On Christmas Eve

As Batman continued to investigate Black Masks's activities, he learned that Roman, who was a disguised Joker in reality at that point, seemingly strove to kill him above anyone else, placed a bounty of $50,000,000 on his head, and brought in eight of the world's most deadly assassins, including Bane, Deathstroke, Deadshot, Copperhead, Electrocutioner, Firefly, Killer Croc, and Shiva to Gotham for one night on Christmas Eve to kill Batman. That bounty and the enlistment of assassins set into motion a chain of events that lead Gotham down a road of death and destruction as Batman faced, for the first time in his career, the most iconic of Gotham's villains and criminals who went and became his immense rouges gallery and the most notorious inmates at Arkham Asylum.

However, as Batman investigated the crime scene in which Tiffany, as well as the impostor Black Mask, who served as a decoy, were slaughtered by the Joker, Batman learned that the new criminal had taken the real Black Mask hostage in order to use him to gain access to his money that was stored at the Gotham Merchants Bank (thanks to a piece of cloth that was torn from Black Mask's white suit that was caught on a glass shard and shoe polish that was left behind while Joker dragged him out). After he arrived at the bank, Batman learned that Joker had impersonated Black Mask, seized complete control of his operations, and slaughtered any of Black Mask's Henchmen who did not turn. While he impersonated Black Mask, Joker was the one who hired the assassins, used Warden Joseph to lead a breakout at Blackgate that saw the death of Commissioner Grogan, and ordered the bombing of the GCPD.

"*You son of a bitch! You think you can steal from me and get away with it?! You're gonna be a dead man when I get out of this! Do you hear me?! DEAD!*"

—Black Mask, foolishly threatening Joker while at the villain's mercy.
After he murdered dozens of the bank's employees, stole billions of Roman's ill gotten profits, and beat the fallen crime lord into unconsciousness after the latter attempted to threaten the former for his actions, Joker escaped in a stolen ambulance and blew up the remaining money and vault with explosives. Joker then consolidated his power by killing his opposition and took control of Sionis' Steel Mill, as well as his drug manufacturing plant and trafficking operations that were hidden within. Joker then had his henchmen take Roman down to his old torture chamber to interrogate him for any remaining secrets or pieces of information that he may have kept from them and to then additionally brutalize and murder him.

However, Batman was able to rescue Roman, and attempted to interrogate him regarding the Joker's location. However, Roman refused to give any information and also told Batman that absolutely nothing that he could do would compare to what the Joker did to him, although Batman intended to prove Roman wrong by attempting to accelerate his pacemaker. However, Copperhead arrived and poisoned Batman before he could get the chance. Roman then attempted to seek revenge by offering to pay her to kill Batman, although Copperhead dismissed his offer, noted that he was a fallen crime lord, and revealed that she was already aware of the Joker's impersonation.

Nonetheless, Roman managed to slip away. Despite his power diminished a great deal, Black Mask rallied his remaining and loyal followers and set up shop at the abandoned Gotham Cathedral, stored his remaining drugs, laundered money, weapons, and planned to control the rest of Gotham within the church. After he sent out his henchmen to continue selling his drugs, which were stored within canisters from his Cosmetics front operation, Roman planned his revenge on the Joker and intended to retake his position as the top crime lord.

Unfortunately for Roman, Batman destroyed his canisters of drugs and tracked him and his remaining henchmen to the Cathedral. However, Black Mask anticipated that Batman might show up, and confronted him at the church with several of his men shortly after Batman destroyed his last drug stash. Roman then told Batman that that his presence saved him the trouble of arranging for his men to track him down and agreed with him about their both being unable to give up. When Batman attempted to threaten Black Mask with how he'd get him and his men to surrender to the GCPD, Black Mask acknowledged the threat, but informed Batman that the latter probably already knew his decision on the matter before he had his men attack him.

Batman consequentially beat them all to a pulp and left them for the GCPD to arrest. While Roman assured Batman that he would be out by morning thanks to the corrupt legal system on his payroll, Batman's exploits throughout the long night filtered out much of the corruption within Gotham's infrastructure as Gordon began to take the leadership of the GCPD, with Loeb, who was violently murdered by the Joker earlier during the brutal night, and rid it of the bent cops once and for all. Harvey Bullock himself became a trusted partner and friend to Gordon and reluctant ally to Batman after he gained a deep respect for Gordon after he became his partner and lost any potential for corruptness in the process.

"*I'm going to dedicate every waking minute to tracking you down and taking you out.*"

—Black Mask, threatening Batman shortly before his arrest and incarceration at the Church.
In the end, Roman was finally arrested, prosecuted, and sent to Blackgate by the renewed legal system, as Joker took his place as the criminal world's lead rouge with his men, resources, and money at his disposal. Roman was finally exposed for the criminal that he was, as his alter ego, Black Mask, was reduced to a fallen crime lord who lost nearly everything to Joker and Batman. His hatred of both individuals was amplified further and ensured that he would return years later to continue in his criminal activities and strive to kill those who wronged him.

## External links

* Black Mask *Wikipedia*
* Black Mask *DC Database*
* Black Mask *Batman Wiki*