Baby-Doll (character)
Mary Louise Dahl, more commonly known as Baby-Doll, is a DC Comics character and a repeat villain in the Batman franchise. The character first appeared in Batman: the Animated Series and reappeared again with a revamped design in The New Batman Adventures. Baby-Doll later made small appearances in a select few DC comic books. She is known for being one of the few female Batman characters with a disability, lacking the conventional "sexy" look of most other female villains and heroes in the franchise. The character was created by Paul Dini, and her original voice actress was Alison LaPlaca.[1]
History
Baby-Doll has a form of dwarfism caused by systemic hypoplasia, which affected her ability to physically grow, therefore she looks like a small child even in adulthood. Commissioner Gordon cites her actual age as 30 in her first Batman: the Animated Series episode appearance. Baby-Doll was the child starlet of a sitcom titled Love That Baby (a mishmash parody of I Love Lucy and Dennis The Menace). As the sitcom dwindled in popularity, Baby-Doll was replaced by a character called "Cousin Spunky", who humiliated her and, in her view, stole her spotlight. Tired of playing silly roles, the then-adult Baby-Doll quit Love That Baby and went off on her own, trying for a career in dramatic acting. Due to her physical appearance as a little girl, she was unable to be taken seriously in dramatic roles, and she went into seclusion. Baby-Doll's childlike appearance affected her friendships, romantic prospects and career, something that she was bitter about for most of her life.
Baby-Doll's character design appears in Batman: the Animated Series as a Shirley Temple-like figure with golden hair in ringlets and a purple dress with a diaper. In The New Batman Adventures, the character heavily appears like little girl character Rhoda Penmark from The Bad Seed, with pale hair in longer pigtails, pale skin, black lipstick and black eyeliner, and a pink dress with a diaper beneath it. This redesigned The New Batman Adventures design of the character continued to be the more prominent and popular appearance of the character, carried over into toys and comic books.
Baby-Doll had a female mercenary for-hire named Mariam in her Batman: the Animated Series appearance. Mariam did any of the physical things that Baby-Doll was unable to do herself due to her stature. Mariam was a redheaded adult woman with thick glasses and a blue power suit.
First appearance
Baby-Doll first appears in the Batman: the Animated Series episode "Baby Doll". With the help of her female mercenary, Baby-Doll kidnaps the cast of Love That Baby, all of whom have since aged since their roles as Baby-Doll's family on the series. Batman and Robin discover Baby-Doll's lair, and learn that her plot is to violently force her former co-stars to keep on reenacting new episodes of Love That Baby so that she can nostalgically role-play as the one character that people loved to watch. Batman chases Baby-Doll into a house of mirrors at a nearby carnival in Gotham, where she comes upon a reflection of herself resembling a grown woman. This causes her to mentally break down and shoot at the mirrors with a gun until she runs out of bullets, after which she sobs as Batman comforts her.[2]
Second appearance
Baby-Doll reappears in The New Batman Adventures episode "Love Is A Croc". Here, the character has given up criminal activity and acting, living in hiding as a motel manager. A drunk tourist recognizes her as Baby-Doll and harasses her, causing her to violently slam his head between the covers of a book before fleeing into her own room in the building, where she coincidentally comes across the court trial of villain Killer Croc on TV. She feels that she and Croc are kindred spirits, both judges for their physical appearances rather than their personalities. After setting Croc free from jail, the pair begin a romantic relationship. Their life is supplemented by a series of robberies, but their relationship fractures after Baby-Doll catches Croc chatting with two strippers about dumping Baby-Doll once he has enough money to move on. Furious, Baby-Doll attempts to hijack a nuclear reactor to kill herself and Croc, but Barbara Gordon intervenes and saves the reactor. Croc tries to kill Baby-Doll, grabbing an industrial pipe full of scalding hot water, which severely burns him. Baby-Doll stays by his side as he falls unconscious.
Other media
Baby-Doll is one of the only female Batman villains, along with Calendar Girl from the Batman: the Animated Series episode "Mean Seasons", to not appear in the webseries Gotham Girls or the animated adult cartoon Harley Quinn. Baby-Doll did, however, make a few appearances after Batman: the Animated Series. The character made an appearance in the Li'l Gotham DC Comics series, and later in the issue "Secret Santa" of Batman: The Adventures Continue in 2020.[3][4] It is unclear why the Baby-Doll character was never more widely-prominent in Batman media. Baby-Doll was noted for disability representation by The Mary Sue, with reporter D.R. Medlin recalling of the character, "it is so heartbreaking that she just wanted to be seen and feel normal."[5]
A collectible plastic figurine of Baby-Doll (based on her design in The New Batman Adventures) was offered alongside a plastic figurine of Killer Croc in 2016, made by DC Direct.[6]
See also
- Orphan, a horror film about an adult dwarf from Estonia posing as a little girl
- Whatever Happened to Baby Jane?
References
- ^ "Baby-Doll". www.imdb.com. The Internet Movie Database. Retrieved 24 May 2022.
- ^ Beepe, Joseph. "10 Times Batman Showed His Soft Side". screenrant.com. ScreenRant. Retrieved 24 May 2022.
- ^ Nguyen, Dustin; Fridolfs, Derek (2013). Batman: Li'L Gotham #3. DC Comics.
- ^ Burnett, Alan; Dini, Paul. Batman: The Adventures Continue Season One. DC Comics. ISBN 9781779507891.
- ^ Medlin, D.R. "Hot Take: The Villains in 'Batman the Animated Series' Might Be the Best in the Entire Franchise". www.themarysue.com. The Mary Sue. Retrieved 24 May 2022.
- ^ "dc direct KILLER CROC BABY DOLL batman animated collectibles universe". www.actionfiguresandcomics.com. Action Figures and Comics. Retrieved 24 May 2022.