The New Teen Titans Annual #1 (1985)

I almost forgot to read the first annual! Not like annuals mattered to the overall series in the '80s. This one tells a flashback story starring Terra constantly moaning and moping and thinking about how she’s going to murder all of the Titans. They do help save Superman. No wait. I’m pretty sure they just tag along as The Vanguard do all of the work.

Human?! Then that isn’t Superman either!

Man-bat! (as seen in Batman and shit)

PERSONAL DATA
Alter Ego: Kirk Langstrom
Occupation: Zoologist, former Detective
Marital Status: Married
Known Relatives: Francine (wife), Rebecca Elizabeth (daughter), Britt (sister)
Group Affiliation: None
Base of Operations: Gotham City, formerly New York City and Chicago
First Appearance: DETECTIVE COMICS #400
Height: 6'1" Weight: 201 lbs.
Eyes: (as Langstrom) Brown, (as Man-Bat) Red [Why do all "monster-types" have Red or Black eyes?]
Hair: Brown

HISTORY
Dr. Kirk Langstrom was the resident authority on nocturnal mammals at the Gotham Museum of Natural History. Inspired by his admiration of The Batman (see Batman II), Langstrom hoped to give himself a natural sonar power like a bat's by taking increasing doses of a compound he extracted from a certain gland in bats [Anal.]. Langstrom succeeded, but to his horror, the compound also turned him into a grotesque bat-like creature. In this form Langstrom fought The Batman and turned increasingly insane. Finally, Langstrom forced his fiancée, Francine Lee, to let him turn her into a bat-like creature so they could mate. The Batman succeeded in injecting both Langstrom and Lee with an antidote [Batman Semen!], restoring them to human form and sanity.

Later, after being bitten by a vampire bat, Francine would uncontrollably become a vampiric bat-like creature under a full moon. Eventually, however, Francine was apparently permanently cured, and she no longer changes into bat-like form.

Able to change back and forth between his human and bat forms, using serums, Lamgstrom [Not my typo!] became a crimefighter as Man-Bat, emulating his hero, The Batman. Langstrom and Francine were married and had a daughter, Rebecca.

Rebecca became deathly ill, and what Langstrom thought was the only serum that could cure her was spilled in a fight between The Batman and a criminal. The Batman knew that the serum had been contaminated earlier, and Rebeccca was later curd by other means [With the help of Superman in DC Comics Presents!]. However, unjustly believing The Batman had nearly caused Rebecca's death, Langstrom sank into a severe depression. Accidentally taking an overdose of his bat-gland formula, Langstrom went insane upon next becoming Man-Bat. The Batman restore Langstrom to normal, but by forgetting to take the antidote regularly, Langstrom reverted to being the insane Man-Bat again. Once more The Batman restored him to human form [This entry is just a bunch of sentences comprised of "turned into Man-Bat" and "turned back into Langstrom." It's super exciting!].

Today Langstrom again appears to be in control of his transformations and remains sane when in his Man-Bat form.

POWERS & WEAPONS
By taking his bat-gland formula, Kirk Langstrom can transform himself into a bat-like creature. He can return to human form by taking an antidote.

As Man-Bat, Langstrom possesses superhuman strength, super-sensitive hearing, and the ability to fly at great speeds.

Like a bat, Man-Bat has natural sonar. He emits high-pitched sound waves and can hear the echoes they make when they bounce off nearby objects. Thus Man-Bat can navigate perfectly even in pitch blackness.

Killer Croc! (as seen in Batman and shit)

PERSONAL DATA
Alter Ego: Waylon Jones
Occupation: Professional Criminal
Marital Status: Single
Known Relatives: Unnamed Aunt
Group Affiliation: None
Base of Operations: Gotham City
First Appearance: BATMAN #357
Height: 6'5" Weight: 268 lbs.
Eyes: Red Hair: None

HISTORY
Born in a Florida slum to an unwed mother who died giving birth to him, Waylon Jones was raised by a deadbeat alcoholic aunt. Cursed with a hideous hereditary disease that gave his skin a scaly, reptilian look, Waylon was tormented by his playmates until he fought back, crippling one of them.

Abused even more in reform school, Waylon soon became a habitual criminal, spending the rest of his adolescence in and out of juvenile hall until he was 16, when he killed with his bare hands a fellow inmate who had insulted his bizarre looks. Condemned to death for the crime, Waylon was sent to state prison, where his sentence was eventually commuted to life imprisonment.

Parole after eighteen years behind bars, Waylon found a job at a carnival sideshow wrestling alligators while billed as "Killer Croc." Eventually, Waylon left the carnival and disappeared into the criminal underground, surfacing months later in Gotham City, working as a small-time extortionist.

When the criminal mastermind known only as Squid (see Squid) attempted to unite Gotham underground, Croc saw his chance to move into the big time. Murdering Squid in cold blood, Croc used his brute strength and animal savagery to unite Gotham's criminals under his own rule by promising to eliminate their greatest foe, the caped crimefighter known as The Batman (see The Batman).

In the course of his efforts to eliminate The Batman, Croc was responsible for the murders of circus aerialists Joe and Trina Todd, parents of young Jason Todd, who would later become the new Robin (see Robin II) [Did Batman just continually stalk young male circus aerialists?].

Despite his gathering a small army of the Batman's greatest foes to assist him, Croc eventually ended up back behind prison bars, where he is currently serving a life sentence, this time without hope of parole.

POWERS & WEAPONS
Though possessing no true super-powers, Croc is a savage and abnormally strong hand-to-hand combatant, easily capable of killing an opponent with his bare hands. A conscienceless killer blessed with almost limitless stamina and leather-tough skin, Croc is one of the fiercest foes The Batman has ever faced.

Brainiac! (as seen in Superman and crap)

PERSONAL DATA
Alter Ego: None
Occupation: Would-be World Conqueror
Marital Status: Single
Known Relatives: Vril Dox (adopted son), Querl Dox (distant descendant--see Brainiac 5)
Group Affiliation: None
Base of Operations: Mobile
First Appearance: ACTION COMICS #242
Height: 7'4" Weight: 479 lbs.
Eyes: Photocellular Hair: None

HISTORY
Years ago, the inhabitants of the distant planet Colu built superior computers possessed of 10th level intelligence compared to the Coluans' own 6th level intelligence. These computers were so sophisticated that they eventually revolted against Colu's populace, becoming dictators of that world.

Deciding at length to expand their dominion beyond Colu, the computers constructed a humanoid spy to reconnoiter other planets. Using the mental patterns of a Coluan scientist to give this android human mannerisms, and boosting its intelligence to an unheard-of 12th level, the computers dubbed their creation Brainiac. To further Braniac's human guise, the computers took a child named Vril Dox and forced him to pose as Brainiac's son [But what about Brainiac's Daughter?]. Ironically, it was this same child who would, several years later while Brainiac was away in space, lead the Coluan rebellion that overthrew the computer rule.

Sent into space by his computer masters, Brainiac traveled from one inhabited world to another, using a unique shrinking ray to steal sample cities from these worlds to test them for conquest. One of these cities was Kandor, former capital of Superman's homeworld, Krypton (see Superman). When Brainiac came to Earth to steal the city of Metropolis, he found himself defeated by Superman, who returned the other stolen cities to their native worlds and took the bottled city of Kandor to his Fortress of Solitude for safekeeping (see Fortress of Solitude).

With the defeat on Colu of his computer masters, Brainiac set out on his own to conquer the universe, returning time and again to Earth to renew his battle with Superman in a vain effort to avenge his repeated defeats at the Man of Steel's hands.

After one such battle, Superman left Brainiac entombed at the very center of a vast computerized planet of Brainiac's own devising. Unable to free himself through any other means, Brainiac forced the planet's sun, Epsilon 4, to go nova, believing the resultant energies would free him.

Instead, the nova's energy was far beyond Brainiac's expectations, reducing the humanoid android to a random mass of molecules. This cloud of Brainiac's atoms drifted through space until the atoms were drawn to a world of living machines where life was not carbon-based, but electronic. Here, he joined with the planet's bio-computers, absorbing information that had been stored there since before the birth of our galaxy. Leaving the computer-world at last, Brainiac's atoms continued drifting through the universe, from world to world, gleaning more information wherever they traveled.

Returning at last to his computerized world, Brainiac's atoms began to reintegrate over a period of many months, until he emerged restored, but drastically changed. Now a fully living machine with no trace of human emotion, the new Brainiac continues to stalk the stars.

POWERS & WEAPONS
No longer merely a humanoid computer but a unique form of organic life, Brainiac is possessed of superhuman strength and endurance, and commands an almost infinite array of the most sophisticated computerized mechanisms ever devised [So he's mostly Commodore 64?].

Though he possesses knowledge of all known forms of hand-to-hand combat throughout the universe, Brainiac considers himself above such barbaric actions, preferring to use his awesome mind to defeat his foes.