This article needs maintenance and organization, as it may have become cluttered or confusing. Its heart is in a good place, it's just a little special. Won't you please help out an article in need? This template will categorize articles that include it into the Clean Up task category.
Christopher Nakano was the Mayor of Gotham City who was elected in the aftermath of The Joker War. He is a misguided man who saw masks, vigilantes and villains alike, as inherently bad and aimed to remove all of them, and had hired The Magistrate to do so; especially Batman himself, who he has personal trauma with. He saw his actions as being in good faith and for the better of Gotham City. Since then, he began working with Batman and the Bat family, having a change of heart after Batman had saved his life.
History
Origins
Nakano was a patrolman at the GCPD before running for mayor. He's been seen as one of the few good cops in the GCPD with how corrupt it is, being seen as always on the straight and narrow by his peers and Bruce Wayne himself. It is suggested that he helped the people more than the system, with average, everyday people having a liking towards him and caring for his safety.
The Joker War
During the onslaught of The Joker War when Nakano and his partner, Bart, were called in by Lucius Fox for a break in at Wayne Enterprises Record Storage Facility: The break in was by Batman, who was disarming a bomb that was planted by The Joker. When Nakano and his partner arrived on the scene, they were quick to assume that Batman was the one who broke into the building, shouting at him to put his hands up. Little did they know, as Nakano let Bart enter the scene first, the place was triggered to explode with one misstep.
In the impact of the explosion, Nakano's partner, Bart, was caught in the explosion and set on fire, quickly dying a painful death. Nakano survived by the help of Batman, who pushed him out of the impact of the explosion, only costing Nakano his left eye.
Despite this, Nakano pledged to his now-dead partner that he would seek justice for his death, blaming Batman and the Joker for Bart's death and the loss of his eye.[1]
Election
After having recovered from his injuries during The Joker War, Nakano ran the elections in Gotham to become the Mayor of Gotham City and help from a real level, instead of small-scale help in the GCPD, having quit the GCPD due to his injuries. His campaign centered around the outlawing of masks and banning vigilantes like Batman from roaming the streets and ultimately making Gotham worse. He attends a fundraising gala on a yacht to pitch himself to the one percent, where Bruce Wayne is also attending. He puts his reason forward for wanting to outlaw masks in that transparency is essential to ensuring injustice doesn't take route, and vigilantes like Batman can be held accountable for their actions. The boat, however, is boarded by thieves who attempt to rob the rich people aboard the ship, and Nakano attempts to fight back before Nightwing arrives and clears the scene.[2]
However, Nakano is plagued by nightmares of the night his partner died, and is haunted by the memories. He wakes up after an intense nightmare, lashing out in anger, before he is comforted by his wife. It is here where it is revealed that Nakano's wife, Koyuki, is pregnant with their son.[3]
Nakano is approached by the Mirror, who, much like him, wishes to see masks be outlawed in Gotham, despite wearing a mask himself. The Mirror is a cult-like criminal who has been shaking up the anti-vigilante sentiment, inadvertently in Nakano's favor, and wants to work with Nakano to aid him in winning the election with a memory drive. Nakano shows his good-hearted intentions by outright refusing the Mirror's help, stating his discontent against working with the enemy, rather losing than be a corrupt mayor.[4]
To aid his lack of eye and remove the eyepatch, Nakano is due an appointment with a doctor to get a prosthetic eye, which he has cancelled twice and is encouraged by his wife to attend. He states that he has gotten used to wearing his eyepatch, comparing it to a mask where he can hide his real identity behind it, despite his beliefs, and finds comfort in it. Yet, he finds the eye he is given impressive, up until the point where he finds out Bruce Wayne had paid for him to get the upgraded prosthetic eye, demanding the eye be removed and smashing the eye to the ground in a panic, stating he refused to be controlled by the rich when he becomes mayor.[5]
Nakano wins the election with no influence by criminals or the rich, purely on his own terms. Despite this, he is shocked he won the election, and doesn't actually know how to proceed.[6]
A-Day
During the events of A-Day, Nakano was acting as both the Mayor and Commissioner, and had ordered his men to get contact with the guard inside, Sean Mahoney, however failing with Batman getting there first.[7] After this tragedy, Nakano began looking for a new commissioner, Jim Gordon refusing to work with Nakano due to his opinion on masks and the last one, Harvey Bullock, having handed in his badge. He settled on Renee Montoya, who he has known for a long time since being a patrolman. She reluctantly agrees, knowing Nakano has been known to be a good man.[8]
Saint Industries
Nakano is approached by Simon Saint who owns Saint Industries and is working with The Scarecrow to pitch the Magistrate to the Mayor, stating it will be a private organization that can help the Vigilante threat with specialized men dealing with the masks, while the police can focus on regular crimes. Nakano politely leaves, but comments on his dislike of Simon Saint, requesting that the entire operation be shut down. After this, the Scarecrow had planted a scarecrow in his bedroom to send a message of fear to the Mayor, with Saint's blessing. This is to scare Gotham, and Nakano, into agreeing to the Magistrate.[9] Nakano inevitably invites Simon Saint to a speech where Mahoney is present, despite Nakano's past dislike of Saint.[10]
Meanwhile, after Saint had gotten Hugo Strange taken out of his holding facility, Nakano gives a speech welcoming Strange to Gotham City, setting up the S.A.F.E program, also known as Secure and Fearless Engagement Program, where Strange is supposedly supposed to help the criminals and clowns in Gotham.[11] He later changes his opinion on Saint and the Magistrate, denouncing them as they get dismantled and arrested.
The Neighborhood
Nakano is giving a speech at a fundraising event for the fifth time that month pitching his vision to the elites of Gotham when the party is crashed by the Party Crashers, who rob everyone of their phones, and Nakano is rushed into a safe area with his staff, two unnamed girls, Hue Vile and Neil Betterman. However, he refuses to leave without ensuring his guests are safe, but this doesn't matter as Batman arrives at the scene and clears it out before the S.W.A.T team arrives, enraging Neil over how incompetent their security is. Unknowing to Nakano, later that evening, Neil murders one of the elites, and Bruce Wayne's neighbor, Sarah Worth.[12]
Mayor Nakano gets a call about Sarah Worth's disappearance by both the police and by her father. The Worth family is a powerful family who built half of Gotham, and Nakano needs connections, so he promises to find his daughter and bring her home safe. Ultimately, she is found dead with Batman analyzing her body, where he is the only suspect they have, and Batman appeared to injure an officer. Meanwhile at Nakano's office, Nakano scolds Neil for making mistakes in a report he wrote up, while Neil is nervous and shaking with an apparent headache, compared to his usual loud personality. Nakano assumes he is sick and had already attempted to send him home. Being refused, Nakano heads home, leaving Hue Vile and Neil alone. Hue comforts Neil and reassures him that he's okay and that he will be back in a minute, while Neil pleads with him, telling Hue that 'it' is in his head.[13] Neil later ends up dead from the Vile parasite.
Worth visits Nakano at his office to demand something is done about his daughter and that Batman and Bruce Wayne are punished for her disappearance, which he strongly refuses. This lead Worth to leave the office and peruse Batman alone and wrecking havoc in the city and sewage system. Bruce Wayne spends some time in prison before being released and finding his home in the Brownstones has been completely destroyed, going into hiding - Nakano is informed about the Vile Parasite, though in short terms without much data on it, a parasite which infects people and drives them mad and violent. This is while Vile is missing after having approached Worth to work with him and spread his violence parasite throughout the city. Hue Vile is the host of this Vile parasite and can control all of those who are infected by it, and with how useful of a weapon this is, he is apprehended by 'The Jury', which was Penguin and Worth among others, and used to infect Batman with the Vile parasite.[14] With Vile controlling Batman, one of the most powerful men in Gotham, he uses him for his own means like a puppet - It is Huntress who apprehends Vile by killing the host parasite that was inside of Hue Vile, her advantage being that she was also infected by the Vile parasite, but in a unique way that allowed her to see through the eyes of Vile's victims.
Fear State: Nakano's Nightmare
Fear State opens with Nakano meeting with Simon Saint at city hall with Simon continuing to push for The Magistrate to be continued and implemented further - This is where Nakano begins to see the flaws in The Magistrate by highlighting concerns he has with how The Magistrate operates and damages it has caused. Once he dismisses the meeting, his wife Koyuki calls him to urge him to come home and tries to reason with him from how he is putting too much pressure on himself and blaming himself for how Gotham is becoming. Nakano promises he will return home soon to distract the topic, and when he hangs up, Nero XIX enters the office and attempts to shoot the Mayor and take his place as 'king'. He escapes the building through a hidden hatch, only to be taken by unknown security, almost kidnapped before Batman enters the scene and grabs one of the men attacking Nakano - Nakano still ends up getting taken, where he is told today is the day he is going to die. Batman continues his pursuit by crashing the car Nakano was taken in. Nakano escapes, on the edge of passing out, into the sewers where he loses consciousness under the sewage. Batman dives after Nakano and saves him, but they get separated by an explosion. When Nakano surfaces from the sewage and awakens, he finds an egg sac filled with Vile parasites.[15]
Batman peruses after Nakano to try and find him in a sewage system that has collapsed from recent damage while Nero XIX and his men have taken city hall, and is being dealt with by Batwoman. When Batman finds Nakano in the sewage system through a collapsed wall, he urges the Mayor to let him help him out of the sewers, but the Mayor refuses out of fear that Batman's men were the ones who had attacked him at city hall, further showing how Chris does not trust Batman due to their past history, Nakano pointing out his misguided conclusion that Batman killed his partner. Batman tries to talk him down and reason with him, but Nakano gets distracted by the Vile parasite eggs hatching. They attack Nakano and burrow into his skin, painfully, while Batman breaks through the fallen rubble to help him, hundreds of the parasites climbing onto, and into, Nakano. Batman saves Nakano by shocking the water around him with a high voltage electric current that Batman notes is higher than what the human body should be able to handle and survive. The parasites die from the electricity, but Nakano seems to die with them, unconscious as Batman tries to do CPR and urges him to wake up, sounding distressed.[16]
Vile parasites escape the sewers into Gotham City's streets as Nakano wakes back up from Batman's help, Batman noting that he does not seem to be infected with the Vile parasite, and after a moment of panic on Nakano's end, Batman helps him to his feet and helps him walk. They make their way out of the sewers, finding a wall of a Vile parasite, with the spawn having combined and evolved into something much bigger. Nakano demands Batman tell him what he knows, and after some hesitation, Batman informs him of everything that has been happening with the Vile parasite and Worth. Nakano goes quiet as Batman points out the errors he's made as Mayor and seems to talk him out of some of his paranoid trauma. Once they make their way back to the surface, hoards of the Vile parasite are raging the streets and Batman urges him to leave and contact the Magistrate while Batman goes off alone to deal with a large Vile monster. Nakano, after the talk from Batman, refuses to sit back and watch, and runs after Batman to help him deal with the issue hands on. Batman is near death while fighting the Vile and shouts at Nakano to leave, but instead, Nakano picks up the shock gun that Batman had shocked him with before, and uses it on the monster. It is too small to deal real damage, however, because of the electric shock, Nightwing picks up from a Magistrate airbase he had taken control of that the electric hurts the Vile, and uses a much larger electric shock to kill the Vile monster. Batman grabs Nakano to get him out of the way of the second electric blast, saving his life again.[17]
After the Vile had been dealt with, Nakano is in his office talking to an assistant. He tells her that he has new information and that they are now working with someone new, meaning Batman, and that he wishes to have a talk with Deb Donavon about the city's infrastructure, and Nakano pledges to help Gotham in a better way. The Magistrate followed in being dismantled, Simon Saint and The Scarecrow being apprehended and arrested. While Scarecrow is being arrested, Nakano apologises to Montoya for everything that had happened due to his misjudgement.[18]
Shadows of The Bat: Arkham Tower
Nakano had been working on Arkham Tower as a replacement for Arkham Asylum in the centre of Gotham to house the criminally insane and to help everyday people with their mental health. After the events of Nakano's Nightmare, he is now more careful with how he implements things like this, and instructs Dr. Meridian to access the success of Arkham Tower during a trial period, and only report back to Nakano himself. Once Nakano goes home, we meet Leo Nakano, his and Koyuki's son which had been born during the time he had been Mayor with the babysitter looking after Leo, her saying Koyuki is upstairs and feeling sick - She is suffering from what seems to be depression under the stress of everything. Chris urges that he's been working on Arkham Tower to help the city, and that it could help Koyuki with how she is feeling, showing Chris's motivation in Arkham Tower's success lies in wanting his wife to feel better.[19]
One week into Arkham Tower, Chris and Koyuki attend a presentation by Dr. Wear, the lead doctor in Arkham Tower. While Koyuki urges them to head home back to Leo, Dr. Wear presents Roy Dowd, better known as Nero XIX, the man who attacked Nakano in his office, claiming that he is cured of his delusions and uncuffs him on stage. Chris seems disturbed by this, but Dr. Meridian says that the progress in Arkham Tower is remarkable[20] - The real reason for this is revealed to be Psycho-Pirate, who has been using Medusa masks to calm the patients in Arkham by controlling their emotions. It works for a while, tricking Nakano and everyone else into believing that Arkham Tower is completely functional, even using this power on Nakano to make him think the tower is even more successful and persuading him.[21] Due to his trust being manipulated like this, he trusts Arkham Tower enough to have his wife stay there to help her depression.
Day 24 of Arkham Tower, Psycho-Pirate's hold continues to slip as Arkham Tower gets more full and he struggles to stay awake and Nightwing finds him and relays this to the rest of the Bat family. Batwoman arrives at Nakano's office to warn him, but whilst doing so, Arkham Tower turns into a riot as Psycho-Prate fails to keep control over the tower.[22] Koyuki is trapped inside of the riot, trying to hide after texting her husband that something is wrong, and she gets attacked by a patient and saved by Huntress, who she believes dies from a stabbing in front of her and because of her. Psycho-Pirate grabs Koyuki and takes her somewhere safe and tells her everything that has been happening in Arkham Tower and why it is failing with Dr. Wear dead in the riot.[23] In a flashback, we find out that Koyuki's depression stems from when she was young with a 'dark cloud' hanging over her, feeling like she was always waiting for horrible things to happen. But after marrying Chris, these horrible things started coming true and she couldn't stay calm and constantly feared for the worst, even when Chris came home safe.[24]
Task Force Z
We see Nakano talking to an unknown man, later revealed to be Crispin, who is then further revealed to be Two-Face, shouting at this man about how Task Force Z had been leaked to the press from bodies disappearing. They name it Project Halperin, which Nakano seemed to have funded and covered for. It is currently unknown why Nakano backed this project.
Powers and Abilities
Abilities
- Leadership: Having successfully become Mayor of Gotham and lead both the Police and his own taskforce, he has shown leadership skills.
- Political Science
- Law
- Markmanship: After being a GCPD officer, Nakano knows how to use guns.
Other Characteristics
- Missing Eye: Nakano lost his left eye during the Joker War.
- PTSD: Nakano shows symptoms of PTSD back to when he lost his left eye and his partner, Bart, and it makes him irrational.
Paraphernalia
Weapons
- Handgun
Trivia
- After meeting Simon Saint, he describes the feeling of something scratching at the back of his skull - the same feeling Batman describes in relation to fear toxin.[9]
- Nakano lost his partner Bart and his left eye on Bruce Wayne's birthday.[1]
- In an article written by Deb Donavon, a photograph of Nakano and his partner Bart are shown at an unknown location, likely outside of Gotham, in uniform similar to a soldiers. It is possible Nakano and Bart met whilst enlisted in the army.[25]
Related
- 53 Appearances of Christopher Nakano (Prime Earth)
- 5 Images featuring Christopher Nakano (Prime Earth)
- 3 Quotations by or about Christopher Nakano (Prime Earth)
- Character Gallery: Christopher Nakano (Prime Earth)
Footnotes
- ↑ 1.0 1.1 Detective Comics #1027
- ↑ Detective Comics #1029
- ↑ Detective Comics #1030
- ↑ Detective Comics #1031
- ↑ Detective Comics #1032
- ↑ Detective Comics #1033
- ↑ Infinite Frontier #0
- ↑ The Next Batman: Second Son #2
- ↑ 9.0 9.1 Batman (Volume 3) #106
- ↑ Batman (Volume 3) #107
- ↑ Harley Quinn (Volume 4) #2
- ↑ Detective Comics #1034
- ↑ Detective Comics #1035
- ↑ Detective Comics #1041
- ↑ Detective Comics #1043
- ↑ Detective Comics #1044
- ↑ Detective Comics #1045
- ↑ Batman: Fear State: Omega #1
- ↑ Detective Comics #1046
- ↑ Detective Comics #1047
- ↑ Detective Comics #1051
- ↑ Detective Comics #1054
- ↑ Detective Comics #1055
- ↑ Detective Comics #1056
- ↑ Detective Comics #1037
  This character is or was an officer of, or held a title in the Gotham City Police Department, in any of its various incarnations. This template will automatically categorize articles that include it into the "GCPD members" and "Police Officers" categories. |
This article needs maintenance and organization, as it may have become cluttered or confusing. Its heart is in a good place, it's just a little special. Won't you please help out an article in need? This template will categorize articles that include it into the Clean Up task category.