Batman: Mr. Freeze / Characters

Mr. Freeze

You're as cold as ice. You're willing to sacrifice our love...

Real Name: Dr. Victor Fries

Known Aliases: Mr. Zero

First Appearance: Batman #121 (February 1959)

"Think of it, Batman. To never again walk on a summer's day with the hot wind in your face and a warm hand to hold. Oh, yes…I’d kill for that.”

Victor Fries was once a great scientist, who was accidentally exposed to some chemicals and was forever changed. While this sort of thing had been beneficial to The Flash, it ruined Fries' body physiology and he cannot survive for very long in high temperatures (even being in room temperature would eventually kill him). Being forced to create a suit to keep him cool, Fries eventually turned to crime, becoming the sinister Mr. Freeze.

That was all there was to the original Mr. Freeze (who actually debuted as Mr. Zero). He was just the gimmicky cold themed villain to fight and was eventually sent to Comic Book Limbo (where Animal Man actually met him!). Then Batman: The Animated Series gave him a tragic backstory and personality, turning him into an Anti-Villain.

Nora Fries, wife of Victor, contracted a rare disease, of which there was no cure. Victor, wanting to save his wife, put her in cryo-stasis. Unfortunately, Fries' boss, Ferris Boyle tried to pull the plug on Nora and knocks Victor into some chemicals and... yeah. Later, when Mr. Freeze tried to get revenge on Boyle, he was foiled by Batman and Nora's capsule was destroyed, killing her. Swearing revenge on Batman, he escapes. Although, like the Penguin, he is not truly insane, whenever Freeze is captured and taken into custody, he is always taken to Arkham Asylum, as it is the only place where he won't die due to the temperature while in custody (his room being essentially a remodeled meat locker).

In recent history, Freeze managed to revive his wife with one of Ra's Al Ghul's Lazarus Pits in exchange for building a machine to capture Cassandra Cain. However, due to Nora being dead for so long, she gains superpowers from the pit. She is pissed off at her husband and left him becoming the villain Lazara. Poor, poor Victor.

The New 52 reboot made a major alteration to Freeze's backstory. After the changes to the timeline, Victor is no longer married. Although he still seeks to awaken and cure Nora, he's actually totally deluded; Nora was cryogenically preserved long before Fries was even born. As Batman rather pointedly deconstructs, Freeze doesn't really care about Nora as a person, she just makes a perfect figurehead for his obsession with ice and cold.

DC Rebirth, specifically All-Star Batman, undid the changes the New 52 made to Fries backstory, with Nora once more being his wife.

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Mr. Freeze in Adaptations

Comic Books

Batman

Film

Batman & Robin - Played by Arnold Schwarzenegger.

Live-Action Television

Batman (1966) - Played by invokedthree actors: George Sanders, Otto Preminger and Eli Wallach.
Gotham - Played by Nathan Darrow.

Video Games

Batman: Vengeance
LEGO Batman
Batman: Arkham Series - Voiced by Maurice LaMarche.
Batman: The Telltale Series - Voiced by Matthew Mercer
DC Universe Online
Injustice 2 - Voiced by Jim Pirri

Western Animation

The New Adventures of Batman
DC Animated Universe - Voiced by Michael Ansara.
The Batman - Voiced by Clancy Brown
Batman: The Brave and the Bold - Voiced by John DiMaggio
Young Justice - Voiced by Keith Szarabajka
Justice League Action - Voiced by Peter Stormare
The LEGO Batman Movie - Voiced by David Burrows
Batman Unlimited: Mechs Vs. Mutants - Voiced by Oded Fehr
Harley Quinn (2019) - Voiced by Alfred Molina
Batwheels - Voiced by Regi Davis - An ice-themed supervillain with a mechanical suit

Mr. Freeze provides examples of the following tropes:

A-I

Abusive Parents: The Mr. Freeze graphic novel by Paul Dini shows an origin in which Victor's father was a violent control freak.
Adaptational Badass: Post-Crisis onward, Mr. Freeze has been involved in larger plots and events and has proven to be just as smart as he is strong, even defeating Batman on a few occasions and he's conducted some grand plans that have elevated him to a world-class threat, provided he really does lose himself to despair and misanthropy in worst-case scenarios.
Adaptational Hairstyle Change: He is traditionally depicted as bald, but his incarnations in the New 52 and the 2019 Harley Quinn cartoon depict him with a mohawk.
Adaptational Heroism: In Batman The Animated Series, Arkham Knight and a few more portrayals, he is a jaded man trying to save his wife, but has no morals for it, instead of being a stereotypical Mad Scientist like in Batman and Robin (though he still wished to save his wife in it), and the Adam West series.
Adaptational Nationality: Mr. Freeze's national origin is rarely consistent from one portrayal to the next; Michael Ansara, Maurice LaMarche, and Nathan Darrow used generic American dialects for their versions of the character; George Sanders, Eli Wallach, Matthew Mercer, and Jim Pirri affected German accents in their portrayals, Otto Preminger and Arnold Schwarzenegger used their natural Austrian accents, Oded Fehr and Peter Stormare also used their natural accents (Israeli and Swedish, respectively), and Alfred Molina used a Russian accent.
Adaptational Sympathy: The most famous example of this trope, Freeze was rewritten from a man with no backstory and an ice-themed gimmick to a Tragic Villain who became the way he was because he was trying to save his dying wife. All he got from it was being trapped in a refrigerator suit, left to believe Nora was taken from him, while the man responsible initially got off scot-free.
Adaptational Villainy: The New 52 version of Freeze is far less sympathetic than most other incarnations of him post-BTAS, being a deluded stalker who was never even married to Nora, to begin with - as Batman points out, he's merely projecting his own twisted desire for love and obsession with the cold onto her. This version of the character has since been retconned out of history after a vocal backlash from fans of the character's more sympathetic interpretation.
Adapted Out: Ferris Boyle is the man responsible for the modern Mr. Freeze's Start of Darkness in the animated series and the Post-Crisis era. However, come the New 52 era, he's no longer included and it's Bruce Wayne this time who's the stand-in for Ferris when he confronts Victor in the lab incident that led to his transformation.
A Day in the Limelight: An issue of Legends Of The Dark Knight has him narrating a retelling of his own origin.
Affably Evil: On a good day, Mr. Freeze is one of the more hospitable and polite foes in Batman's ever-growing list of enemies, being cordial and cooperative as well as disavowing needless callousness. It should be noted that he was once a good man plagued by an unfortunate past and heavy misfortune and thus, he isn't inherently evil. Of course, his affability can go right out the window in case his despair and misanthropy flare up.
Alien Blood: As a result of his accident, he is now literally cold-blooded, which would be downright bizarre for any mammal let alone human.
Amazing Technicolor Population: Freeze is frequently drawn with blue skin, Depending on the Artist. However, it's unclear whether his blue skin was caused by his Freak Lab Accident, simply a reflection of his helmet, or both.
An Ice Person:
- Unlike most examples, his powers don't come naturally. Instead, he has to use his gun (which may or may not be linked to his sub-zero body temperature) to achieve this. Although his condition would kill him in a room-temperature environment, he can walk around openly and quite comfortably in the frigid polar regions.
- Thanks to shenanigans courtesy of The Batman Who Laughs delivering him a special Joker Card, Mr. Freeze gains the ability to actually use cryomancy under his own free will and is assigned to defend a base, resulting in him battling against a couple of heroes. He would be depowered after being defeated though.
An Ice Suit: His armor's main purpose is to provide him with internal cooling that is necessary to keep his body functional. Without it, exposure to even the most normal temperature would prove fatal to Victor.
Anti-Villain: Depending on the Writer sometimes, but he's one of the greatest examples of a Type II of all times. His primary motivation is to develop or find a medicine that could cure his cryogenic wife who has a rare incurable disease and is placed in stasis to halt the disease's progress, but given his past experience of dealing with people and being mistreated most of the time, he has a misanthropic, nihilistic streak.
Attack Its Weak Point: His helmet is more fragile than the rest of his suit, and he needs it to survive.
Bad People Abuse Animals: As a child, he had a hobby of freezing animals, though this was more a coping mechanism to ease himself from the clutches of his Control Freak of a father than showing signs of sociopathy.
Badass Bookworm: He was an esteemed researcher and scientist who specialized in cryogenics. Since he became Mr. Freeze, he has put his occupational skills to very effective and terrifying use and is one of the more notable members of Batman's rogues gallery for a reason.
Bald of Evil: The transformation process apparently caused all his hair to fall out.
Be Careful What You Wish For: At one point during Post-Crisis, he decides to use a Lazarus Pit to resurrect Nora. He gets his wish... only for Nora to be immediately terrified and opposed to Victor and attack him with pyrokinetic powers. Dramatic Irony, indeed.
Blue Means Cold: Fitting for his association with ice, Victor is always depicted with a bluish-frosty-white color scheme.
Boisterous Bruiser: A literal man of ice who carries within him a lot of pent-up passion and anguish that he is close to releasing on any notice as well as a powerful combatant whose cryogenic suit gives him augmented strength that he uses to its fullest advantage.
Breakout Villain: One of the most standout examples among Batman's Rogues Gallery. Originally he was nothing more than an unremarkable villain with an ice gimmick until Batman: The Animated Series reimagined him as a Tragic Villain to wide acclaim. Since then he's gradually grown in popularity and now sits alongside Two-Face, the Riddler, and the Joker as one of Batman's most iconic enemies.
Clingy Costume: His cryonic suit he wears almost all the time is iconic for a reason; he is entirely dependent on his as the suit is built to regulate Mr. Freeze's body temperature and to keep it cool so long as he is wearing it. If he's out of the suit, he'll die quickly as his frozen physiology is unable to cope with regular body temperature.
Create Your Own Villain: In the New 52, the executive who shut down Victor's research and unwittingly exposed him to the chemicals that made him dependent on sub-zero temperatures... was Bruce Wayne.
Cold Ham: It's only natural that he makes a fine example of this in most incarnations, with one foot in pompous madman and the other in tortured anti-villain, and a love for grim humor to round things out.
Control Freak: Sometime after reviving her and converting her into Mrs. Freeze, Nora accuses her husband of being this, citing that she's trying to take control of her life, despite Victor's primary motivation being that he doesn't want either of them, but especially her, to be involved in a life of crime any longer. Unfortunately, this serves as a build-up for Nora to betray Victor later on.
Crusading Widower: His wife, Nora, being placed in cryokinetic stasis after being diagnosed with cancer is the main reason why Mr. Freeze is a villain and him fighting against anyone who gets in his way in the first place. To him, he will not stop until he can finally be reunited with his love.
Cursed with Awesome: Freeze's condition means that room temperatures will kill him. However, he can survive without his suit in bitterly cold regions that would kill ordinary humans. Arguably more Blessed with Suck, since super-cold environments are comparatively rare/temporarily limited and usually very barren, whereas the world where all the people live is out to kill him.
- One of the Batman vs. Predator minis had a very interesting spin on this: because of his complete lack of body heat, he can hide from the Predators' thermal vision with absolutely no effort.
Cut Lex Luthor a Check: He is a very intelligent and capable scientist and his knowledge in cryogenics means he could likely create and patent a lot of creations based on that field. Unfortunately, all that money, resources, and talent is used in the name of claiming vengeance against whoever wronged Victor or committing one dangerous act after another in the hopes of finding a cure for Nora. That said, Victor already had a pessimistic view of humanity long before he even met Nora and with him being a misanthrope, it's most likely he has no reason to want to use his talents for legitimate purposes and gains.
Cyborg: Maybe. It's hard to tell. He definitely was a normal human before the lab accident (which note did not involve robotics in any way), but various depictions since then have shown him surviving being decapitated or blown up, even when explicitly reduced to just a (still-talking) head.
Dark and Troubled Past: Sure he had a morbid fascination with taking animals and freezing them up to see how they would react and cope, but he did this because he needed an outlet to relieve his tension from his parents who treated him terribly. When they found out what he was doing, they dropped him off at a boarding school and promptly cut off all contact with their son, a fact that he discovered during the holidays when kids his age were going back to their parents. This left him with crippling self-esteem and feeling that he didn't really matter to the world. Any wonder why he turned out to be a misanthropic nihilist?
Deadpan Snarker: Rivals Batman on this front in his more sedate moments, often at the expense of any other villains he's teamed up with at the moment. Fittingly enough, most of his snarks consist of ice-related puns.
Determinator: No matter what he's been through, who gets in his way, and whoever tries to mess around with him, Mr. Freeze will save his wife, and nobody is going to stop him from accomplishing reuniting with his lost love.
Detrimental Determination: Even in comparison to other members of Batman's rogues gallery, he is incredibly one-track-minded. Victor has dedicated and defined himself to saving Nora in such a deep and compulsive way that it has dominated his life and warped his perspective on humanity as well as his own mental well-being. He'll destroy the world to save his life and he couldn't care less about whether he would die or be hated more by either heroes or villains alike.
Downer Ending: Every instance where he finally gains the means to revive and cure Nora ends badly for him, and only rarely goes well for Nora, if even that. He's just never allowed to catch a break.
Dramatic Irony: When he does get to restore Nora to a healthy state, she ends up turning against her husband, ultimately making his ambitions and goals even more tragic.
- In Post-Crisis, Nora is horrified and rattled at seeing Victor after being resurrected by a Lazarus Pit. She proceeds to attack her husband with her newfound pyrokinetic powers before fleeing the scene.
- In Rebirth, Victor is forced to use the same phenomena he went through to cure Nora of her ailment, though this causes her skin to grow blue, become more irate, confrontational, and aggressive, and take on the moniker of Mrs. Freeze. They become a criminal couple, but while Victor grows weary and simply wants to retire and have a happy life with his wife, Nora's sanity begins to slip and she starts to butt heads against her husband. It culminates with Nora betraying Victor twice later on and rendering him to be put in the same cryogenic state by Batman, only that he doesn't have someone who wants to cure him.
Dude, Where's My Respect?: He earned a doctorate, dammit, no one should be calling him Mister Freeze.
Et Tu, Brute?: He ends up on the receiving end from his wife, of all people, during Cold Dark World. Naturally, he really doesn't take it well.
Even Evil Has Loved Ones: Possibly one of the most famous examples of this in comic history - Victor and Nora truly loved one another, and he will do anything and everything he can to save her in the present. He's the current trope page image for a very good reason.
Evil Counterpart: A good argument can be made with him being one to Batman. Both were once esteemed people who were struck by tragedy and have since come to be defined by it, plus they are experts in scientific fields. The loss of a loved one (parents for Batman, wife for Mr. Freeze) is a major motivation for the two of them. However, Bruce cites the death of his parents as why he wants to improve Gotham and has dedicated his cause to justice, even after going through several hardships and reaffirming his own humanity for it. On the other hand, Victor went through hardships before he met Nora and had a cynical view of humanity even before becoming a villain. Once he became Mr. Freeze, the loss of his wife burdened him so much that he dedicated his life to saving her and not caring about the consequences of his actions. As far as he is concerned, Gotham can die out so long as Nora gets to live.
Evil Genius: He was a scientist who specialized in cryogenics and the entirety of his powers and equipment are based upon his scientific creations. The "Evil" part of the trope is downplayed in that he is more amoral and desperate than malicious, though they can be played straight whenever he's having a really bad day.
Evil Is Deathly Cold: He's more amoral, desperate, and unfettered than evil, but he is a villain who uses cryokinetic gadgets and tools, and is a very dangerous and tough foe to come across.
Evil Virtues: Creativity, Decisiveness, Determination, Honor, Passion, Resourcefulness, Respect, Vigilance, and most importantly, Love. For a villain defined by loss and rage, Mr. Freeze has a lot of virtues he's embodied over the years and these have proven a reason why he's one of Batman's most persistent and formidable foes. After all, even a villain can live by the rule that "there is no stronger emotion than love".
Find the Cure!: His ultimate goal is a comparatively mundane one in comparison to other villains and furthering his nature as a Tragic Villain. Simply put, Mr. Freeze wants to either find or create a cure for MacGregor's Syndrome, a fatal disease which is what Nora has and is the reason why is put in cryogenic sleep.
Foil:
- He and The Joker have some similarities; they're both misanthropic nihilists who justify their selfishness based on that and have no qualms about destroying Gotham City and the world if it means gaining something out of it. Both are also driven to insanity and resort to extreme measures to accomplish their tasks no matter what. However, despite his grief and rage, Mr. Freeze has a comprehensive motive, can be reasoned with, and only really fights the Batfamily because of them getting in his way. He's also one of the more sympathetic enemies Batman goes up against and can be nice on a good day. The Joker, on the other hand, is utterly incomprehensible in both motive and personality, makes it a point to antagonize the Batfamily as much as he can, and is an unrepentingly maniacal psychopath.
- Of course, there is Mr. Freeze and Captain Cold. Using ice-themed guns aside^note, both are criminals who had Abusive Parents to deal with in their childhood that shaped their perspectives on life and they're fiercely protective of a loved one (wife for Victor, sister for Snart). Both also have a strange code of honor and have a complex dynamic with their main enemy, with The Flash seeing Cold as a Friendly Enemy most of the time while Batman is sympathetic to Mr. Freeze's angst and tragedy. However, Snart is mainly a career criminal who sticks to robbing banks as that's what he's best at and enforces standards on his fellow Rogues to make sure they don't turn out too evil or catch too much attention from other superheroes. Victor has more personal motivations but is a bit too ambitious about his plans to the point where he would potentially endanger the world if it meant Nora could be saved.
Freak Lab Accident: Something that every version of him has in common. During a scuffle against Ferris Boyle, Victor was knocked into one of his cryogenic creations. This caused a mutation in his body that altered its physiology to be icy, complete with literal cold blood. This is the last straw that would eventually see Victor becoming the infamous Mr. Freeze.
Freeze Ray: The exact size and shape of Freeze's Freeze Gun has varied wildly over the years; when it first debuted, it looked more like a teakettle than anything. Since then, it's been portrayed as everything from the standard futuristic pistol design to a massive two-handed cannon connected to a backpack to a tiny, unassuming-looking device mounted on the wrist of his armor.
Freudian Excuse: A massive one; he was a brilliant scientist with a loving wife and a hopeful future. Then Nora was diagnosed with an incurable disease and Victor became desperate to cure her, only for whatever research and pleas he made to be ridiculed and denied by his superior, Ferris Boyle. Then Ferries tried to release Nora as revenge for being left in debt due to Victor secretly conducting research to preserve Nora's life. The two fought, resulting in Victor being knocked into his own cryogenics and forever changing him into the bitter, hateful misanthrope that needs a suit of ice to survive and stopping at nothing to save Nora's life.
Freudian Excuse Is No Excuse: The Batfamily is aware of why Mr. Freeze became the way he is and greatly sympathizes with him. If anything, they want to help him cure and restore Nora to finally give him the happiness he lost. Unfortunately, Victor doesn't want to be pitied and denies whatever help and advice the Batfamily can offer in favor of causing more destruction and chaos in his maddened attempt to either find a cure for Nora and/or spite the world for causing him misery. Of course, the Batfamily acknowledges that Victor needs to be stopped before he can cause further damage to others, regardless of his motivations and tragedy.
Genius Bruiser: He's an absolute genius, and his suit enhances his strength to superhuman levels.
Happily Married: He and Nora are typically portrayed as both best friends and deeply in love, at least before her disease struck. This is sadly subverted in the Cold Dark World storyline where, despite being happy together after being reunited and working as an Outlaw Couple, Nora begins to oppose Victor's desire to just retire and retreat to a more comfortable life. She ends up betraying him before retreating to Canada while Victor ends up in the same predicament as Nora did; cryogenically frozen and locked up.
Harmless Freezing: Sometimes, in cases where he's not in the mood to kill anyone. Most of the time, he does kill whoever he freezes. It's said that Mr. Freeze can willingly alter how his freeze gun can work depending on how he's feeling; if he's generous or he needs to minimize damage in an objective, freezing someone isn't going to kill them. If he's having a shitty day, prepared to be shattered into a million pieces once you're shot.
Healthcare Motivation: His main motivator for villainy is his desire to preserve and eventually revive his wife Nora, whom he was forced to place in cryogenic suspension to stop her from dying from a terminal illness.
Heartbroken Badass: This is why he's even a villain in the first place; he's a heartbroken man who has to endure being seen as a failure, cannot be with his wife as she's placed in cryostasis, and the world generally seems to be against him almost all the time.
Heroic Self-Deprecation: A villainous inversion and a major part of his Freudian Excuse of why he's a nihilist. Because his parents abandoned him and he learned about that during the holidays, Victor convinced himself that he was worthless and nobody really cared about him regardless of his intellectual talent. It wasn't until he met Nora that he was able to break out of his self-defeating mindset.
Human Popsicle: Did this to his wife, pre-New 52 — afterwards, he fell in love with Nora specifically because she is on. He's kind of a walking, talking, killing one himself.
Hurricane of Puns: In Batman (1966) and Batman & Robin, he makes a blizzard of puns.
Hypocrite: After years worth of stories based on the tragic Nora-centric DCAU blueprint created for him, Freeze has inevitably turned into this. He hates Ferris Boyle for ruining his life and pulling the plug on Nora but in both the Post-Crisis and New 52/Rebirth eras, Freeze himself has gone to ruin lives on a scale his former employer can't compete with anymore, including killing, kidnapping, and/or experimenting on women who share similarities with Nora.
Icy Blue Eyes: Appropriately enough, he has blue eyes and they're just as icy as the man himself.
Immortality Seeker: Obviously not Victor himself, but a somewhat recurring element is people attracted to Freeze's condition for the sake of immortality. It never goes well for them.
- A Pre-Crisis story has Freeze experimenting on aging citizens as a way to grant his new lover the same icy life he has. The process inevitably fails, leaving the unlucky subjects as brain-dead "ice zombies". Even worse, his lover is actually plotting to betray and murder Victor once she's acquired his un-aging form.
It's All About Me: On his worst days he falls headlong into this, either robbing people blind to fund his research/planning to use them as test subjects because the recovery of his wife justifies anything he does to achieve it, or destroying people's lives and making them miserable because if he can't be happy, no one can be happy.

J-Z

Jerkass: He's got quite the caustic and mean-spirited attitude. Nora is the only person he shows any sort of affection for, but he's venomously condescending and pessimistic to everyone around him, even fellow allies. Then again, he was treated like shit since childhood and he doesn't have a good opinion about humanity either way.
A Lighter Shade of Black:
- Mr. Freeze may be a ruthless villain and he may end up working alongside the likes of Penguin, Riddler, and Black Mask, but with a combination of having sympathetic motives and having some standards and sense of honor, he comes off as one of the more reasonable and likable villains Batman tends to deal with, not to mention Freeze's difficulty in working alongside Batman's other enemies may stem from him just not wanting to do crimes for the sake of it.
- Oddly enough, he serves as this to his wife, Nora, during the Cold Dark World story arc. Though the two are initially happy to be together and commit some robberies, he eventually decides that he's gotten weary of being a criminal and wants to retire. His wife, on the other hand, wants to continue with her life of crime, causing the two to have a conflict against each other, with Victor being the more sympathetic party.
Literally Shattered Lives: He invokes this trope with objects just as much as with people.
Long-Lived: Due to his body being frozen, he ages much slower.
Lost in Imitation: With the exception of the one in the Adam West show and The Batman version (which uses his original characterization, though references his later look), every version of Freeze draws from the DC Animated Universe one. This is partially because the comics themselves adopted the DCAU version as his official backstory.
The Lost Lenore: Nora is perhaps one of the best examples in comic books.
Love Makes You Evil: Especially when the one you loved is dead and even before that, he was mistreated and assaulted for even trying to save his life. In short, Victor wants to get back at the world, let alone Gotham City, if he cannot be reunited with his wife.
Mad Scientist: He's a master of cryogenics and cybernetics, creating his mechanized life-support suit and his trademark Freeze Ray himself, but he uses his genius to help in his crimes.
Matricide: In the New 52 version. He became obsessed with the ice after his mother fell through thin ice and nearly died from the cold. The following winter, he led her back to the same spot and pushed her through deliberately. This time, she didn't survive.
Misanthrope Supreme: Sometimes depicted as such to further emphasize his cold and venomous perspective on life. Given his wife's sudden illness and his being denied, mistreated, and attacked for trying to save her, only to nearly come to death's door himself, it's little wonder Victor became hateful of humanity as a whole.
Necromantic: Not at first, since his wife was technically still alive, but after her death, he still did everything he did out of his love for her.
No-Holds-Barred Beatdown: He ends up on the receiving end of one from Batman after the latter was left heartbroken by Catwoman leaving him at the altar. Already angry and embittered, Batman discovers that Mr. Freeze murdered three women and promptly beat him up to a bloody pulp upon encountering him. Except it turns out that Victor never actually murdered the women, and he hadn't even touched his freezing ray for days. When Bruce finds out about this, he is left appalled by his actions and works in court to try to give Victor a Not Guilty verdict.
Not So Stoic: While he's generally aloof and quiet, his actions and his motivations offer a very different story. While Mr. Freeze isn't exactly the most vocal person, he lets his actions dictate his motives and personality and with what's known about him, he's an incredibly bitter and hateful person who has a tendency to act out of rage and spite. It's a very jarring contrast to how he likes to present himself like.
Only Sane Man: Usually shares this role with Penguin. He goes to Arkham not because he's insane, but because they're the only place that can accommodate him.
- A notable exception is his appearance in City of Crime, in which he is a delusional psychotic. Penguin even remarks that he hates working with crazy "freaks" like Mr. Freeze.
- Another exception is the New 52 incarnation, who is delusional and obsessive.
Outlaw Couple: He and Nora end up becoming this once the latter becomes Mrs. Freeze and the two of them have a brief stint as robbers before the two end up having conflicting desires with Victor wanting to retire from crime while Nora wants to keep going, having just grown accustomed to her newfound career and interest as a supervillain.
Personality Powers: Mr. Freeze is a cold, unfeeling, and reserved individual... for the most part. Internally, he is a raging blizzard of hate and bitterness who wants to get back at the world.
Palette Swap: For Injustice 2, he is a Premier Skin to Captain Cold.
Parental Abandonment: In Post-Crisis, his parents sent him to a boarding school so that he could be "disciplined" better. When the holidays came, he was shocked to discover that his parents had outright ditched him and wanted nothing to do with him. Victor never saw his parents ever again.
Perpetual Frowner: Frowning is his most common facial expression and there usually isn't a moment where his face looks glum and despondent. Then again, this is a guy who lost his wife to a disease and is constantly being beaten down by the world to the point where he has low expectations in just about anything.
Powered Armor: Most of the time, he'll be wearing a suit of robotic armor that not only channels his ice powers and stabilizes his temperature but also grants him super strength to take on Batman.
Psycho for Hire: Often shows up as a mercenary in stories not centered around his personal goals, hired by a crime lord to do some damage and/or attack Batman. Freeze is known to be difficult to work with- the exact mix varies between stories, but generally, a hazy mix of Punch-Clock Villain who might quit when a gig has become more trouble than he's getting paid to deal with, a Consummate Professional easily offended by incompetence or attempts to deceive him, and an Unfettered nihilist who might kill everyone involved if it was the simplest way to accomplish the given task.
Pungeon Master: A hail of ice and winter-related puns frost his appearances.
Red Eyes, Take Warning: While his eyes are actually, blue, he's more commonly associated with having bright red goggles that give him a more menacing appearance.
Reimagining the Artifact: When he made his debut, he was simply an average villain with basic motivations to beat Batman and get some cash to flaunt his superiority and his equipment was merely a gimmick. Then Batman: The Animated Series came around with a very different interpretation of Mr. Freeze that won such acclaim that this iteration would become the defining one for the character as a whole, being integrated into Post-Crisis and turning his wife into being his biggest motivator. Even the suit and freeze gun have undergone such, going from being a gimmick to a major factor in his characterization.
Ret-Canon: After the animated episode won an Emmy, DC Comics hastily adapted Freeze's new origin into the comics as well. The New 52 made another retcanon to invalidate his DCAU origin, itself undone in Rebirth, much to the relief of fans of the tragic origin and motivations.
Roaring Rampage of Revenge: On Boyle at first. His later career is supposedly one targeted towards Batman, and to a lesser extent, the rest of Gotham. Nowadays, if saving Nora isn't his main goal, then Mr. Freeze is focusing on fulfilling his vengeance towards whoever wronged him, which unfortunately often includes Batman and Gotham City.
Scary Impractical Armor: He wears a cryogenic suit that has a stocky physique and grants him some degree of superhuman strength. That said, he needs the suit as regular body temperature is lethal to him. Overall, it seems to be a case of the armor being less "impractical" and more "necessary yet debilitating at the same time".
Seeks Another's Resurrection: The core of most of Victor's modern iterations, but even his most sympathetic portrayals frequently note an element of selfish delusion to the situation- a belief that by reviving her, all of his actions will have been justified and his suffering will end.
Shadow Archetype: Victor Fries represents what Bruce Wayne could potentially become if he lets the death and loss of his loved ones completely overtake his better morals and judgment and chooses to enact disproportionate vengeance for the sake of expressing his own misery towards others.
Sinister Shades: He's usually seen with red goggles.
The Stoic: Befitting of a character who is themed around ice, Victor is very reserved and soft-spoken, with the most he comes to expressing himself being blunt remarks. This helps with him being the giver of various sarcastic remarks, often with ice-related puns and even those do little to deter his general disposition. That said, given his past and his viewpoint on life, he's internally incredibly chaotic and his body language shows a lot of rage.
Straw Nihilist: On his worst days. In Mr. Freeze's perspective, if Nora can't be saved, then life is meaningless and the world can be damned for all that matters.
Sympathy for the Devil: Victor is one of the most sympathetic members of Batman's rogues gallery and while the two have fought countless times, the Caped Crusader never harbors any ill will towards him and makes it clear that Mr. Freeze is just as much of a victim to Gotham's corruption and strife as he himself is.. Of course, Batman has tried to help Victor on a few occasions, though those never tend to last.
Teeth-Clenched Teamwork: He's known to be notoriously hard to work with and employ under by other criminals and supervillains. Even Black Mask comments about this during Under the Hood. When Roman wants Victor to deal with his dirty work regarding his control over Gotham City, the latter complies... but only if he's given a suit upgrade. Until that happens, Mr. Freeze kills a number of Black Mask's henchmen until the latter gives in and gives the former the upgrades he asked for. Even then, Victor ends up defying much of Roman's objectives and does things his own way, though Roman himself isn't too fazed by it.
Tin Man: Although he has a very stone-faced and usually unfazed expression, he's actually incredibly emotional as his actions and motivations give a good visualization of just what kind of person he is.
Tragic Ice Character: Often characterized as an Anti-Villain who was mutated into An Ice Person by a Freak Lab Accident, and is motivated to villainy by his desire to preserve and revive his wife Nora, whom he was forced to place into cryogenic suspension to prevent her from dying from an incurable disease.
Tragic Villain: A depressed scientist desperate to save his wife's life before it's too late, and is forced to live in coldness, never getting attached to warmth due to the incident by one specific person. He also holds the page image.
Tranquil Fury: He's a vicious and borderline destructive man who has a lot of hate, spite, and rage bottled up in him. Most of the time, he expresses it without having to raise his voice much, which makes him all the more... chilling.
Trauma Conga Line: Let's see... his parents treated him like shit which forced him to perform freezing experiments on animals to curb his frustrations, is sent to boarding school and learns that his parents have completely ditched him, gets a bright spot with marrying a loving wife, only for the said wife to be diagnosed with cancer and he's forced to place her in cryonic stasis to keep her alive, then his superior refuses to offer funds to either develop or find a cure, then said superior attacked him one day and he's eventually thrown into his own cryonics, which turns him into an ice man who literally can't survive without being in freezing temperatures and has to be placed in a suit to keep him alive. In short, Victor Fries had a really really shitty life.
The Unfettered: When it comes to saving Nora, Victor will do anything to make that happen. He doesn't care if he has to freeze a bunch of innocent people, cause massive property damage, herald a gigantic blizzard, or even put the world at risk, if it means a cure could be made for his wife, he will unhesitantly take that risk.
Villain Team-Up: He has seen some days teaming up with Batman's other adversaries in plans to take down the Caped Crusader. Though given their differing priorities and motivations, Freeze ends up butting heads with his supposed collaborators rather often. A notable one is in Under the Hood where he's employed by Black Mask and though they have very differing priorities, their relationship remains rather professional, though Freeze would eventually ditch Roman later on.
Well-Intentioned Extremist: Sure Freeze is fine with freezing Gotham City and killing innocent people, sub-zero suit and all, but his ultimate end goal (and top priority) is to both save and reunite with his beloved wife Nora and find a cure for his disease.
Woobie, Destroyer of Worlds: The version of him created from the DCAU and which became his main comics persona prior to (and following) the New 52. Freeze was made into a person biologically incompatible with human warmth, and all he wants is to restore his wife to full health, which is what he was trying to do before he was transformed. Even if he succeeds, he'll never be able to hold her again, as the temperature difference would kill them both.

Characters / Batman: Mr. Freeze
aka: Mr Freeze

Mr. Freeze

Real Name: Dr. Victor Fries

Known Aliases: Mr. Zero

First Appearance: Batman #121 (February 1959)

Mr. Freeze provides examples of the following tropes:

Alternative Title(s): Mr Freeze

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Characters / Batman: Mr. Freeze aka: Mr Freeze

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Mr. Freeze

Real Name: Dr. Victor Fries

Known Aliases: Mr. Zero

First Appearance: Batman #121 (February 1959)

Mr. Freeze provides examples of the following tropes:

Alternative Title(s): Mr Freeze

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Characters / Batman: Mr. Freeze
aka: Mr Freeze