The See-through Slasher was a male Yautja hunter and the champion of a clan that came to Gotham City in the 1991 DC Comics and Dark Horse miniseries Batman vs. Predator. He stalked the city's strongest fighters and the gang bosses behind them, and the Gotham press named him after the cloak that made him almost invisible. After killing a heavyweight champion, three crime figures and the mayor, he was beaten by Batman in single combat and took his own life by the rules of his clan.
Biography
Arrival In Gotham
The hunter arrived in Gotham City on the night that Marcus King won the heavyweight title from Bull Bersaglio at the Gotham Arena, a fight that set the gangsters Alex Yeager and Leo Brodin against each other once again. His first victims were junkyard owner Woodrow Pickett and his dog Satan at Pickett's Salvage on Eastern Avenue, where he made his base among the wrecks and watched the city through Pickett's television. There he picked out his prey from the fight broadcast and the news, and he began to copy the voices he heard on the screen.
The Champion And The Gym
That same night he crashed through the skylight of King's penthouse at the Plaza Hotel, caught the champion in a net and killed him, while King's girlfriend Lita hid and was spared. He took King's head and spine as a trophy, in keeping with the Predator trophy rooms of his kind, and later watched Batman through his thermal vision before killing a stray cat. His next target was Brodin's Gym, where he slaughtered Bersaglio and the boxers but spared a blind old trainer, who told the police that the killer walked like a man.
When SWAT teams fired on him from the street, he held his fire on Batman, who had stepped into the open as a target, and left the detective with a sense of the code of honor that guided him. He spared the weak and the unarmed throughout his hunt and chose only those who could fight back or held power in the city.
The Junkyard Duel
At a peace meeting called by the property tycoon Raymond Squire at the Squire Center, the cloaked hunter came through the glass, killed Yeager's guards and then Yeager himself with a thrown disc. Batman leapt at him, and a blast from Brodin's shotgun carried them both out of the window. Batman then traced magnetized rust and car paint back to Pickett's Salvage and entered the yard alone, finding Pickett's body among the hunter's skulls.
The Predator removed his bio-mask to face Batman openly and cut him with his smart disc. Batman dropped a crane magnet full of scrap on him, but the hunter pushed free and was about to finish him when the remote-controlled Batmobile rammed him and he answered with his plasma caster and a thrown spear that struck Batman in the side. The car pulled the wounded detective away as the police arrived, leaving the hunter free in the yard.
The See-through Slasher
With Batman lying unconscious in the Batcave, the hunter tracked Raymond Squire to his office building, killed him in the dark and left his secretary Marcia alive. The news then named the unseen killer the "See-Through" Slasher, and when Brodin vowed on television to hunt him down, the Predator cut through his hired guns with wristblades and plasma fire at his house on Westgate Drive. He broke into the strong room and killed Leo Brodin, sparing his mother.
His next victim was Mayor Julius Lieberman, killed in his private bathroom at City Hall moments after demanding the National Guard. The hunter then came to Commissioner Gordon's home, where Detective Kandowski wounded him and spilled his yellow-green blood before he cut her down, and Gordon escaped through a hatch.
The Rooftop And The Batmobile
Batman returned in a suit of reflective armor with a sonar visor that hid him from heat vision, and he called the hunter out over the rooftops beside St. Martin's Cathedral, where the police had found the Predator's lair of skulls. His plasma shots glanced off the armor, and their charge across the roof in the storm ended with the hunter falling onto a police car. The Batmobile then drove him off his feet and carried him out of the city on its hood toward Wayne Manor.
The Batcave
In the woods a swarm of bats engulfed him, and he followed Batman into the Batcave, where he cut free of a giant net and was trapped in a cage of titanium steel. Batman shot him with a tranquilizer strong enough to stop a herd of rhinos, but the hunter began a countdown on his wrist computer, one of the self-destruct devices his kind carry to avoid capture. Batman tore open the cage and grappled him until a massive electrical discharge burned the device out.
Still on his feet, the hunter fought on through the cave past the giant penny and pinned Batman against it, until Alfred Pennyworth fired an antique blunderbuss into his back. He threw the butler aside and staggered up into Wayne Manor, smashing out of a window and leaving a trail of blood into the woods.
Defeat And Ritual Death
Bruce followed the trail with a baseball bat under the full moon and beat the weakened hunter to the ground in a last round of single combat. A Predator ship then landed in the woods, and a party of armed hunters stepped out to reclaim their fallen champion. One of them called him a loser, and the defeated hunter killed himself with a curved blade, the fate that waits for those who suffer Yautja failure. The cloaked leader then handed Bruce the sword as a mark of respect, and the clan carried the body back to its ship.
Legacy
Bruce told Alfred that he had beaten the clan's champion, so the creature had been obliged to kill itself, and he believed the hunters would not come back. The clan later honored that defeat by keeping away from Gotham, but a young hunter broke the vow in Batman vs. Predator II: Bloodmatch, opening the long run of Batman vs. Predator encounters.
Personality And Traits
The See-through Slasher was unusually talkative for a Yautja, and he used vocal mimicry constantly, echoing lines from the fight broadcast, the news and his own victims to taunt the people he hunted. He had a dark sense of humor, laughing at Batman's jokes and repeating everyday phrases at his prey, and he learned about Gotham by watching television in Pickett's trailer. He kept to a strict code, spared women, the old and the unarmed, and accepted his own death without resistance once he had been beaten.
Weapons And Equipment
His arsenal included retractable wristblades, a smart disc, a shoulder-mounted plasma caster, a spear and a net weapon that the Gotham police lab could not analyze. He wore a bio-mask with heat vision and a cloak that made him nearly invisible, and his wrist computer carried a self-destruct device that Batman shorted out in the Batcave.
Behind The Scenes
The character was created by writer Dave Gibbons with artists Andy and Adam Kubert for the three-issue Batman versus Predator, published by DC Comics and Dark Horse Comics between December 1991 and February 1992. He is never named inside the comic, and the See-through Slasher title comes from the Gotham news reports, which fans and reference works adopted for him. Adam Kubert won the 1992 Eisner Award for Best Inker for the series, and its ending with the clan presenting a sword to the human victor became a model for later crossovers.
Merchandise
NECA released the character in 2019 as part of the DC/Dark Horse Batman vs Predator 2-Pack, a 7-inch scale set sold as a San Diego Comic-Con exclusive, with limited numbers offered through the NECA store. The comic-based Predator has over 30 points of articulation, two heads, a removable backpack, retractable wristblades and a spear, while the armored Batman comes with a fabric cape, a gun and a baseball bat. The set retailed for $60 in a window box with an embossed opening flap.
Conclusion
The See-through Slasher was the first Predator to hunt in Gotham City, and his trail of champions, gangsters and officials made him one of the deadliest hunters in the DC crossovers. His defeat at the hands of Batman, and the ritual death and gift of the sword that followed, set the terms for every later meeting between the Dark Knight and the hunters.
Appearances
- Batman vs. Predator #1-3 (1991-1992)
- Batman vs. Predator II: Bloodmatch (mentioned)
Tag Categories: Individual Predators | Predators From The Comics | Predator Lore
