Black Mask (comics)

Dark beginning

Black Mask's origin story was established in his first appearance. Roman Sionis was born to wealthy and utterly self-absorbed parents who cared more about their social status than their son; moments after his birth, the doctor carelessly dropped him on his head. Roman's parents were less concerned about their son's well-being than in covering up the entire incident so their high society friends wouldn't find out. As a child, he was attacked by a rabid raccoon at the Sionis family country estate; his parents forbade him to mention the incident to anyone.

Further adding to the cauldron was his father's "friendship" with Thomas Wayne; both of Roman's parents disliked Wayne and his wife Martha, and were quite vocal about it in private, but they continued to associate with them to ensure their social status, to the extent of literally forcing Roman to become friends with their son, Bruce. His parents' hypocrisy had a deep impact on him, and he grew to hate and resent them and the "masks" they wore in public.

After graduating from high school, Sionis was given a high ranking position inside his father's company, Janus Cosmetics. There, he met and fell in love with Circe, a working class secretary. His parents did not approve of the relationship and made it clear that they wanted him to break it off. Enraged, Sionis burned down the family's mansion, killing both of his parents. Upon their deaths, he inherited the family fortune and business. Sionis lacked his father's business acumen, however, and eventually ruined Janus Cosmetics by funding a failed line of face-paint make-up. In desperation, he threw large sums of money at the staff chemists to create a product to save the company, and what came back to him was a kind of water-proof makeup. The product was rushed to market without proper testing, and once it hit the market turned out to be a deadly toxin which disfigured several hundred women.

Circe, now Sionis' fiancée, broke up with him in front of his entire staff. Bruce Wayne, now the head of Wayne Enterprises, offered to bail out the company on the condition that Sionis give up control and allow Wayne to appoint his own Board of Directors. Sionis agreed, but was furious at the humiliation he had suffered. He went to the family mausoleum and broke his father's ebony coffin lid, from which he carved a mask; he thus became the crime lord "Black Mask".