Located on the small Blackgate Island in the Gotham Bay, Blackgate Prison was the primary penitentiary in which the sane criminals of Gotham City were incarcerated, whereas criminally insane individuals were housed at Arkham Asylum.
Sometime after the Arkham Asylum incident, the prison was converted into Blackgate Mall.
Incident Reports[]
Before Arkham Origins Incident[]
In the closing days of World War II, Carl Draper was contracted to construct a prison for Gotham's criminals. The result was Blackgate Penitentiary, which was completed after four years of construction. Draper called it "the prison of the future".
Blackgate was the primary prison for criminals of Gotham City. Insane people were imprisoned there along with the sane due to the lack of mental health facilities in the city. Many of its guards were corrupt taking bribes from Black Mask and Penguin. Some guards were cruel to the inmates, beating them without consequence. To combat this, a new warden was appointed. He was not corrupt, but he was easily manipulated.
In December of Batman's second year of crime fighting, Julian Gregory Day was arrested on multiple counts of murder. He was psychologically evaluated by Dr. Harleen Quinzel, who deemed him insane. After this, Warden Joseph was manipulated into making Quinzel reevaluate her patient. This led to his being deemed sane and eligible for execution.
Arkham Origins Incident[]
Black Mask invaded Blackgate Prison along with Killer Croc to release the prisoners, as well as kill Commissioner Loeb, until Batman arrived to stop them. After he encountered Warden Joseph, Batman followed a trail of death and destruction caused by Killer Croc, until he discovered that Black Mask had put Calendar Man in the gas chamber, but gave up on killing him, and put Loeb in instead. Black Mask then turned the chamber on, killed Loeb, and made Batman swear that he would stop him.
After they got to the roof of the prison, Black Mask and his gang escaped, minus Killer Croc, who stayed to kill Batman and get the bounty. They fought until Croc was defeated, then Batman interrogated him until he discovered that Black Mask had put a bounty on his head, but was interrupted by Captain Gordon. Batman then fled the facility in the Batwing, and left Killer Croc to be arrested.
Throughout the night, Batman arrested several criminals, who were sent to Blackgate to await trial. These included Black Mask, Mad Hatter, Copperhead, Deathstroke, Deadshot, Anarky, Firefly, Ricky "Loose Lips" Leblanc. Bird, Black Mask's Gang. Joker's Henchmen, The Penguin's Henchmen, Bane's Henchmen.
After Batman tracked the Joker to the Gotham Royal Hotel, he was captured and later imprisoned at Blackgate. Sometime later, Joker lead yet another riot at the prison. Batman arrived to stop Joker only to find Bane wearing a heart monitor that was charging an electric chair that he was sitting in. The only way to end this was for someone to die. Batman realized that no one had to die, someone's heart just had to stop beating. Batman used the Electrocutioner's Shock Gloves to temporarily stop Bane's heart. Joker later tried to escape with the intent of detonating the bombs that had his men place all around the city, but was pursued by Warden Joseph and Captain Gordon. Batman resuscitated Bane by using the Shock Gloves, but Bane injected himself with TN-1, which turned him into a gigantic, mindless beast. Batman defeated Bane in the sub basement level. He tied him up and left the police to find him. Joker had Joseph shot and he ran into the prison chapel. Batman disarmed him, beat him up, and left him to be arrested. Even though Captain Gordon was under orders to arrest the vigilante, he let Batman go believing that he could help Gotham City.
During the riot, 20 prisoners escaped. Gordon contacted Batman for help as he was short handed. Eventually, Batman found them all and left them to be arrested and taken back to Blackgate.
These events later become known as the "Christmas Eve Riots". An oversight committee determined that the prison's administration was not at fault for these events. Nevertheless, security measures in the prison were drastically increased, with the result that prison was believed to be safe from future riots.
Cold Cold Heart Incident[]
Penguin, Mr. Freeze, and GothCorp CEO Ferris Boyle ended up sent to Blackgate due to their respective roles in attacking Wayne Manor, selling freeze guns on the streets, and human experimentation/illegal weapons manufacturing. In Freeze's case, his incarceration there ultimately led to a hastening of reopening Arkham Asylum due to Blackgate being ill-equipped to provide for his subzero condition.
Arkham Origins Blackgate Incident[]
Three and a half months after the Christmas Eve Incident, a mysterious explosion occurred at Blackgate Prison, one that allowed all of the inmates, including Black Mask, Joker, and Penguin, to take over the prison and hold the staff hostage. Batman was forced to work with Catwoman, a female burglar he put behind bars weeks earlier for an unspecified data theft, to stop the riot. It was implied that the Department of Justice member Amanda Waller secretly instigated the riot as a way to find recruits for her fledgling Suicide Squad unit, with Bane in particular being a primary recruitment target. Catwoman in particular was tasked with trying to get Bane out using leverage (strongly implied to be the expunging of her lengthy criminal record), although she ultimately failed with Rick Flag being forced to "release" Bane by arresting him as soon as he arrived to cover up their role in his escape. However, they nonetheless managed to recruit Deadshot and Bronze Tiger instead due to their role in nearly besting Batman in a fight. The three kingpins, meanwhile, managed to escape into the night via a variety of factors.
Arkham Shadow Incident[]
TBA
Arkham Asylum Incident[]
The Blackgate Prisoners were relocated to Arkham Asylum because a "mysterious fire" had burnt the prison down. During the incident, Batman discovered that the fire was caused by Frank Boles, a corrupt guard who worked at Arkham Asylum. It was also mentioned by Gordon as he thought Bane broke out of Blackgate.
Arkham City Incident[]
The Arkham City prisoners could be heard talking about the building that was Blackgate Prison, with some of them that said that they heard that it was turned into a shopping mall.
Between Arkham City and Arkham Knight Incident[]
After it was shown that the late Joker had somehow exposed Commissioner Gordon to a strain of Joker Toxin, Batman was forced to break Harley Quinn out of Blackgate to quickly track down an antidote. It's revealed that after the fire had burnt down the prison, the city had sent construction builders in to rebuild it. Afterward, the prison was re-dubbed New Blackgate.
Arkham Knight Incident[]
The rumors of the Arkham City inmates turn out to be true, as billboards advertising Blackgate Mall department stores can be seen in Gotham.
Locations[]
- Administration
- Arkham Wing
- Blackgate Chapel
- Cell Blocks
- Commissary
- Common Room
- Death Row
- Gardens
- Industrial
- Infirmary
- Lighthouse
- Maximum Security
- Processing
- Showers
- Yard
Personnel[]
Staff[]
- Martin Joseph (Warden) (formerly)
- Captain Lyle Bolton (Warden/Commander of Blackgate's TYGER forces) (formerly)
- Professor Hugo Strange (Director of Rehabilitation) (transferred to Arkham Asylum) (deceased)
- Dr. Johnathan Crane (Director of Rehabilitation) (formerly)
- Dr. Harleen Quinzel (Psychiatrist) (transferred to Arkham Asylum)
- Howard Branden (Correctional Officer/Interim Commander of Blackgate's TYGER forces) (formerly)
- Frank Boles (Correctional Officer; transferred to Arkham Asylum) (deceased)
Inmates[]
- Alberto Falcone (formerly)
- Anarky (formerly)
- Arnold Wesker (transferred to Arkham Asylum) (deceased)
- Bane
- Bird
- Black Mask (deceased)
- Bronze Tiger
- Calendar Man (transferred to Arkham Asylum)
- Carmine Falcone (formerly)
- Catwoman
- Chucky Berks
- Copperhead
- Count Vertigo
- Deadshot
- Deathstroke (formerly)
- Ferris Boyle
- Firefly
- Harley Quinn (shipped in from Arkham City) (formerly)
- Ian Chase
- Irving "Matches" Malone (formerly)
- John DeMarco
- Joe Chill (formerly)
- The Joker (transferred to Arkham Asylum) (deceased)
- Killer Croc (transferred to Arkham Asylum)
- Killer Moth (transferred to Arkham Asylum)
- The Mad Hatter (transferred to Arkham Asylum) (deceased)
- Maxie Zeus (transferred to Arkham Asylum)
- The Penguin
- Qing Lu
- The Ratcatcher (transferred to Arkham Asylum) (deceased)
- Ricky "Loose Lips" Leblanc
- The Riddler (transferred to Arkham Asylum)
- Two-Face (transferred to Arkham Asylum)
- Razor (deceased)
- Robert Hanes
- Scarecrow (transferred to Arkham Asylum)
- Shrike (formerly) (deceased)
- Toyman (deceased)
- Woody (transferred to Arkham Asylum) (deceased)
- Blackgate Prisoners
Gallery[]
Trivia[]
- Penguin, Catwoman, Black Mask, and the thugs of the super-villain gangs usually ended up here after the asylum was reopened, since they were deemed sane.
- That said, Arkham Asylum implied with some files by Dr. Penelope Young that Penguin and Black Mask were both incarcerated at Arkham once, and Catwoman was apparently a recent enough patient that Joker considered her for his "party list."
- Jonathan Crane used to be an employee but was fired once his fear gas was discovered.
- Warden Joseph only appeared in Batman: Arkham Origins and Batman: Arkham Origins Blackgate.
- Blackgate Prison appeared in the online multiplayer of Batman: Arkham Origins, where Batman and Robin tried to stop the Joker and Bane from making a breakout and freeing their followers.
- The player could find Calendar Man's cell in Arkham Origins.
- The cutscene used at the end of Batman: Arkham Origins was the same as the one that was used at the beginning of the game, just with some fire in the background.