| Silver St. Cloud | |
|---|---|
 Silver St. Cloud inDetective Comics #475 (Feb. 1978), art by Marshall Rogers and Terry Austin. | |
| Publication information | |
| Publisher | DC Comics |
| First appearance | Detective Comics #470 (June 1977) |
| Created by | Steve Englehart (writer) Walt Simonson (artist) |
| In-story information | |
| Supporting character of | Batman |
Silver St. Cloud is a fictional character appearing inAmerican comic books published byDC Comics, commonly in association with the vigilanteBatman. The character debuted inDetective Comics #470 (June 1977) and was created bySteve Englehart andWalt Simonson.[1] Silver St. Cloud is typically depicted as a romantic interest of Bruce Wayne.[2]
St. Cloud appeared in the second season ofGotham, portrayed byNatalie Alyn Lind.
Created bySteve Englehart andWalt Simonson, Silver St. Cloud debuted inDetective Comics #470 (February 1977).[3] The issues featuring her earlier appearances have been collected in trade paperback form asBatman: Strange Apparitions.
St. Cloud is a socialite residing inGotham City, hosting parties for the rich and influential. She later becomes a successfulevent planner outside Gotham.
Silver St. Cloud is Bruce Wayne's love interest in stories fromDetective Comics #469–476, 478 and 479, later reprinted as a trade paperback collection of those stories titledBatman: Strange Apparitions. St. Cloud first meets Bruce Wayne following the Batman's defeat of new villainDoctor Phosphorus in a battle that occurred at a nuclear power plant on the ocean. She soon begins dating Bruce Wayne. She suspects from the start that Bruce is hiding something, citing his interest in crime reports and his encounters with Batman as evidence of a secret. When Bruce Wayne is captured and replaced byHugo Strange in a prosthetic disguise, Silver quickly notices Wayne is not acting like himself and contactsDick Grayson (Robin) to tell him about Wayne's strange behavior. Her insight and quick action leads to Robin rescuing Bruce.
Silver is one of the few characters to have discovered Batman'ssecret identity. Her relationship with Bruce was initially in trouble due to his repeated disappearances. However, over the time she was able to piece together the clues and eventually recognize her lover in the Batman costume. Silver confirms her suspicions by calling out to Batman while he battled the villainDeadshot, causing him to turn and allowing Silver to recognize Batman's chin as the chin of Bruce Wayne. The initial appearances of Silver also represent the first time that it is explicitly recognized that Bruce Wayne or even Batman has engaged in a sexual relationship.
Silver witnesses Batman fighting theJoker. After defeating the Joker, Batman meets with Silver. She reveals to Batman that she knows his secret and that she still loves him. She says that she could not be with him because she could not stand worrying about him each night. She then ends the relationship, asking him not to see her again.
Silver's breakup with Bruce has repercussions in the following issues, where Batman takes out his frustration over the failed relationship on a couple of criminals. Most of his fury becomes concentrated on one criminal, whom he punches repeatedly. Bruce tellsAlfred Pennyworth that he blames his crimefighting persona for driving Silver away, and for a time muses whether he should give up being Batman forever.[4]
In theLegends of the Dark Knight story arc "Siege", written byArchie Goodwin, St. Cloud briefly returns to Bruce Wayne's life while organizing a mercenaries' convention in Gotham, but is severely injured by the convention's leader when she discovers a plot to assault the city.
Silver returns once again in Steve Englehart'sstory arcBatman: Dark Detective, a sequel toBatman: Strange Apparitions. In this series, her relationship with Bruce Wayne evolves further, to the point that Silver prepares to leave her fiancé, a campaigningsenator, to be with him, but her fiancé's arm and leg are cut off in the Joker's booby traps while he attempts to find her in the Joker's house. Wayne instructs her to continue her relationship with the senator until his campaign ends, but she is angered by this and leaves Wayne's life again. Englehart wrote an additional chapter to the trilogy to resolve its plot, but DC declined to publish the story and it has since been removed from continuity.[5][6]
Silver returns in the non-canon seriesBatman: The Widening Gyre,[7] where she is killed byOnomatopoeia.
In the crossover specialBatman/Elmer Fudd, Silver briefly enters a relationship withElmer Fudd.[8]
The character was ranked 64th inComics Buyer's Guide's "100 Sexiest Women in Comics" list.[9]
Silver St. Cloud appears inDC Super Hero Girls, voiced byGrey Griffin.
