Mr. Freeze (Arkhamverse)

"You will bring me Nora or you... will... die."

- Mr. Freeze to Batman seconds before their conflict in Arkham City

Doctor Victor Fries, also known under his supervillain alias Mr. Freeze, is an anti-villainous supporting antagonist-turned-anti-heroic supporting protagonist in the 2011 Rocksteady game Batman: Arkham City, and the main, later secondary antagonist of the Batman: Arkham Origins DLC; Cold, Cold Heart.

His story arc ends in the Season of Infamy DLC of Batman: Arkham Knight, where he asks Batman for help after his wife has been taken from him.

He is voiced by Maurice LaMarche, who also voiced Calendar Man in the same series.

Past
In his childhood Victor was always interested in freezing and began trying to cryogenically preserve animals, however his behavior worried his parents who had him sent away to a boarding school. Several years later he met up with Nora, fell in love and married her. However, Nora was stricken with a fatal degenerative disease. To save her, Freeze preserved her in ice until he could find a cure. He then agreed to work with Ferris Boyle in exchange for helping him with his experimental cryogenic weapons and for research on the cure. Freeze later realized that Boyle had no intention of keeping his side of the bargain, and so Victor began to do the work himself.

Angered by this, Boyle confronted him in the lab and had two security men assault him while taking Nora. In the confusion, it caused one of Freeze's weapons to fire, which set off the experimental chemicals to be released in a shockwave. Boyle escaped, but this mutated Freeze's body meaning that if he was outside subzero temperatures he would die. In the lab he built himself his suit and then pursued vengeance on Boyle. Freeze made a deal with the Penguin, offering him the experimental weapons in exchange for his men's assistance.

Arkham Origins
Though Freeze doesn't appear in Batman: Arkham Origins, he does appear in the DLC pack; Cold, Cold Heart, as the main antagonist.

On New Year's Eve, a few days after Batman defeated the Joker on Christmas Eve, Bruce Wayne is hosting a humanitarian's award ceremony at Wayne Manor for Ferris Boyle, a Gotham based scientist. As the guests begin to countdown to midnight for New Year's Day, the house begins to become freezing cold and a strange man along with the Penguin's men come in and take Boyle hostage.

Bruce, having suited up as Batman, attempts to rescue Ferris, but is frozen solid by Freeze, although only with enough cryofluid to simply stun him, as Freeze had no quarrel against the Caped Crusader.

Freeze kidnaps Ferris and escapes, forcing Batman to interrogate Penguin's henchman, who explains that Penguin's dealer may know his location. Batman finds many people in the city frozen. Scanning one, he manages to track down the dealer via the leaking cryogenic gun he was armed with. Batman interrogates the dealer, who reveals that Freeze made a deal with the Penguin to steal cryogenic weapons from GothCorp, in exchange for Penguin's help in kidnapping Boyle. Batman is confused, since GothCorp doesn't produce weapons. Using the entry codes from the dealer, Batman enters the building. Upon finding Freeze, Batman sees that Penguin has taken Boyle hostage and has betrayed Freeze, wanting the weapons he was promised. Batman intervenes, giving Freeze the chance to recapture Ferris and freeze everyone, including Penguin, although not before telling Batman that his threats mean nothing to a man who has lost everything. After obtaining a Cryo Drill from one of Penguin's hidouts, he discovers that the device requires a supercooled fluid, which is only found in Victor Fries' lab at GothCorp.

Returning to GothCorp, Batman finds Fries' lab a frozen mess and a dead guard who apparently died of heatstroke. Setting up a crime scene, he determines that Fries was trying to help his wife Nora, who was put into cryostasis as she contracted Huntington's Chorea. Fries agreed to secretly develop weapons for Gothcorp, in exchange for Boyle devoting his company's resources to finding a cure. But when Fries learned that Boyle never intended to uphold his end of the deal, Fries attempted to find the cure himself. Furious, Boyle had Nora removed from the lab to another section of the facility. He then assaulted Victor but an accident caused the discharge of Freeze's weapon, causing an explosion of supercooled fluids, which affected Fries and a remaining guard, altering their metabolism. When the guard attempted to escape the lab and died, Fries realized that he can only survive in a sub-zero environment and thus cobbled together a suit so he could step outside the lab. Realizing that Freeze was only intending to free his wife, Batman instructs Alfred to tip of GCPD about Boyle's crimes.

Freeze is attempting to force Boyle into releasing Nora, to which the man stubbornly refuses. Batman breaks in and attempts to reason with Freeze, informing him that the GCPD now know of Boyle's crimes, but the latter refuses to care, as he shoves Boyle into a cryo tube, claiming that it won't matter what Nora feels about his crimes, as the accident had destroyed any chance of him feeling any emotions. As he summons Penguin's men to attack, Batman goes around the lab and overloads the three cryotanks before using smart tactics to fight Freeze, their battle causing Nora's container to fail. But just as he downs Freeze, Boyle unleashes cryo gases, freezing Batman in ice. Believing the Dark Knight to be dead, Boyle believes that he can make up any story he wants to the police and begins to assault a helpless Freeze while he watches his wife die. However, Batman manages to break free of the ice, and manages to subdue Boyle. He then saves both Freeze and Nora's lives.

Arkham Asylum
Sometime after Freeze was defeated, he was placed in a special cell in Arkham Asylum. Sometime before the Joker took control over Arkham, Freeze managed to escape. How he managed to escape is unclear, but it's likely that he continued to find a cure for Nora.

Arkham City
In the dawn of a snowy night, Fries was kidnapped by The Penguin and put up for display in his museum. Meanwhile, Batman discovered that both he, Joker and most patients of Gotham City's hospital were poisoned via a side effect of the TITAN drug and were slowly dying if not treated to a cure. Joker stated that Fries almost had the cure prepared, but was postponed after the Penguin locked him up. As such, Batman headed out to the Penguin's museum to stop him and save Fries.

Batman was successful in defeating the Penguin, recovering Fries, and retrieving his suit, and watched as the doctor researched the disease. Fries discovered that the main ingredient to the cure was nearly impossible to get, but fortunately, the compound in said ingredient was grafted into Ra's Al Ghul's blood. After hours of tracking and fighting, Batman recovered the blood, much to Freeze's surprise, and the latter used it to form the cure.

However, after finishing processing it, Freeze locked the vial of curing liquid in his safe and demanded that Batman were to retrieve Nora's frozen body, as it was stolen by the Joker's men and placed in a warehouse near Gotham's docks. Batman, impatient, instead battled Freeze and defeated him only to find out that, during their showdown, Harley Quinn stole the cure for the Joker when they weren't paying attention. On a side-mission, the player can link the coordinates of Nora's location to Freeze after beating the Joker henchmen residing there. Freeze will then travel over the warehouse and rest near Nora's frozen body, admitting that he gave up his life of crime.

Arkham Knight
"They wanted me to join them. Help fight you. I refused, so they took her. They took Nora BECAUSE! OF! YOU!"

- Freeze upon meeting Batman

Though having given up on crime, Batman's and Freeze's paths cross again when the Arkham Knight's Militia take Nora. When Batman is told that a freighter is frozen near Gotham City and goes to investigate, he finds that the ship is called Nora and is taken over by the Arkham Knight's forces. After defeating them, Batman ventures inside the ship, where he sees Freeze desperately trying to fix the machinery. He then turns to Batman, telling him that the Arkham Knight initially wanted Freeze to assist him in taking down Batman. When Freeze refused, they took Nora from him and told him that she would be returned to him if he would kill Batman. He then aims a weapon at Batman, claiming that they took Nora because of him. Batman tells him to pull the trigger if he thinks the Knight will be true to his word. Freeze then holsters the weapon and begs Batman for help.

Since Freeze can't leave the ship because he has to prepare his Cryogenerator for Nora's return. Batman promises that he will find her and tells Victor to get the ship under control. Before Batman can leave, Victor tells him to hurry, as her Cryopod won't last long.

Batman tracks Nora's trace to a rooftop in Otisburg. There, he defeats the militia guarding the cryopod. As the cryopod has lost its energy, Nora de-freezes and Batman takes her out of the Cryopod before she suffocates. Victor calls Batman to find out whether he found Nora. Batman tells him that Nora is awake and he is alarmed, telling Batman that he needs to bring her back. Nora then asks Batman to let her speak to Victor. Victor states that he will save her and is close to finding a cure, but Nora replies that she doesn't want saving anymore. The transmission is then interrupted and a giant explosion is heard from the bay, as Victor wasn't able to fix the generator because he was talking to Nora. Batman then calls Victor, who is alive but doesn't want to leave the ship as he is determined to fix the cryogenerator for Nora. Driving to the ship with his Batmobile, Batman has to defeat a small army of the Arkham Knight's tanks while Freeze is fixing the generator.

As more and more drones arrive, Batman tells Freeze to take them all out by overloading the generator but Freezze refuses, stating that he needs it for Nora. However, when the situation turns dire, Victor gives in and detonates the reactor, sacrificing his equipment in the process. After the drones are destroyed, Batman and Nora meet with Victor on the deck of the ship, where Nora and Victor decide to use the small amount of time they have together to live. Batman then leaves the scene. He is later told by Alfred that the ship has set course and is leaving Gotham and asks Batman whether he should track them. Batman refuses, stating that they won't see Freeze and Nora again.

Trivia

 * Mr. Freeze's boss battle is regarded as the best fight in the Arkham series, and even at times one of the best in gaming history due to its creative layout and huge step up from the repetitive TITAN bosses from Asylum.
 * His tragic background story was no doubt based on the Mr. Freeze of the DC Animated Universe.
 * It was unknown if Freeze knew Batman's identity.
 * It is also unknown if Freeze knew about his "death".

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Mr. Freeze (Arkhamverse)