Tony Zucco

Tony Zucco first appeared in Detective Comics #38 (April 1940) and was created by Bob Kane, Bill Finger, and Jerry Robinson.

Haly refuses to pay him protection money, Zucco has his henchman Blade sabotage the trapeze ropes, causing the Graysons to fall to their deaths.

[4] Zucco is an Italian immigrant who is orphaned at a young age when a gang of criminals murder his parents for refusing to pay protection money.

[5] In Batman: Dark Victory, Zucco is portrayed as a low-level thug working for Sal Maroni and a member of Carmine Falcone's criminal empire.

Zucco attempts to take over Haly's Circus to use its trucks for his smuggling activities, kills Dick Grayson's parents as a demonstration of power, and disappears.

However, his daughter Sonia informs Nightwing that he is still alive and working in Chicago under its mayor Wallace Cole, who has declared him legally dead.

Melinda's mother Meili Lin was forced to marry Zucco and had a brief relationship with John while staying with Haly's Circus.

Zucco is eventually released from prison and returns to Blüdhaven to fill in the power vacuum of the criminal underworld after Blockbuster's death.

Elements of Tony Zucco are incorporated into Batman Forever's depiction of Two-Face (portrayed by Tommy Lee Jones).

Tony Zucco in Nightwing (vol. 3) #18 (May 2013, DC Comics), art by Juan Jose Ryp .