The Batman Rouge's Gallery is full of colorful and fearsome foes, several among them considered the best villains in the superhero genre. But some of those villains are less notable than others, with some becoming more memorable for their ridiculous nature. But all it takes is one solid story to reinvent them as genuine threats -- such is the case with Killer Moth and Firefly.
However, Scott Beatty, Chuck Dixon, Marcos Martin, Alvaro Lopez, Willie Schubert and Javier Rodriguez transform those two minor villains into Batgirl's earliest enemies in Batgirl: Year One.
Arriving at a gala event with the intention of kidnapping Bruce Wayne, Killer Moth finds himself confronting Barabra Gordon, who'd arrived to the event dressed in a modified Bat-Suit as a gag for her father. Killer Moth is revealed to be a desperate and bankrupt Cameron Von Cleer, who hopes to use the ransom money from kidnapping Wayne to fund his new criminal enterprise -- a protection plan for criminals. However, he (and Wayne, for that matter) isn't prepared for the quick-thinking and surprisingly skilled Batgirl to counter him. She was able to hold back Killer Moth and his henchmen with the skills she'd developed training to join the FBI -- eventually forcing Killer Moth to flee.
Ultimately abandoned by his henchmen and the rest of the criminal underworld -- and with a massive debt to repay to a local crimelord -- Killer Moth finds an unlikely ally in Garfield Lynns: a former special-effects expert from a film-set who begun to indulge too deeply in his pyromania. Donning his own costume as the Firefly, Lynns quickly establishes himself a genuine threat by using his newly built flamethrowers to great effect. The sadistic man ends up even frightening Killer Moth, but Lynns forces them to continue their partnership. It repaints the minor fire-based bad guy as a genuinely sick individual whose commitment to the thrill of setting massive fires can be seen as a dark reflection of Barabra's own thrill-seeking adventures as Batgirl.
When other criminals threaten to frame them for the kidnapping of James Gordon, Firefly casually burns the doppelgangers to a crisp -- effectively sending the pair on the warpath. They even end up attackng the Gotham City Police Department head-on, with Firefly indulging in his dark obsession for fire by setting the entire building on ablaze while the officers are still inside. It's a deeply personal attack from the pair, cementing them as solid antagonists to the Gordon family in the same way that Robin: Year One solidified Two-Face as Dick Grayson's ultimate enemy. Even Killer Moth almost comes off as a sane and controlled figure when compared to Firefly. But when Batgirl is able to snag a rope on the underside of the helicopter, Killer Moth practically drools over her being injured in the ensuing chaos.
The two are eventually brought to justice, but Batgirl: Year One makes a good case for the pair being two of the best early threats for Batgirl to overcome -- even giving them psychological elements they had largely lacked in their earlier incarnations.