In the 1966 Batman series there was a two-parter called “The Greatest Mother of Them All”/”Ma Parker”. Ma Parker was this elderly, seemingly kind hearted mother, who was really the leader of a cutthroat gang family. She was inspired by the real life gangster, Kate "Ma" Barker. Now, this is no longer in effect, but for a long time any character created for the Adam West series was not allowed to be used by DC, not without paying the creators of the show. (For this reason, apart from reruns on TV, there was no way to watch the series! No DVDs!) Therefore, when they tried bringing this sort of character to the comics, they couldn’t use the same character. So for Batman issue 408, (The origin issue of Jason Todd, even!) the character was reinvented into Ma Gunn. Then, for the Batman Beyond episode, "The Eggbaby", they wanted to use the same sort of character, but instead of using Ma Gunn they made a third incarnation of the same trope, and that became Ma Mayhem. Now for the fourth time we are calling back to the Adam West series, and for the third time we are making up a new name for her, in the form of Ma Murder! Nowadays, this is all in the past. The rightholders have reached an agreement, and today the Batman 66 series is available for purchase, and DC can use those characters anyway they'd like.
How Ted Kord died in the comics is actually more brutal. In the comics he was shot in the head by Maxwell Lord. The Blue Beetle of the 27th century, sensing a massive temporal disruption caused by Ted's death, traveled back in time to save Ted, recruiting Dan Garrett (the original Blue Beatle who was Ted's mentor), Jaime, and Booster to assist him. Together, they succeeded, managing to rescue Ted before Max could kill him.
Have I ever said how much I love that this show uses obscure DC characters? I’m a hard-core comic book fan and even I had was wondering “who are these people“ during the intro. But nope, the ghost tank is an actual DC character
Sadly Ted dying is pretty much a canon event in every DC universe, but for what it’s worth he was a champ and his efforts led to possibly the greatest blue beetle being created
