(Feature Comics 046, 1941) An exciting development! Up until now our minor super-heroes have been of two flavours: the stars of minor super-hero strips or a new identity adopted by the stars of crime or adventure strips – the key word in either case is star – they are the focus and driving force of the strip. The Red Triangle is our first example of another type of super-hero: the single issue guest star. These are far more common in the…
(Feature Comics 045, 1941) It’s a tale as old as time, by which I mean about a year: noncostumed adventurers adopting costumed identities to keep up with the oncoming juggernaut that is the Golden Age super-hero boom. In this case, it’s Rusty Ryan and the other unusually muscular teens of the Boyville orphanage, who up until now were more of a high school sports type of bunch, dealing with the plague of unscrupulous gamblers betting on local hockey games and…
(Feature Comics 045-046, 1941) Golden Age crossovers were a pretty rare thing, other than in places like All-Star Comics where that was the whole idea, but one place you occasionally encounter them is in the kind of adventure strips that filled out the bulk of anthology comics before the super-heroes really got into full market domination mode, and especially if the same person was working on both characters and wanted to have them meet up and say what a good series…
Names: Bulldog Teeters. (Feature Comics 044, 1941) Zero the Ghost Detective getting straight-up punched by a ghost. (Feature Comics 051, 1941) Dates: Johnny Thunder born 7th July, 1917 (Flash Comics v1 001, 1940) Calling Cards: He only ever used ’em a couple of times but the Flash had metal lightning bolt dart calling cards. Costumes: Absolutely the best Hawkman costume variant is the brief period in which he wore a big hat in the shape of a sassy hawk’s head…
(Feature Comics 043, 1941) Another example of the classic combination of someone posing as a spooky local legend-figure in order to scare folk away from a valuable area. In this case one Jean Dupre and his mother are trying to use the legend of the giant Black Bat (that they might have just made up) to scare their step sister/ daughter Marie away from the family ranch, which is just lousy with radium ore. It’s a good attempt, foiled by…
(Feature Comics 043, 1941) Another example of the classic combination of someone posing as a spooky local legend-figure in order to scare folk away from a valuable area. In this case one Jean Dupre and his mother are trying to use the legend of the giant Black Bat (that they might have just made up) to scare their step sister/ daughter Marie away from the family ranch, which is just lousy with radium ore. It’s a good attempt, foiled by…
Thinking about this thanks to USA, the Spirit of Old Glory. Will probably add to this as time rolls on: TOP UNHINGED PATRIOTISM –Inherently tied to the Myth of their Nation: USA, the Spirit of Old Glory –Embodies the spirit of their nation: Uncle Sam, John Bull, Captain Britain –Draws power from a symbol of their nation: Liberty Belle, Miss America (Quality) –Obnoxiously talks about patriotism all the time and is a jingoistic xenophobe: Don Glory, the Ghost of Flanders –Inspired…
(Feature Comics 042-048, 1941) USA, the Spirit of Old Glory might just be the most overtly patriotic super-hero concept ever, which is saying something. Especially as she is a Quality Comics character, a company that also featured Uncle Sam (the literal Spirit of America) and Miss America (literally given her powers by the Statue of Liberty) in their roster. USA was originally a little girl who saw Betsy Ross sew the first American flag and was just so friggin’ jazzed about…
(Feature Comics 039-040, 1940-1941) This is a bit of a complicated one. So: “Captain Bruce Blackburn – Counterspy” was a strip that started in Feature Comics 032 in media res with the cover of the titular Captain and his colleague Lieutenant Jackson having been blown. The two then fake their deaths and a government plastic surgeon alters their appearances so that they are virtually identical, thus allowing them to operate as an incredibly efficient spy team with a flawless ability to generate…
(Feature Comics 038-041, 1940-1941) Pretty fond of the Ace of Space. As you can see above he has the fairly common origin of finding an alien spaceship and [getting powers accidentally from alien technology/ getting powers as a reward for helping the alien/ looting the deceased alien/ taking on the dying alien’s mission and technology]. In this case, he has to defend the Earth from invading Slogoms. Also, I demand that you appreciate that cool looking alien. What a cool…