(Big Shot Comics 020, 1941) Dr Howard Vyle is a pretty disappointing villain to land on for the big Number 500, if I’m honest. He’s just some guy from some country (Big Shot Comics 1940-1941 is rife with spies but the folks at Columbia Comic Corporation were even more cagey than the rest of the industry about indicating where those spies might actually be from – it’s faintly possible he might be supposed to be a commie, even as late…
Mad or criminal, it’s the science that matters. This fellow is known only as “the hypnotist” and has an unspecified plan to do… something that involves taking control of flights of Army bombers and having them blow up targets of his choosing. If the details seem thin on the ground it’s because this fellow speaks precisely three words (see above) before being captured by Jeff Cardiff, Spy-Chief and so the only knowledge we have about his plans is that which…
(Big Shot Comics 017, 1941) Like a lot of Skyman’s enemies Nels Lambert is a disaster causing guy. Specifically, he has a rig called an Electrical Wave Generator, with which he can create waves – presumably of all sizes but as he is a criminal scientist he’s mostly focused on the largest and most destructive ones. A note on naming: the Electrical Wave Generator is an okay name at best but he does refer to his base here as Nels…
(Big Shot Comics 016, 1941) The Rockingham Bandit is a masked fellow who commits robberies and murders in the town of Rockingham (natch) who turns out to be a balloonist from a nearby circus who is framing another guy from the same circus in an attempt to steal his girl. Two items: 1) The frame works like this: the Rockingham Bandit does a crime and then leaves behind an item identifiable as belonging to the target. The Rockingham PD are…
(Big Shot Comics 016, 1941) Ramun the Evil One aka Ramun the Great is a hypnotist/ stage magician with a simple if short-sighted plan: 1) open a club in New York 2) have it become popular with the wealthy social set 3) hypnotize rich guys 4) profit (aside: just look at that charming picture of a man who thinks he’s an ape! The little dance!) The short-sighted part goes hand-in-hand with the profit, as once Ramun has induced his victims…
(Big Shot Comics 016, 1941) The Cobra technically works for the Chief if you want to exclusively go by the criminal org chart, but the Cobra is also the only reason for the Chief being mentioned at all and not just thrown into my big bin of nondescript gang bosses. Thus: a dual entry. Like I said, the Chief is your regular degular gang boss, albeit one who swans around in a green smoking jacket the whole time. Feeling the…
(Big Shot Comics 011, 1941) Stentor is named after a character from the Iliad who was known to have an amazingly loud voice and from whom we derive the word “Stentorian”. This is a real slap in the face to me, a mythology-obsessed kid who got a minor in Classics at university essentially by accident because I kept signing up for classes I found interesting. I have opinions on Greek heroes! I know who Philoctetes is! And yet Stentor, a…
All Columbia Comic Corporation edition! Skyman: Skyman (properly the Skyman but it just doesn’t scan for me) is a pilot hero, normally a ho-hum sort of character for me. But between his sci-fi super plane (the Wing), his blood-freezing stun ray (the Stasimatic) and his cool on-the-edge-of-being-too-busy costume there’s just enough super-hero peanut butter mixed in with the pilot chocolate to make it appealing (bonus running list of Skyman’s super science: atomic explosives, invisible glass phonograph, disitegrator ray, explosives-detonating ray…
Nazi Superweapon: There’s nothing terribly special about this giant dirigible that the Phantom Sub encounters after it starts to fly as well as submerge, but I do appreciate a dirigible that can not only camouflage itself as a stormcloud but has a proper old-school lightning cannon mounted underneath. And is filled with hydrogen, nuch to its later detriment. (Blue Bolt v2 007, 1941) Honours: Corporal Collins, Infantryman earns the French Croix de Guerre. (Blue Ribbon Comics 002, 1939) Rang-a-Tang the…
(Big 3 006, 1941) Our story opens with Samson investigating a series of mysterious deaths and ship disappearances in naval yards across the country. Cut to beloved Samson supporting character J. Rembrandt Speedball hilariously painting camouflage on a Navy cruiser. He is briefly distracted by horniness, and when he manages to get ahold of himself *pow*, the ship has vanished. Speedball is arrested as a spy and spends the rest of the issue failing to commit suicide in his cell…