(Hit Comics 007, 1941) If Tibetan Lams aren’t the top religious figures cast as super-villains then they at least have to be in the top three, along with druids and Catholic priests – we won’t see any of those for a while but once they get going they go hard. This bunch of Lamas have decided to turn their formidable mental powers (natch) to the task of world conquest, and have chosen to do so by influencing the mind of one…
(Green Lantern v1 002, 1941) What can I say about Baldy? To start: he’s not really a bald guy, but a guy in a bald cap. That’s about as clever as he gets, if I’m honest. Okay, that might be a bit mean, but Baldy tries my patience. After seeing so many good villain ideas wasted on six-page nothing-stories over and over, it’s kind of galling for Baldy here to get a whole book-length tale of his own. Baldy is…
Like costumed villains, there are a lot of scientists out there doing crimes involving superscience but just missing the levels of interest, ambition or scale to graduate to true super-villain status. Sometimes this is because of poor planning or lack of vision and others just have the misfortune to run into a protagonist while still in the initial stages of their venture. And don’t they deserve a forum just as much as the generic costumed villains we all love? Julius…
(Flash Comics v1 023, 1941) I’ll be honest: this is a very charitable entry on this list. The Smoke Thief is Dr Lucius Darrell and his gang of toughs, who use smoke bombs and special goggles to rob people on trains. If this was the main focus of the story, that might just be enough for full Minor Super-Villain status, but it ain’t. The real point of the story is this. Darrell captures Hawkman, then tries to kill him by…
(Flash Comics v1 023, 1941) Not much to say about the White Dragon: he’s a guy with a bunch of costumed henchmen who captures Chinese folk in NYC and uses them as slave labour in his motor factory until the Whip settles his hash. He is of course Walter Morgan, a guy who brags to Rod “the Whip” Gaynor about how well he’s doing in the motor business on the first page of the story. About the only interesting thing…
New Powers: An injured Hawkman is tended to by birds and learns to speak their language. (Flash Comics v1 023, 1941) Just some of my favourite alien designs ever: the Kriglo AKA Martian Spider-Men (Flash Comics v1 024, 1941) Super Hero Costume Party: Hawkman attends a costume party with Shiera Sanders as Hawkgirl. Though not the first time she wore the costume, this does mark the start of the two as a crime-fighting duo ongoing, no matter what stinky ol’ Hawkman…
This bit where Hawkman intends to attend a costumed event as himself but doesn’t quite make it (Flash Comics v1 022, 1941) made me realize that I’ve missed a few examples of super-heroes attending costume parties as themselves, one of my most favourite tropes in comics! Time for some catchup rectification! Here’s the Red Gaucho being mistaken for someone who was dressed as him, who is then impersonated by a third person in a story that was not called “Too Many…
(Flash Comics v1 021, 1941) This one’s got a lot of setup. First, Hawkman sees a spaceship crash, as you do. Venturing inside, he finds a deceased Neptunian couple, their egg son and a Rosetta Stone of a ship’s log. He makes off with the egg and the journal and just leaves the ship and its former crew to rot. Next night is the Scientist Society Ball, where monocled botanist and creep Noel Ratchford makes a play for Shiera Sanders…
(Flash Comics v1 020, 1941) An absolutely ordinary criminal scientist villain completely overshadowed by his criminal rival Big Frenchy in this adventure. Sathan has at-the-time fantastically futuristic guided missile tech, as well as one of my personal favourite bits of super-villain utility tech: the communications cut-in, via which he extorts money from banks lest they get hit by guided missiles. The only reason Sathan hasn’t been relegated to the Criminal and Mad Scientist Roundup queue is this here henchman’s inspired…
(Flash Comics v1 019, 1941) Hey, it’s the Hood! I’ll be honest: I thought that the Hood was one of those super-villain names like the Masked Man that was super common and that we already had one or more guys with this name but here we are, 250 villains in and welcoming our first. The Hood is Pratt Palmer, and he’s a bog standard scientist-villain of type A: scientist who develops some astonishing new tech and turns it to crime…