(Crack Comics 013, 1941) The Crab here is a prime example of the gang boss who goes just over the top enough – and has a good enough moniker – to make the jump to full super-villain. His plan – hold the city to ransom for 5 million bucks, then blow up the first ambush the cops set for him to show he means business – is sufficiently out there, and he adds some flourishes like taunting the police via…
Another collection of those middling muddlers who didn’t quite make it to the minor leagues: the generic costumed villains! Silas Greer: Tried to kill his own nephew to get his fortune but was walloped by the Clock (and the Orchid!) for his troubles. (Crack Comics 002, 1940) Trag: A gentleman with the unlikely name of Trag dressed up in this unusual mask in an attempt to frame a guy with the only slightly less unusual name of Doctor Prowl before…
(Crack Comics 012-013, 1941) It doesn’t take much to push a space pirate over the line into super-villain status, and Captain X’s name and costume are more than enough to do so for me. Plus, she has two whole appearances! What’s that? Yes I said “she” because you see… CAPTAIN X IS A WOMAN! Yes, it’s the ol’ gender switcheroo, which is perhaps not as mind-blowing in 2022 as it was in 1941. Evidently, though, it’s almost unthinkable by 2441.
(Crack Comics 010, 1941) The Jester is your standard costumed thief. He commits a series of daring robberies that would in the normal course of things land him in the slammer at the end of a super-hero’s fist. But before Madam Fatal, the hero of this particular feature, can get around to the business of stopping the Jester, the man himself shows up, knocks out Fatal’s civilian guise Richard Stanton and kidnaps his friend Professor Mason. OR DOES HE? No,…
(Crack Comics 010, 1941) The Sophisticated Lady is a femme fatale thief of the kind that comics love. She has a decent career going as the comic opens but the Black Condor shows up to put the kibosh on it. Sadly she doesn’t actually get to do that much on-panel, but the terrific name makes up for it a little.
(Crack Comics 009, 1941) I’ll be honest: the Screw is about as generic as it gets. He’s a hooded gang boss who runs a protection racket and just so happens to turn out to be the very head of the Chamber of Commerce who has been pressuring the police to take care of this awful Screw Gang. Pretty regular costumed villain stuff: his only real point of distinction is his fairly cool name.
(Crack Comics 009, 1941) The Tiger Woman is another in a long line of characters who are vilified for pushing back against colonialism – in this case, American explorers appropriating her peoples’ treasures. Or she would be if the way she was pushing back wasn’t murder, which tends to muddy the righteousness of any cause. She does have a really great costume, though. Top marks for style.
(Crack Comics 009, 1941) The Tiger Woman is another in a long line of characters who are vilified for pushing back against colonialism – in this case, American explorers appropriating her peoples’ treasures. Or she would be if the way she was pushing back wasn’t murder, which tends to muddy the righteousness of any cause. She does have a really great costume, though. Top marks for style.
(Crack Comics 019, 1941) Black Condor skips out on receiving a Congressional Medal of Honor for rescuing FDR from being kidnapped by Nazis but his secret identity Senator Tom Wright ends up getting one for discovering that FDR had been kidnapped in the first place.
(Captain Marvel Adventures 005, 1941) The Swamp Devil! Part of a couple of fairly populous subgroupings of supercrook: the “kill or scare off folk in order to do a land-grab” type and the “pose as a figure from local legend in order to capitalize on preexisting fear, etc” cohort (a frequently paired duo). Specifically, the Swamp Devil is actually Woggs, an engineer tasked with draining part of the Great Dismal Swamp to create more farmland who is instead flooding nearby farms…