It’s hard out there for the little guys.
Unnamed Spy Chief:
I don’t know if I’ve ever seen a comic book villain with such a distinctive look and clear devotion to a visual theme but absolutely nothing else. Her “decadent Egyptian Queen” bit doesn’t spill into her plans, it doesn’t inform how her minions dress… she doesn’t even have a name. Baffling!
On top of everything else, her plans are foiled and she is captured by the oafish Navy man Spark Stevens.(Green Mask v1 004, 1941)
John Dale:
When John Dale decides to murder his elderly cousin Ludwig in order to speed up the inheritance process, he disguises himself by grabbing this lizard-goblin mask that seems to be part of the decor, and then again when he decides that further murders will help him to cover up the first one. Thankfully for intrepid reporter Dell and her companion, the Night Bird is there to prevent this second (and third) murder.
Dale’s plan is flimsy at best, and includes multiple key factors that would fall apart under the lightest of scrutiny (no autopsy because he, the main beneficiary with power of attorney, said that they didn’t need it, fake will, etc). The best of these is this secret room setup, where the open window in the library is covered in an enlarged photo of the view from the secret room in order to obfuscate its presence to those in the library. Would having the will reading in a room other than the library make it even easier to conceal the secret? Certainly, but it wouldn’t be as clever. (Green Mask v1 007, 1941)
the Corpse:
In Green Mask v1 007, the titular Green Masks solves the murder of a man named Brown over an engraved box that turns out to contain a map to lost pirate treasure. The murderer, a con artist and fake medium called Swami Zodia, is captured, and Michael “the Green Mask” Shelby and his pals take possession of the map in what I would call morally questionable circumstances. Hope Mr Brown didn’t have any heirs!
The voyage to the treasure-bearing island is fraught with death and danger courtesy of a treacherous ship’s captain and his ally the Corpse, supposedly the walking cadaver of the pirate who drew the map in the first place. This is of course hogwash, and despite putting in a surprisingly strong showing against the Green Mask and Domino the Corpse is eventually unmasked to reveal that he is… Swami Zodia again! Yes, having committed murder for it, Zodia isn’t yet ready to give up on the treasure and has pulled out the comic book con artist’s ultimate weapon: the fake ghost. Alas, it does not work. (Green Mask v1 008, 1941)
Simia:
Simia is, simply put, an evil ape (species up for debate. Chimpanzee? Gorilla?). He was found as an orphaned baby and raised by a man named Jim Keane – does his evil nature stem from being brought up in a household where using utensils was prioritized and acting like an ape meant that you get locked up in a cage, seemingly indefinitely? Possibly.
Simia is set free by some evil men who are after Keane, and immediately organizes an ape gang to terrorize the local jungle, which includes kidnapping Kaänga’s mate Ann (he also inadvertently helps his foster father by killing his enemies).
Kaänga is not a guy whose home life you want to mess with, as Simia learns just before getting his head bashed in on a boulder. (Jungle Comics 014, 1941)
