The Curse of Skeleton Munroe

Category: Captain America

  • MINOR SUPER-VILLAIN 303: THE HANGMAN

    (Captain America Comics 006, 1941) 

    There are three big reasons that I like the Hangman:

    1. It’s hard to beat a Golden or Silver Age story that revolves around a group of suspects who might be the villain. Just a series of fun character sketches followed by (in this case) the character’s grisly murder.

    2. The Hangman isn’t actually supposed to be a luchador but he sure does look like one, and that’s one of the top super-hero/ villain looks.

    3. The Hangman is in reality… Dr Nicolai Vardoff, the supposed victim! Always a fun twist. His motivation? People kept bothering him when he was trying to work, so he faked his death and killed all the botherers, plus his best pal Ludwig. What a wacky dude.

  • NOTES: JUNE 2023

    Where is Camp Lehigh?

    As noted previously, Camp Lehigh has been assigned a retroactive location of Virginia, but when that happened is hard to pin down– the earliest citation on the Marvel Comics Wiki is Captain America: White in 2008, which is recent enough that I’m surprised that the MCU location of New Jersey didn’t take precedence when the 2011 movie came out. Was it in fact established earlier? More notes follow:

    -nothing in the various Handbooks of the Marvel Universe

    -nor any issues of What If?, which I thought might have added a little detail like that to the scene-setting portion at the beginning of a Cap issue

    -various officers stationed at Camp Lehigh are shown to live in NYC

    -travel between the camp and NYC is frequent and speedy. Bucky’s class visits New York Harbor on a lark

    -BUT Captain America Comics 006 places Camp Lehigh within a similar distance of San Francisco, leading me to conclude that it’s the Brigadoon of army camps, popping up where it’s needed.

    At this point I guess it’s just a matter of watching out for the word “Virginia” to be explicitly written next to the words “Camp Lehigh” because that’s all we can really hold onto.

    EDIT: A late addition to the fun confusion: Captain America Comics 009 introduces “Lehigh City” as the nearby urban area that Cap and Bucky visit and it’s clearly one of your classic NYC stand-ins, down to the lions on the Lehigh Public Library:

  • NOTES: JUNE 2023

    Where is Camp Lehigh?

    As noted previously, Camp Lehigh has been assigned a retroactive location of Virginia, but when that happened is hard to pin down– the earliest citation on the Marvel Comics Wiki is Captain America: White in 2008, which is recent enough that I’m surprised that the MCU location of New Jersey didn’t take precedence when the 2011 movie came out. Was it in fact established earlier? More notes follow:

    -nothing in the various Handbooks of the Marvel Universe

    -nor any issues of What If?, which I thought might have added a little detail like that to the scene-setting portion at the beginning of a Cap issue

    -various officers stationed at Camp Lehigh are shown to live in NYC

    -travel between the camp and NYC is frequent and speedy. Bucky’s class visits New York Harbor on a lark

    -BUT Captain America Comics 006 places Camp Lehigh within a similar distance of San Francisco, leading me to conclude that it’s the Brigadoon of army camps, popping up where it’s needed.

    At this point I guess it’s just a matter of watching out for the word “Virginia” to be explicitly written next to the words “Camp Lehigh” because that’s all we can really hold onto.

    EDIT: A late addition to the fun confusion: Captain America Comics 009 introduces “Lehigh City” as the nearby urban area that Cap and Bucky visit and it’s clearly one of your classic NYC stand-ins, down to the lions on the Lehigh Public Library:

  • MINOR SUPER-VILLAIN 302: THE FANG

    (Captain America Comics 006, 1941)

    Comics history seems to have taken the Fang as a Japanese agent but I’m pretty sure that as written he’s a Chinese American gang boss who’s working for the Japanese against the Chinese government. Either way, he’s your basic pulp holdover Asian gang boss with swarms of fanatical hatchet-man and a pronounced lack of humanity down to his namesake fangs. Part of me always wants to skip guys like this but they’re just as much a part of comic book history as the Big Wheel or the Hypno Hustler.

    EDIT: Just noticed that he wasn’t even actually technically hired by the Japanese! His employer was “an Asiatic aggressor nation” – Marvel seems to be a bit less inclined to name  and shame them than they were the Nazis.

  • MINOR SUPER-VILLAIN 301: THE CAMERA FIEND

    (Captain America Comics 006, 1941) 

    The  Camera Fiend is your regular gimmicked-up gang boss who parlays the classic comic book camera gun into a modestly successful career in theft that sees him almost getting away with the British Crown Jewels before being beaten down by Cap and Bucky. He is of course playing off the idea of the rabid photography fanatic from the advent of cheap personal cameras.

    I was going to criticize him for having such a grotesque costume while attempting to do stealth assassinations with a poison dart-firing camera but now that I think of it I guess the point is that the Fiend is so wild in appearance that nobody would suspect  Bucky Barnes’ high school teacher Professor Hall of being the killer in question. I will however critique his choice to attempt to kill Captain America in front of about 20 witnesses as seen above. Still, this is exactly the sort of low-level crook I’m always in favour of being BRUNG BACK, even if it’s a legacy-of-a-legacy-of-a-legacy character: the Camera Fiend begat the Home Movie Murderer begat the Home Movie Murderer II (this time it’s on VHS) begat Selfie Stick or the Gram etc.

  • MINOR SUPER-VILLAIN 300: THE RINGMASTER OF CRIME

    (Captain America Comics 005, 1941)

    Finally, FINALLY, after 300  of these guys an arbitrary milestone lines up with a reasonably cool character: the Ringmaster of Crime AKA the Ringmaster of Death. Compounding the fun of the circus of crime aesthetic is the fact that some of that good-style retconning has been going on and the Ringmaster in this tale has been made the father (and presumably later grandfather, per Marvel’s sliding timeline) of the mid-level super-villain the Ringmaster! Uh, if saying that someone is someone else’s grampaw is a retcon, that is.

    The practical upshot of this is that this Minor Super-Villain writeup also functions as Super-Villain Yearbook, 1941 for the Circus of Crime, which, as a family-owned business entity, is contiguous with the version that reappeared in the 60s even though no individual members reoccur.

    All that said, the Ringmaster himself is a fairly regular Nazi creep super-villain. Sure he’s got the Jack Kirby villain snake-man look that we all love to hate but compared to his descendant (or, indeed, a regular circus ringmaster) he’s a positively dour dresser – his actual theming is pretty weak, when you get right down to it.

    Although we must not neglect the Wheel of Death, a perfectly cromulent random victim generator that the Ringmaster presumably stole from one of the sideshow games and spends hours/day applying all the little faces to.

    The real star here is the burgeoning Circus of Crime. Not all of the classic archetypes are present (no tall man, no fat guy) but it’s a pretty good criminal circus lineup already. To whit:

    Omir the Snake Charmer

    the Missing Link putting in an appearance for the sideshow folk

    Tommy Thumb the circus dwarf who might be held against his will? He definitely does not want to be there

    the Trapeze Trio

    Zandow the Strong Man

    various unnamed clowns, roustabouts and elephant handlers

    It’s not quite Princess Python levels but it’s a good showing.

    The Ringmaster of course gets trounced by Captain America, and then according to lore he gets murdered after the war by Nazi loyalists for his failure. His circus endures to this day, however, so that’s something. Speaking of which:

    CIRCUS OF CRIME 1941 

    Body Count: 2

    End-of-year Status: Captured/ Defunct

  • MINOR SUPER-VILLAIN 300: THE RINGMASTER OF CRIME

    (Captain America Comics 005, 1941)

    Finally, FINALLY, after 300  of these guys an arbitrary milestone lines up with a reasonably cool character: the Ringmaster of Crime AKA the Ringmaster of Death. Compounding the fun of the circus of crime aesthetic is the fact that some of that good-style retconning has been going on and the Ringmaster in this tale has been made the father (and presumably later grandfather, per Marvel’s sliding timeline) of the mid-level super-villain the Ringmaster! Uh, if saying that someone is someone else’s grampaw is a retcon, that is.

    The practical upshot of this is that this Minor Super-Villain writeup also functions as Super-Villain Yearbook, 1941 for the Circus of Crime, which, as a family-owned business entity, is contiguous with the version that reappeared in the 60s even though no individual members reoccur.

    All that said, the Ringmaster himself is a fairly regular Nazi creep super-villain. Sure he’s got the Jack Kirby villain snake-man look that we all love to hate but compared to his descendant (or, indeed, a regular circus ringmaster) he’s a positively dour dresser – his actual theming is pretty weak, when you get right down to it.

    Although we must not neglect the Wheel of Death, a perfectly cromulent random victim generator that the Ringmaster presumably stole from one of the sideshow games and spends hours/day applying all the little faces to.

    The real star here is the burgeoning Circus of Crime. Not all of the classic archetypes are present (no tall man, no fat guy) but it’s a pretty good criminal circus lineup already. To whit:

    Omir the Snake Charmer

    the Missing Link putting in an appearance for the sideshow folk

    Tommy Thumb the circus dwarf who might be held against his will? He definitely does not want to be there

    the Trapeze Trio

    Zandow the Strong Man

    various unnamed clowns, roustabouts and elephant handlers

    It’s not quite Princess Python levels but it’s a good showing.

    The Ringmaster of course gets trounced by Captain America, and then according to lore he gets murdered after the war by Nazi loyalists for his failure. His circus endures to this day, however, so that’s something. Speaking of which:

    CIRCUS OF CRIME 1941 

    Body Count: 2

    End-of-year Status: Captured/ Defunct

  • MINOR SUPER-VILLAIN 299: DOCTOR GRIMM

    (Captain America Comics 004, 1941)

    Doctor Grimm is your regular-style mad scientist, subtype Owns a Private Hospital and Conducts Unethical Experiments on the Inmates and Staff. He comes to Captain America’s attention when Bucky gets bashed on the head real good (teen sidekick head trauma is no laughing matter and I hope we never get an earnest comic about it) and has to be admitted for observation. Things get predictably creepy, with disappearing nurses, strange cries in the night and deformed patients.

    The real star of the story is Gorro here. Just look at him! A real classic Kirby man-monster with a thirst for human blood. I love him, and mildly begrudge Bucky for shooting him in the face about a page later. At least I can rest easy in the knowledge that Kirby never met a comic he wouldn’t draw a monster in, so we’ll be seeing guys like this for years to come.

  • MINOR SUPER-VILLAIN 298: THE UNHOLY LEGION

    (Captain America Comics 004, 1941)

    This is one of those moments where the first examples of a thing that shows up here is not a great example of the thing. Blame the tyranny of alphabetical order, I suppose, because I know for a fact that Star-Spangled Comics will feature the Ring of Rags when I work my way down my list to it, and that is a good example.

    The thing in question is of course Poor People as a Horrifying and Existential Threat, and it’s going to crop up periodically. The poor end up as a creeping horde without real agency of their own who can be mobilized in service to some evil end, in this case the destabilization of the American military/ industrial complex.

    The reason that this is not the best example of the type is that the people in question are probably not actually poor beggars but Nazi spies. I mean, they are absolutely Nazi spies. The probably is in regard to the fact that there’s no indication that any of them are anything else. Actual poor people being portrayed as monsters will have to wait.

    (bonus: the thing that gets Captain America and Bucky on this case is that they give a guy money and then he turns out not to be disabled enough for them to have done so)

  • MINOR SUPER-VILLAIN 297: THE BUTTERFLY

    (Captain America Comics 003, 1941)

    The Butterfly is great. You just can’t beat a guy in a semi-accurate butterfly outfit (I mean that head is a bit of a mashup) who robs museums. He’s got a glider rig and a weaponized proboscis! The only really problem with his operation is that he is in reality museum curator Doctor Victroli, both because he is a fairly obvious suspect and because he is an old man who ends up biting the dust after falling maybe 10 feet off a rope.

    Still, the Butterfly is a perfect candidate to be BRUNG BACK. After all, it’s a guy in a suit – someone else can wear it, and this is precisely the kind of low-level supercrook that the Marvel Universe should be awash in.