The Curse of Skeleton Munroe

Category: Sandman

  • MINOR SUPER-VILLAIN 069: THE COIN

     (Adventure Comics 046, 1940)

    The Coin is a few different super-villain clichés rolled into one. Firstly he’s an old college chum of Wesley “Sandman” Dodds, and “old schoolmate of hero turns out to be villain” is as much a recurring thing in comics as an old friend showing up and immediately dying. Which the Coin also does.

    Finally, the Coin is a man who dresses up as an old lady to do crime, which is a super-villain bit and also something that regular-style crooks are apt to do in the Golden and Silver Ages. Old women are such unlikely villains that everyone else poses as them – even Catwoman, in her first appearance.

    Anyway, he’s a counterfeiter.

  • MINOR SUPER-VILLAIN 024: THE FACE

    (Adventure 044, 1939)

    Another early Sandman villain. A fairly standard master of disguise who was later reworked into an axe-wielding maniac in Sandman Mystery Theatre.

  • MINOR SUPER-VILLAIN 022: THE TARANTULA

    (Adventure 040, 1939)

    Standard masked crook, remarkable only for being the Sandman’s first foe. Shows up later in one or two crowd scenes.

    This story is also notable for being the only time Golden Age Wesley Dodds tucks in a little doll version of himself before heading out as Sandman, a charming bit that was later adopted as an ongoing thing in Sandman Mystery Theatre.