(Whiz Comics 015, 1941) As seen in his recent update, Spy Smasher’s arch-foe the Mask eventually gets a bit too good at villainy for his own sake. While he succeeds at warping Spy Smasher’s mind and turning him against the US government that he once sought only to defend, the Mask’s enthusiasm means that he is a bit too loose with his commands to “Kill! Kill! Kill!” meaning that the first that Spy Smasher does is to kill the Mask….
Some highlights of the Mask‘s career c. 1941. The Mask starts off 1941 with a bag, quite literally, as he attempts to blow up a munitions factory with FDR inside of it. (Whiz Comics 012, 1941) He’s at it again in the next issue, with another plot to kill FDR – this time by dropping a time bomb on the roof of the White House. He’s an ambitious guy, the Mask. Fortunately for the President, he is also a guy…
(Whiz Comics 012, 1941) The city of Watertown is under the thumb of a mysterious crime lord known only as the Big Shot, and Edward Lucas, the Special Prosecutor in charge of tracking the Big Shot down, has been shot and killed just before a meeting with Watertown District Attorney Harper. Enter super sleuth Dan Dare and his associate Carol Clews to pick up the trail and finish Lucas’ last case. The most obvious suspect is of course DA Harper,…
The fools! The fascist fools. the Steel Guard: The Steel Guard are a home-grown fascist group in the Balkan country of Murania, who plot to sell out their country and its oil wells to the Nazis. They fail to recognize the threat inherent in leaving a camera in the hands of crack magazine photographer Fran Frazer and she ruins their entire setup with a few evidence-heavy snaps. (Top-Notch Comics 010, 1940) the Redshirts: The Redshirts are a homegrown US fascist…
(America’s Greatest Comics 001, 1941) Like Mr Skeleton before them (and possibly because I first encountered them both in the same comic), the Death Battalion is one of those super-villain concepts that really lodged itself in my brain and which I am glad to have finally appear here. Unfortunately, unlike Mr Skeleton, the Death Battalion isn’t quite as great as I’d remembered. For one thing, I’d long thought that they were a Mr Scarlet revenge squad, but despite the fact that he…
(America’s Greatest Comics 001, 1941) An invisible killer is on the loose in New York City, robbing banks and hijacking gold shipments and murdering bank clerks, and while an invisible killer is a very scary thing to contemplate we must as ourselves: is armed robbery the best criminal use of the power of invisibility? If nothing else, a stealthier approach would have kept the involvement of an invisible man a secret for longer, since as it stands the poor gunned-down…
(America’s Greatest Comics 001, 1941) The Ghost of the Deep, a dastardly fellow indeed. As the comic opens, a captive scientist named Hugo has just completed a mysterious formula for him, only to be rewarded with murder. In the following days, the Ghost attacks US West Coast shipping, each time leaving behind a calling card in the form of a message in a bottle. The Ghost even tries to silence Billy Batson’s fairly routine reporting on the attacks (but why…
(Wow Comics 004, 1941) The Hummer, “the deadliest killer on Earth” has just gotten out of jail and is out for revenge on those responsible for sending him away in the first place, starting with Taylor, the prosecutor. Like so many of his peers in the murder community, the Hummer has an affectation: he hums while he kills, and also while preparing to kill and after he kills. He hums all the time. It’s a bit of a liability, to…
(Wow Comics 003, 1941) The Laughing Skull specializes in extortion. They call it blackmail and it is kind of framed as being blackmail but over the course of the story it becomes clear that he has no concrete dirt on any of his victims and is just counting on carrying the day with vague threats and eventually by being able to point to all the people who he killed for not paying him. Straight-up threats-of-violence extortion, in other words. To…
(Wow Comics 003, 1940) The circus is in town! And in what must be a complete coincidence, a circus-themed villain murders a prominent banker using a python! And did I mention that the circus has a big box full of pythons as one of its attractions? As someone who sincerely enjoys clown- and circus-themed villains despite having no particular affection for either in real life I have to say: do a bit better, the Black Clown. Like, try a bit…