The Curse of Skeleton Munroe

Category: psychic zombies

  • MINOR SUPER-VILLAIN 572: JULES CARTIER

    (Champion Comics 005, 1940)

    “Revenge of the Zombies” is a feature that ran in Champion Comics from issues 003-005 and reads kind like it was written in a free-jazz fugue state, like once the 10-12 characters were introduced by issue 003, page 2, events just proceeded on their own with no real input from the writer. A huge cast gathers at the home of Dr Karl Hartmann in Haiti for no reason that is ever given. Various people are kidnapped. Various people turn out to be other people: the novelist is a police detective; the voodoo cult leader is a gang boss; two guests are crooks but it never pays off. Several people die.

    The most striking and interesting thing about the serial is the death’s head moth attack in issue 004 that takes out one of the crooks… wait, maybe they were there as disposable victims? After all, who could care if a criminal dies horribly?

    Champion Comics 005 saw the wrapping up of several serialized adventure stories in favour of more hero-driven fare (I have Lyle Kenton tagged as the protagonist of this story but he was simply the most proactive member of the cast – it was an ensemble jazz-fusion voodoo mystery). And since gang boss/ voodoo priest Jaques “Frenchy” Atell was already dead: enter Jules Cartier!

    Cartier, the former owner of Dr Hartmann’s mansion, has not been dead as everyone suspected but just been living in the basement, farming death’s head moths and using hypnotic mind control to turn people into zombies.

    When confronted, Cartier literally brings a knife to a gunfight, attempting to take on two armed men using only a throwing knife. It’s an honourable way to go for a complete dipshit. 

    Cartier’s plan comes out in the aftermath: discovering that he can produce high-quality silk from death’s head moths and that they enjoy drinking human blood, he researches a more sustainable alternative so that he can produce at a profitable level relocates to a cave to employ mind-controlled locals as both a labour force and blood supply. It’s a frankly ludicrous scheme – a cursory bit of searching indicates that Cartier is engaging in an astounding level of risk for something like thousands of dollars, which even in 1940 isn’t worth it. But of course, he was an insane textiles-based super-villain… who are we to dictate his priorities?

    And in the end it certainly was… a revenge of the zombies.

  • MINOR SUPER-VILLAIN 419: PSYK

    (Funny Picture Stories v2 001-003, 1937)

    I think I recently mentioned the dreamlike quality of some Golden Age comics. This is one of them, and only partially because the villain operates out of some sort of pocket dimension in the collective human subconscious. 

    Psyk is a would-be world conqueror with three really good tricks in his arsenal: travel between Earth and the aforementioned Realm of the Subconscious, the ability to raise the dead and mental domination of both the raised dead and the living. His plan seems to be to raise an army of dead and living thralls and then transport them to strategic invasion points. It’s not a bad plan, even if the thralls are all armed with swords and nothing else.

    Psyk is opposed by Jack Strand, who ultimately prevails by exploiting Psyk’s two weaknesses: a power-sapping “ray” (and here I think they’re using ray in the not-much-used sense of a radiation rather than a beam of energy) and the fact that each person affected by Psyk’s power has a weak point where that power entered their body – this point is the only vulnerable place on a thrall’s body and so they cover it with a very obvious and easily removed green piece of metal. Strike a living thrall in the spot and they are freed from Psyk’s power; do the same to a dead thrall and they die for good.

    What’s odd is that Psyk himself has such a spot: his cheekbones (as you might be able to tell from his stylish green cheek armour). What does this imply? Is Psyk himself just a thrall to a more powerful being? Maybe! Doesn’t matter though because Jack Strand punches him right in the cheek and blows up his dream castle.

    He’s an interesting guy, Psyk – definitely has the feel of a character bridging the pulp/comic transition. I’d love to see him BRUNG BACK in a limited series told in a more modern style.