Browsed by
Month: November 2024

MINOR SUPER-VILLAIN 665: THE WIND GOD

MINOR SUPER-VILLAIN 665: THE WIND GOD

Comments 0 comment

(Jungle Comics 007, 1940) Not quite a normal super-hero/ super-villain interaction, this. Tabu, Wizard of the Jungle intervenes to stop the wind elemental Sirocco from wreaking havoc and in so doing incurs the wrath of the unspecified but very Norse-looking Wind God. At this point we have a simple misunderstanding over a poorly-trained pet. Everyone involved now escalates things simultaneously. The Wind God unleashes lightning, storms and tornadoes on the valley and Tabu counters using both his own power and…

Read More Read More

MINOR SUPER-VILLAIN 664: THE DEVIL

MINOR SUPER-VILLAIN 664: THE DEVIL

Comments 0 comment

(Jungle Comics 007, 1940) Camilla, Queen of the Lost Empire, having made the transition from capricious villain to noble hero and staved off a couple of attempts on her throne and her life, is getting ambitious. She is determined to descend into the Cave of Sighs, a local portal to Hell, and banish the Devil from her lands. Together with the reformed assassin Caredodo, Camilla passes the Copper Gates of Hell after a brief encounter with one of my favourite…

Read More Read More

MINOR SUPER-VILLAIN 663: THE JUNGLE DEMON

MINOR SUPER-VILLAIN 663: THE JUNGLE DEMON

Comments 0 comment

(Jungle Comics 006, 1940)  The Jungle Demon starts out as an unnamed boy lost in the jungle and true to the old trope he is found and nurtured by a beast – we’ve seen it many times before. The beast in this case is a mind-bogglingly large constrictor snake, which is fun. Boy grows to man and he and the snake (charmingly named “Powerhouse”) are at peace with the people and animals of the jungle until one day the still-unnamed…

Read More Read More

MINOR SUPER-VILLAIN 662: THE GUY BEHIND WORLD WAR II

MINOR SUPER-VILLAIN 662: THE GUY BEHIND WORLD WAR II

Comments 0 comment

(N/A) This is perhaps the ultimate narrative football. At the very least it is in the running. Will there be more villains claiming credit for, say, the Fall of Rome or the French Revolution? Only time will tell. CLAIMANTS: the Black Dragon (Silver Streak Comics 010, 1941)  the Dictator (Blue Ribbon Comics 013, 1941) the Devil (Blue Ribbon Comics 019, 1941) Mars (Liberty Scouts Comics 002, 1941) Mars (National Comics 001, 1940) Wotan (National Comics 011, 1941)

MINOR SUPER-VILLAIN 661: THE GUY WHO SHOT BATMAN’S PARENTS

MINOR SUPER-VILLAIN 661: THE GUY WHO SHOT BATMAN’S PARENTS

Comments 0 comment

(Detective Comics 033, 1939) Can’t believe that I didn’t think of this before but The Guy Who Shot Batman’s Parents a) should already be here and b) is representative of a class of plot devices I’ll be calling Narrative Footballs. Narrative Footballs are big pivotal events, usually related to a character’s origin in some way, that get more and more significant over time and eventually become something that can be pinned to a villain in order to lend them a…

Read More Read More

MINOR SUPER-VILLAIN 660: MUNDOOR

MINOR SUPER-VILLAIN 660: MUNDOOR

Comments 0 comment

(Jungle Comics 005, 1940) Mundoor is a scientist who hangs out in the Fantomah part of the Jungle Comics Omnijungle and has seemingly been spending his time looking for a vitamin-rich plant that will induce giant growth in those that eat it, and in an astonishing turn of fortune an asteroid bearing that very plant lands on his doorstep one day! And the asteroid is also stuffed full of viable monster eggs! What a day for Mundoor. Mundoor raises his…

Read More Read More

MINOR SUPER-VILLAIN 659: THE MASKED ARROWS

MINOR SUPER-VILLAIN 659: THE MASKED ARROWS

Comments 0 comment

(Jungle Comics 005, 1940) As far as being minor super-villains goes, the Masked Arrows are all right: a group of cloaked bandits who manage to run circles around the local forces of law until they push their luck too far and are wiped out. The far more interesting thing about the Masked Arrows is the fact that they appear in a story that highlights just how literal the title Jungle Comics is, that virtually all of the stories that appear…

Read More Read More

MINOR SUPER-VILLAIN 658: THE ANT WOMAN

MINOR SUPER-VILLAIN 658: THE ANT WOMAN

Comments 0 comment

(Jungle Comics 005, 1940)  Conceptually, I love the Ant Woman, a ruthless bandit who lives in a giant anthill and sends swarms of venomous ants out to kill and loot for her. I particularly love her little ant tiara – is it the source of her preternatural ability to control the beasts? I cannot say for they did not go into that.  (these pics are a bit more racist than I usually go for but they really front loaded it…

Read More Read More

MINOR SUPER-VILLAIN 657: THE SCIENTIST

MINOR SUPER-VILLAIN 657: THE SCIENTIST

Comments 0 comment

(Jungle Comics 004, 1940) The Scientist (no other name given) is a man with a very comic book plan: develop a serum capable of giving gorillas superhuman intelligence, do so to a population of the particularly huge Gorgon Gorillas, and use the resulting army to conquer the world, presumably after a period of rapid gorilla breeding. Though the Scientist is a compelling villain in his own right (he is a world-class asshole, for example, like all the best bad guys),…

Read More Read More

NOTES – NOVEMBER 2024

NOTES – NOVEMBER 2024

Comments 0 comment

Honours:  Wonder Boy is generically honoured by all of Europe for stopping a Mongol invasion. (National Comics 001, 1940) Panel Fun: I don’t normally have enough time or inclination to read the text portions of old comics but I do often enjoy the illustrations accompanying them, especially including this cake man who menaces the Yankee Doodle Boy, whoever he is. (National Comics 006, 1940)