MAD AND CRIMINAL SCIENTIST ROUND-UP 012

MAD AND CRIMINAL SCIENTIST ROUND-UP 012

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Science class was never like this. Count la Roach is a scientist-spy looking to synthesize enough “noxio gas” to flood the NYC of the I-think-it’s-still-the-near-future world of Yank Wilson, but all he gets is a sock in the jaw for his trouble. (Fantastic Comics 007, 1940) This unnamed fellow is our first proper mad scientist in a while! I really like his style, particularly the fact that he’s introduced while sitting in a tennis judge’s chair for no stated reason….

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MINOR SUPER-VILLAIN 642: QUEEN OF THE WEED PEOPLE

MINOR SUPER-VILLAIN 642: QUEEN OF THE WEED PEOPLE

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(Fight Comics 002, 1940) After spending so long with Sub Saunders in the far-off year 10 000 it’s a bit strange to detail an undersea menace that he isn’t battling but here we are and our focus is present-day adventurer Kinks Mason, who sets out with nothing but a helmet that extracts oxygen from seawater to solve the mystery of just where all these missing ships have been getting to and ends up discovering an underwater civilization of seaweed people….

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MINOR SUPER-VILLAIN 641: ONE-EYE

MINOR SUPER-VILLAIN 641: ONE-EYE

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(Fantastic Comics 013, 1940)  One-Eye is a stylish fellow with a real bone to pick with humankind, who have apparently rejected him for the heinous sin of Having Only One Eye, I guess? Unless having a widow’s peak and a long waxed mustache are considered disfigurements? I suppose that cultural mores do change over time and it is 8000 years in the future… in any case, the point is that he’s upset at the world and has decided to kill…

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MINOR SUPER-VILLAIN 640: YEW BEE

MINOR SUPER-VILLAIN 640: YEW BEE

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(Fantastic Comics 013, 1940) Yew Bee! A scientist/fifth columnist working for an unnamed nation to soften the US up for invasion! A pretty common type of guy in Golden Age comics if I’m honest, and I might have passed him by if he weren’t a Stardust the Super Wizard villain. Even the most rote Fletcher Hanks creations have at least a couple of interesting things about them. The first thing is obviously the name. Yew Bee. Is it a reference…

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MINOR SUPER-VILLAIN 639: LU CHENG THE FORBIDDEN

MINOR SUPER-VILLAIN 639: LU CHENG THE FORBIDDEN

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(Fantastic Comics 013, 1940)  A vampire holed up in a cave in the Gobi Desert with a bunch of lady vampires, Lu Cheng the Forbidden talks a big game but I reckon that he’s super screwed. He’s somehow found himself in one of the largest deserts in the world, presumably farther from human habitation than is comfortable for a vampire – when Captain Kidd wanders into his cave all Lu Cheng is concerned with is using his plane to get…

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MINOR SUPER-VILLAIN 638: THE BLACK HOOD

MINOR SUPER-VILLAIN 638: THE BLACK HOOD

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(Fantastic Comics 013, 1940) Yank Wilson, Super Spy Q-4 (who started out as a near-future character and maybe isn’t any more but until I see a clear sign otherwise still is to me) is after Prusslandic spies Karl Wolff and the Black Hood down in Florida and is going about his search with all the subtlety of a character in a point-and-click adventure game. It’s his bad luck that the first person he asked was an agent of Prussland Intelligence…

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MINOR SUPER-VILLAIN 637: CHANG

MINOR SUPER-VILLAIN 637: CHANG

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(Fantastic Comics 013, 1940) It finally happened: Flip Falcon told the world that travel between Earth and the Fourth Dimension was possible (I haven’t been highlighting it because there aren’t super-villains etc but a fair few of his adventures have just been commissions from randos to go back in time and find out where pirates hid some treasure and whatnot. Everyone knows about the Fourth Dimension, Billy.) and someone has finally replicated his findings. Too bad for the world in…

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MINOR SUPER-VILLAIN 636: THE SERPENT LADY

MINOR SUPER-VILLAIN 636: THE SERPENT LADY

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(Fantastic Comics 012, 1940) We open on Mephisto, the Dreaded Poison Serpent, attacking a small boat and making off with its inhabitants. For a split second I am excited – maybe this is our long-sought criminal animal! – but then I remember the lessons I learned from Cephalopoda the Octopus and rein myself in. And it’s a good thing I did, for Mephisto is a mere tool of the mysterious Serpent Lady, who lives in a golden city in an…

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MINOR SUPER-VILLAIN 635: KAOS

MINOR SUPER-VILLAIN 635: KAOS

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(Fantastic Comics 012, 1940) Kaos, a Venusian scientist, has a plan that in true comics book fashion is both simple (invade the Earth with overwhelming force, thus taking over almost immediately) and overly complicated (hypnotize the local population of giant vultures and then feed them super vitamins extracted from a specially-bred vine, thus making them even more giant and so fast that they are unbeatable, then teleport them to Earth as your main invasion force). Also: those are some crazy…

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MINOR SUPER-VILLAIN 634: KING RATON

MINOR SUPER-VILLAIN 634: KING RATON

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(Fantastic Comics 012, 1940) King Raton is a fellow met by the Golden Knight and his companion/ lover Alice after the earth near a pool of water gives way and they are dropped into a cavern. He demands that they fetch a potion for him from Kataka, Witch of the Volcano, under threat of death – this is a source of conflict not only because of the threats but because he wants the potion in order to conquer Blackamoor Forest,…

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