(Flash Comics v1 003, 1940) Big fan of Una Cathay! The criminal scientist-type super-villains that you get in the Golden Age could get a little samey after a while – even if they all had their individual weirnesses, they were all of a common stripe – and it’s amazing how fresh a well put-together lady-villain makes the old tropes seem. Una’s main deal was extracting the secret of eternal life from a young scientist named Dick Blendon who, unfortunately for…
(Flash Comics v1 002, 1940) This strip (Rod Rian of the Sky Police, natch) might just be the greatest stand-alone future in comics, if only for Earth Commandant Elmus’ uniform, which includes not only a belt covered in little stars but a helmet with a planet and star on top! (better look at that great helmet) Amazing uniforms aside, this strip has some top-notch sci-fi jargon: pilotar, telespaceship, terlurium ore, sensotar, earthons (that one’s a currency), alien races called…
(Flash Comics v1 002, 1940) On the one hand, Alexander the Great is your standard criminal scientist with an ego as big as his great big head who tries to extort the city of New York just as soon as he has developed the technology necessary to do so, in this case a density increasing ray. On the other hand, I like him a whole lot more than most criminal scientists. He’s cool! he wears a tux and is kind of…
(Flash Comics v1 002, 1940)
(Flash Comics v1 001, 1940) Johnny Thunder is given a medal and a promotion to head window washer. In true Johnny Thunder fashion he is fired the next day.
What was Hath-Set up to in 1940? That’s actually a tricky question, because Hath-Set is a tricky character! Technically, he did absolutely nothing in 1940, because he died somewhere in the 1200s BC. Because, yes, Hath Set is mixed up in the unholy mess that is Hawkman and Hawkgirl’s origin story. Of course, it didn’t start out complicated: Hath-Set was an evil priest of Anubis who murdered Prince Khufu and his lover Shiera and then they all got reincarnated some…
(Flash Comics v1 001, 1940) I have a lot of fondness for the Faultless Four, the first super-foes of original Flash Jay Garrick. Firstly and most simply, they are a perfect illustration of the power creep that super-heroes introduced to comic books: where this group of criminal scientists armed with mildly-fantastic skills and tactics would have been sufficient to occupy your traditional adventure hero for months if not years, the Flash walks all over them without a care in the…
(Feature Comics 049, 1941) The Purple Monster is a pretty lacklustre super-villain. He ticks all the boxes: volcano lair on an island somewhere off BC, army of costumed henchmen, subjugated population of poor island yokels to exploit complete with fake human sacrifices and an unexplained sinister use for the sacrificial victims… it’s a complete checklist of features designed to qualify him for this list. He even draws his name from a local superstition, albeit one he started himself by projecting…
(Feature Comics 047, 1941)
(Feature Comics 046-055, 1941-1942) If you, like me, aren’t familiar with WWI-era espionage figures, then this one will require some explanation. Fraulein Doktor was the only name that German spy Elsbeth Schragmüller was known by, even after the war had ended and up until German records were seized in 1945, in fact. And once Captain Bruce Blackburn’s adventures had wrung all of the interest they could out of the German-American Bund, a sexy spy nemesis was just the ticket! Thus: Sonya…