MINOR SUPER-VILLAIN 409: THE SPHINX

MINOR SUPER-VILLAIN 409: THE SPHINX

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(Mystery Men Comics 018, 1941) The Sphinx is (somewhat appropriately) a bit convoluted? Or maybe disjointed? It’s hard to put into words but there is a weird dreamlike quality to some Golden Age comic books and the Blue Beetle stories from Fox Features often have it. To begin: the Sphinx is a mysterious figure who causes subway accidents and then utters threats and pronouncements in a booming voice, seemingly from nowhere. The Blue Beetle swiftly discovers that one of the…

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MINOR SUPER-VILLAIN 408: MR WHO

MINOR SUPER-VILLAIN 408: MR WHO

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(More Fun Comics 073, 1941)  It’s Mr Who! You know, from comics! I was very excited for this guy to turn up, as he’s one of those comic book characters I had heard about but never really read about, and… he’s okay. See, Mr Who was born all scrawny and seems to have been a weird kid (and to have had a shitty dad, jeez), so he channelled all of his efforts into science, and more specifically into developing a…

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MINOR SUPER-VILLAIN 407: DR CLEVER

MINOR SUPER-VILLAIN 407: DR CLEVER

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(More Fun Comics 074, 1941) I have taken an immediate liking to Dr Clever. I mean, just look at the guy: the classic tuxedo-and-cape combo, the rictus grin, the bald pate with two little hair-horns, the tiny skull-and-crossbones pin… he’s really a triumph of design when you think about it. Lucky for us he’s a recurring foe of Johnny Quick so we’ll be seeing him again. Somewhat strangely for a man with such an overall villainous look, Dr Clever’s major…

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MINOR SUPER-VILLAIN 406: CAPTAIN BLACK JACK

MINOR SUPER-VILLAIN 406: CAPTAIN BLACK JACK

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(More Fun Comics 074, 1941) Captain Black Jack is your typical modern pirate, albeit a very charmingly-written one. He took a look at the nautical landscape of the early 40s and saw a niche that he could fill: that of the buccaneer. He raids a yacht and comes into conflict with Aquaman and almost comes out on top but makes the key mistake of trying to drown an amphibious man and ends up blown to Kingdom Come for his efforts….

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MEDIAN SUPER-VILLAINS: WHAT TO DO?

MEDIAN SUPER-VILLAINS: WHAT TO DO?

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What is a Median Super-Villain? It’s a made-up category of character that doesn’t fit into either of the other two made-up categories that I’ve been working from up til now, the Super-Villain and the Minor Super-Villain.  By my definition, Median Super-Villains are all actually Minor Super-Villains: they have a limited number of appearances and your parents have never heard of them. So what gives them the extra zazz that makes them Median? It’s that they keep on appearing, mostly. Some,…

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MINOR SUPER-VILLAIN 405: THE VOICE

MINOR SUPER-VILLAIN 405: THE VOICE

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(More Fun Comics 074, 1941) “The Voice” is such a cool and evocative name that I have a real bias in favour of it but I have to say that this guy leaves me cold. Basically, he’s some sort of science man who has invented a “sound destroyer” capable of dampening all noise in an area the size of Manhattan. His crime-gambit involves employing this device and deploying sign language fluent gangsters to cause mayhem during the resultant confusion, then…

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MINOR SUPER-VILLAIN 404: THE AVENGER

MINOR SUPER-VILLAIN 404: THE AVENGER

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(More Fun Comics 074, 1941) Another day, another Avenger. This Avenger is a disgruntled scientist named Mortimer Crandall who is seeking revenge on his old bosses for firing him because of his wacky scientific theories that, you guessed it, turned out to be correct. He uses his working technology to kidnap the men responsible in preparation for their murders. This Avenger also demonstrates a flair for comic-book style hypnosis sufficient to place the Spectre himself under his power, which is…

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MINOR SUPER-VILLAIN 403: THE AVENGER

MINOR SUPER-VILLAIN 403: THE AVENGER

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(More Fun Comics 073, 1941) Just a Central American general trying to overthrow his government with crypto-fascist backing, foiled by Clip Carson because he and his men were covered with rice from their rice warehouse HQ. Much more interesting is the fact that this is one of the occasional comics set in a real country but with off-the-cuff, made-up information. In this case, it’s the fact that Clip is in Honduras at the behest of its president, who is a…

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MINOR SUPER-VILLAIN 402: THE BLACK KNIGHT

MINOR SUPER-VILLAIN 402: THE BLACK KNIGHT

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(More Fun Comics 073, 1941) As our tale begins, a figure in black knight’s armour roams New York City, destroying statuary seemingly at random. Johnny Quick soon gets involved and ferrets out a link between the destroyed pieces: they all once belonged to a man implausibly named Black Knight, who went bankrupt and was forced to sell them. The statues turned out to be worth a great deal more than Knight paid for them and the prevailing theory is that…

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MINOR SUPER-VILLAIN 401: THE MASKED MAN

MINOR SUPER-VILLAIN 401: THE MASKED MAN

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(More Fun Comics 073, 1941) This is not a new development but having Johnny Quick and Green Arrow’s debuts so close together made me realize that a minor sea change had happened some time in 1941: whereas the earliest super-heroes would start out collaring regular crooks we’re entering an era in which super-villains are the norm! (that said, Aquaman’s debut is in this issue as well and he just blows up a few Nazis). As for the Masked Man (our…

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