MINOR SUPER-HERO ROUND-UP 086

In contrast to the last group of minor super-heroes, 3/4 of these guys have a teeny-tiny chance of appearing in a modern comic. Like, 5% more.

Mister E: 

Mister E, aka "wealthy sportsman Victor Jay," is a masked vigilante of the suit-and-cape type, and is remarkable mainly for the fact that Marvel Comics doesn't really have that many of those kind of guy. In his one recorded adventure he battles the very entertaining Vampire to a stalemate. After this singular adventure, Mr E is not seen again until J. Michael Straczynski's The Twelve, in which he mainly exists to be emotionally crushed as an object lesson in how being a super-hero can have an impact on your real life, you guys. (Daring Mystery Comics 002, 1941)

Categorized in: Alphanumeric (E)*, Day Jobs (Wealthy Socialites), Generica (Misters)

*we're up to 12 out of 26 letters! 

the Laughing Mask:

Dennis Burton, assistant district attorney and latest in a long line of Burton lawmen, is also one of the many, many comic book law officers who adopt a costumed identity in order to enact justice via fist and gun. Burton's real spin on the concept of vigilantism is in his choice of costume: a simple red-and-yellow number topped off with a theatrical comedy mask. Eerie! 

The Laughing Mask is a calling card leaver of the ominous school, and while this is not exactly groundbreaking stuff I do enjoy seeing how he sets it all up. Someone like the Blue Beetle must be doing all this creeping around in crawlspaces to achieve this kind of effect too, but we never get to see it. (Daring Mystery Comics 002, 1940)

Categorized in: Accessories (Calling Card Leavers), Activities (Laughing), Day Jobs (Assistant District Attorneys) 

the Purple Mask:

Nothing gold can stay, as Ponyboy, or possibly Sodapop, said, and quirky Golden Age super-heroes are no exception. For the second and third of his three appearances, Dennis Burton sets aside his golden mask to adopt a far more generic costume. At least it's a new mask colour for us. (Daring Mystery Comics 003, 1940)

Categorized in: Colours (Purple), Objects (Masks) 

Breeze Barton:

Breeze Barton is more of a science fiction adventurer than a super-hero, but the particulars of his story are weird enough that I want to talk about them. Breeze is a US soldier fighting in World War II, only not our World War II but a near future version of the war (1945 CE) in which American and Japanese forces are clashing in South Africa and the US Army Air Force has instituted a furry-shouldered look in their pilots' uniforms. Shot down while on a scouting flight, Breeze crashes his plane in the Sahara Desert (a truly staggering distance to travel between being shot down and crashing - the entire length of Africa, essentially!). 

While wandering around the desert, Breeze then falls through a dimensional portal called the Spot and finds himself in Miracle City, which is populated by people from across the breadth of human history who have fallen through the Spot and who now do not age thanks to the properties of the Spot Dimension. There are also dinosaurs running around, plus the hostile Demon Folk, who are native to the dimension and who want to invade the Earth for some reason. To finally know death, I guess? 

Breeze eventually figures out the trick to going back through the Spot and returns to Earth to find that it is now 1995 and that the war has been going on for the entire 50 years that he was away. Thanks to the relentless grind of the war humanity has reverted to a state ranging between medieval and stone age. The exception to this is a small remnant of the military forces, who have now banded together as the last bastion of civilization. This is all very interesting, especially if you consider the intermediate period in which society is starting to stagnate but the military is still organized and powerful enough to maintain the former state of things within its ranks. Now, as the military forces finally start to fall, Breeze Barton emerges to rally them and rebuild a non-war-based society.

In conclusion, Breeze Barton is a fellow from a near-future alternate history and then a moderate-future alternate history (but both in the past as far as we're concerned) with a bit of dimensional travel in between. Also he is eventually and inexplicably brought back to die in a 2012 Marvel Zombies book. (Daring Mystery Comics 003, 1940)

Categorized in: Day Jobs (Military), Origin (Heroes of the Future)

the Phantom Reporter:

The Phantom Reporter is actually Dick Jones, smart alec cub reporter for the Daily Express, and like his fellow news-themed super-hero the Press Guardian I really must stress that making such a clear link between your secret and public identities is a bad idea in the long run. Why, if Clark Kent had chosen "Super-Reporter" as his nom de geurre, Lois Lane would've been on him like a hawk.

There are no shortage of suit-wearing mystery men in comics (though as mentioned in the Mister E entry, not so many in Marvel Comics) and they all trend toward the mildly superhuman in their physical prowess. The Phantom Reporter goes a bit farther than that, with a punch so powerful that he straight-up kills his first three opponents with his bare mitts. There was only the one Golden Age adventure for the Reporter, so we cannot say if this trend would have continued or not but it definitely would have set him apart from the regular vigilante crowd.

Dick "the Phantom Reporter" Jones is of course eventually brought back in The Twelve just like Mr E and the Laughing Mask, in his case as the audience surrogate. One thing that falls by the wayside in the course of this is the fact that newspaper reporter Dick "the Phantom Reporter" Jones is also a wealthy socialite named Mr van Ergen, with the implication being that van Ergen is the real, original guy and that Jones and the Reporter are both alternate identities. Interesting, but not particularly conducive to being an everyman character. (Daring Mystery Comics 003, 1940)

Categorized in: Day Jobs (Newspaper Reporters), Professions (Journalism), Supranormal (Phantoms)

ALIENS AND SO FORTH ROUND-UP 034

We got your aliens right here.

Martians: 

While I think that we might have a couple of Fletcher Hanks aliens in our future, the number is definitely going down at a fairly rapid clip, so let's enjoy these here Martians while we have them. Like so many aliens, these guys are looking to conquer the Earth, and like so many Fletcher Hanks antagonists they have come up with a completely bonkers and over-the-top method of doing so: by stupefying the entire population with gas and then loading them all into individual rocket pods that are then shot into space to drift forever. This is a Whirlwind Carter adventure and thus set in an undefined future date, which means that the Earth's population is effectively a big question mark, but the Martians have to be firing off billions of these things, right?

Perhaps this is why these fellows look so satisfied as they look out over a conquered New York, because they have just put in a very hard day's work to get it.

Like I said: this is a Whirlwind Carter story, and the key thing about Whirlwind Carter is that he lives on Venus and is thus not present for the Martian gas attack. Carter rounds up the stranded Earthians and employs them as the crew of a space fleet to take back the planet using a combination of gas and hand-to-hand street combat.

It makes only a brief appearance in the issue, but perhaps the most intriguing thing that we see in this issue is the Martian vapor arm that is deployed to kidnap Carter's partner Brenda. Is it a creature? A technology? Something that Martians can just do? Throw these questions on the big Never To Be Answered pile. (Daring Mystery Comics 004, 1940)

Hawk-Men:

The people of Earth in the year 3090 CE are being troubled by a series of bright flashes in the clouds, and when troubleshooter Planet Payson flies up to investigate the cause he discovers a hitherto-unknown society of winged people called the Hawk-Men living in a floating city. The flashes turn out to be ray gun blasts, resulting from a war that the Hawk-Men are engaged in with a second, unnamed group of cloud-dwellers. It's not entirely clear whether the Hawk-Men are a separate species, an offshoot of humanity or simply a group of humans who have bioengineered themselves some wings and taken to the skies, but what is clear is that they were pretty directly inspired by Vultan and the other Hawkmen of Flash Gordon fame. Just look at this Brian Blessed-ass Hawk Commander, for gosh sakes.

Payson and his companions take it upon themselves to stop the war by invading the cloud city of the other side (unnamed, but led by a jerk named Buzzlark). They aren't particularly successful, but while Buzzlark is gloating over them after sticking them in some clear tubes, the Hawk Commander is able to sneak in and assassinate him. War over on account of coup t'etat!

Another technology shout-out: this zippy little one-man tank that Buzzlarks men patrol his city in. (Planet Comics 002, 1940)

Hawkmen:

Speaking of things that are pretty clearly inspired by Flash Gordon, I now realize that that is exactly what the Rocket's adventures in and around the Diamond Empire are, and what would a Flash Gordon pastiche be without some Hawkmen? These particular Hawkmen are introduced in the person of Prince Falkar, who meets the Rocket and the Queen of Diamonds during a pitched battle with some Lizard-Men and becomes their staunch ally thereafter. After a brief interlude with some Ape-Men, he brings the duo back home to the Hawk Kingdom with him.

Rocket and the Queen's visit to the Hawk Kingdom causes some Big Problems: Falkor's fiance Princess Abbie becomes in turn jealous of the Queen and then attracted to Rocket, and the latter's rejection of her in favour of the former inspires her to assassinate the King and take the throne for herself. Falkor is forced to flee his home for the Diamond Empire, and as of the end of the series is still waiting for a little help in reclaiming his rightful throne. (Pep Comics 004, 1940)

Headless Men:

When scientists discover a weird new asteroid, space adventurer Buzz Crandall and his aide Sandra Curan are sent out to investigate. They discover a species of humanoids held in servitude by a bunch of big pitcher plants (who are not really ever given a name other than Plants, so that's what we'll go with).

The Headless Men have been systematically bred by the Plants into small, low-intellect, easy-to-control  creatures by the Plants, but the downside to this is that they are now too feeble to fix a problem that has developed in the solar concentrators that the Plants derive sustenance from. Buzz fixes this problem under threat and is immediately betrayed, and he and Sandra are eaten by the Plant king.

The Headless Men are not, it turns out, completely without volition, and rise up in defense of Buzz and Sandra. Under Buzz' direction the solar concentrators are repurposed into heat weapons that fry the Plant population instead of feeding them. (Planet Comics 005, 1940)

MINOR SUPER-HERO ROUND-UP 085

Welcome to "The Four Characters Least Likely to Return in a Modern Comic" Theatre.

Marvex the Super-Robot: 

Marvex the Super-Robot! Created to be a slave by a Fifth Dimensional jerk named Bolo, Marvex rejects his fate, kills Bolo and his associates and accidentally blasts himself to Earth while smashing up Bolo's lab equipment.

If you're already aware of who Marvex is then it's likely because of the Michael Kupperman strip featuring the character during Marvel's 70th Anniversary run of comics, and indeed, Marvex' propensities for cartoonish violence, shutting down romance with sudden nudity and receiving twenty dollars all make him a perfect Kupperman character.

Sadly, the nudity and twenty dollar reward system go the way of Marvex' hair in his second and third appearances, but he never stops yelling about being a robot whenever his companion Clara gets a bit too comfortable around him. (Daring Mystery Comics 003, 1940)

Categorized in: Language (Superlatives - Super), Origins (Extradimensional, Robot), Supranormal Beings (Robots)

the Falcon:

The Falcon is Carl Burgess, assistant district attorney in an unnamed city who is kind of betraying the spirit of his office by meting out vigilante justice when he feels like the legal system isn't working. Though he is a pretty average costumed vigilante, the Falcon has precisely four interesting things to note. The first is that his name is weirdly close to that of Carl Burgos, the creator of the Human Torch. This might be a coincidence, but still. The second is of course that he is the original Marvel Falcon but by far the least-known of the half dozen or so Marvel characters to share that name.

Like the Eagle, the Falcon is a bit of a fashion plate or at least someone who adjusts his costume on every adventure and for the same reason: a different artist on every one of his appearances.

Finally, the Falcon has been retroactively assigned an accessory based on an assumption, just like his fellow Daring Mystery Comics alum the Fiery Mask and his morning star. In this case, it's that his suit gives him the ability to glide. I assume that this is because of a stylistic choice on the part of his various illustrators to have him dive down on his enemies like a falcon stooping on prey, because the suit does not come up in his handful of Golden Age appearances. (Daring Mystery Comics 005, 1940)

Categorized in: Animals (Falcons), Day Jobs (Assistant District Attorneys)

Marvel Boy:

Up until about 2012 I'd have confidently said that "Marvel Boy" was one of the most commonly-shared super-hero identities in the Marvel Universe, but it seems that the concept of the legacy identity has gone through a weird mutation in the last decade or so and I am now regularly surprised to find that there are way more Wolverines or Captains America than I had previously imagined. With that in mind, we'll revise my statement to be that there are more Marvel Boys than you might expect, like Starmans over at DC.

This particular Marvel Boy is the Earthly reincarnation of Hercules, come down from Valhalla (?!) to aid a world threatened by fascism. His human form is named Martin Burns and like a veritable Silver Age Superboy he is born with so much physical strength that he must constantly hold himself back lest he endanger those around him and out himself as something strange and different.

On Martin's fourteenth birthday a mysterious stranger (who is implicitly the Roman god Jupiter) delivers a package containing his heroic costume to him and then somewhat redundantly also appears in his bedroom to really spell out his whole deal and charge him to uphold democracy etc.

Marvel Boy is super strong, very agile and fast enough to run from New York City to Washington DC and back - carrying three grown men on the first leg of the trip - in the course of a night that also includes the aforementioned visit from Jupiter and busting up two fifth column cells.

Both this Marvel Boy and his successor (coming up in 1942) never returned after making a single appearance, and while I can't say just why they didn't have further Golden Age adventures, the lack of a modern appearance for either of them is almost certainly down to the fact that their origins both revolve around a dead Hercules, who is in fact more often than not a very living second- or third-tier hero in the Marvel Universe. They're also both named Martin Burns for some reason, which means that later handbook writers have felt compelled to differentiate them by giving them middle names based on their creators, making this one Martin Simon Burns.

Frankly, I think that the fact that the two Marvel Boys have origins that are incompatible with both Marvel Comics continuity and also one another is terrific fodder for comic book storytelling. Both of them should be BRUNG BACK immediately, preferably in a comic that also has Hercules in it. (Daring Mystery Comics 006, 1940)

Categorized in: Generica (Boys), Language (Superlatives - Marvels), Origin (Reincarnated God) 

the Flying Flame:

The Flying Flame is a red fighter plane flown for the RAF by the two-fisted American pilot Captain Red Ruff, who is also known as the Flying Flame due to his shock of red hair. During his brief comic book career, Ruff battled the Black Ace and ferreted out some spies at an airbase. (Daring Mystery Comics 006, 1940)

Categorized in: Activities (Flying), Elements (Fire), Team Membership (RAF)