Saturday, October 1, 2022

MINOR SUPER-VILLAIN 169: THE SWAMP MASTER

(Blue Beetle Comics 010, 1941)


Once again I am faced with the painful dichotomy of a villain with all of the trappings I love - he's a bombastic loudmouth with a bunch of costumed henchmen, who uses simple trickery to appear superhuman - who uses them in service to some frankly uninspired crimes.

In this case, the Swamp Master (great name, too!) emerges from the swamp (natch) with his wet-suited Swampmen and a saurian monster that is actually a disguised series of cranes and flatcars. Driven by a lust for cold hard cash, he and the Swampmen steal whole trains and remove them to the swamp for looting.

The problem with this scheme is... everything? Stealing and looting entire trains (and murdering everyone on board!) might be a viable money-making scheme if you're mobile, but just sitting in one place and doing it over and over, particularly in a super-hero universe, is a surefire ticket to jail or the grave, and the Swamp Master is lucky that he got the former.

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