MINOR SUPER-VILLAIN 268: GNORR

(Marvel Mystery Comics v1 013, 1940)

 

The history of spaceflight is of course very different in a super-hero universe. For example, Empress Nara of Ligra, featured in a previous post about Professor Zog being knighted, was actually an Earth-woman who arrived on Ligra as an infant because her father invented an interstellar spacecraft sometime around 1920 or so. This it is practically unremarkable that Professor Zog was invited on a trip to the Moon in 1940 by Dr Simon Crane and his daughter Betty. Also Electro came along.

And having reached the Moon almost 30 years earlier than we in this dimension did, Zog and the Cranes encountered the other side of the super-hero universe coin (if the first side read EASY SPACE TRAVEL, that is): there's always going to be one or more evil space-creeps when you get where you're going.

In this case, the space-creep is Gnorr, self-styled Emperor of the Moon! Last of his kind, thousands of years old and cute as hell! Just a big roly poly head with four wee little tentacles and a wall-eye: I love him. Too bad for him and me that he set his sights on the conquest of Earth, because that's always the cue for Professor Zog to take a hand - Gnorr ends up blown to high heaven and the Marvel Universe was poorer for it.

Gnorr also has some pretty great moon-robots in his employ, for the record.

MINOR SUPER-VILLAIN 267: THE SHARK

(Marvel Mystery Comics v1 012)

The Shark is a submarine pirate, a thing that is fairly common in comic books and as far as I can tell has never actually happened in real life. He's a bit more ambitious than most such guys, and at the beginning of this particular story is trying parlay a successful streak of piracy into a general toll on shipping. He's also a pretty snappy dresser.

The US, of course, does not take an extortion attempt at such scale lightly, and Professor Zog is brought in to send Electro after the scoundrels, leading to the Shark learning the second rule of having a hard-to-access undersea dome HQ (the first rule being that it rules): if a giant super-robot gets into your dome, there's nowhere to run.

The third rule of having a hard-to-access undersea dome HQ is that YOU NEED TO EVACUATE AT THE FIRST SIGN OF TROUBLE. Don't try to capture the giant robot and put it in the atom-smasher. Do make a run for the submarine while your more expendable minions distract it. Otherwise you could end up like the Shark: smushed into jelly by the pressure of the ocean depths.

BONUS HONOURS: Professor Zog gets a Congressional medal of some sort from FDR! They're not just telegram pals anymore!

MINOR SUPER-VILLAIN 266: DR BRUNO VAROZ

(Marvel Mystery Comics v1 010, 1940) 

I like this guy. This guy is the fun kind of mad scientist with a lot of fun details. First of all he lives in a castle roughly the same size as the island it sits on, off the coast of Cuba. Secondly, he follows the rules of Mad Scientist Grooming, which state that they must either be impeccably groomed or, as with Dr Varoz here, look like they woke up in a compost heap.

Varoz' great discovery is a formula for artificial blood, which he uses to bring the dead back to life. Like aerial torpedoes (missiles) and airplane detectors (RADAR), artificial blood as something that both real-world and comic book people were trying to perfect in the 40s, but unlike the former we still haven't quite gotten the handle on artificial blood, probably because it always seems to turn people into draculas or monsters or, as here, a bunch of skull-faced science revenants.

And there's a lot to like about these guys! They look great for one, they're seemingly unstoppable for two, even though there's nothing stopping them from being killed again - I guess they're just too scary to stop.

They're also intelligent, which rules, and which is why they're science revenants and not science zombies. They talk, fly planes, fire guns... Dr Varoz can stay forgotten as far as I'm concerned, but I would love to see his Corpse-Beings BRUNG BACK in some capacity.

(I really like that the animated corpse is afraid of Electro)

Dr Bruno Varoz' other two claims to fame are this excellent two-headed monster and a pretty cold-blooded death via being thrown by Electro into the same acid pit pictured above; The monster, unaccounted for at the end of the story, would also be a welcome sight in a modern comic, if only in one of those crowd shots on Monster Island or in the Mole Man's tunnels.

CREEPS OF THE WORLD: GHOULS

(Marvel Mystery Comics v1 010, 1940)

If there's one thing you can say about just about any given super-hero universe it's that any given cave, canyon or unguarded parking lot will have its own little group of creeps who lurk in it and are just spoiling for a chance to get up to mischief.

Our inaugural creeps are the Ghouls!

Hailing from volcanic caverns beneath the Blue Ridge Mountains, Ghouls just love to gather up hot ladies for volcanic sacrifice. They love big fur underwear and big rag shoes and hate when a super-hero like the Angel shows up to foil their religious observances. Good job, Ghouls! 

There are also what seem to be giant ghouls in the same cave system. Not nearly as interesting, but still creeps.

HONOURS - PROFESSOR ZOG

(Marvel Mystery Comics v1 009, 1940) 

Professor Zog is made an Honorary Knight of Ligra for his services in the war between the Lion-People and the Dragon-Men. If the Lion-Person in the background looks a bit disgruntled it is perhaps because Zog was originally coerced into fighting on the Dragon-Men's side and really did a number on the Lion-People's army before getting free. This is possibly why he only gets to be an honorary knight.

MINOR SUPER-VILLAIN 265: THE MAD DOCTOR

(Marvel Mystery Comics v1 009, 1940)

This one, while not being particularly spectacular as a whole does contain a lot of fun elements. Let's count them off!

We open on our hero one a one-issue trip to Europe (1) where he pooh-poohs the local superstitions (2) about a castle full of vampires who steal young women (3).

The Angel - for it is he who pooh-poohs - quickly gets mixed up in an attempted vampiric abduction and, surprise surprise, the guy isn't actually a vampire at all (4). A shame, because I love it when vampires are wretched little weasels instead of cool guys in evening wear.

It turns out that the supposed vampire clan is actually a front for an unnamed mad scientist - "Mad Doctor" is a captions-only unofficial name (5) - who is kidnapping the young women for use as test subjects (6) in his mind-swapping machine (7) and he intends to place his latest victim's mind into the body of a gorilla (8).

Lucky for the hapless fraulein, the Angel shows up, there is a fracas and the whole place ends up exploding (9).

MINOR SUPER-VILLAIN 264: THE VOICE

(Marvel Mystery Comics v1 006, 1940)

The Voice! Mysterious drug kingpin of San Francisco! Nobody has seen his face, not even his henchmen!

The Voice! Using loudspeakers and radios, he coordinates his operations from a hidden place of safety!

The Voice! Is a street-level supercrook who has the misfortune to be operating in a story about Electro, Marvel of the Age! All his precautions are as nothing against the giant remote-controlled robot! Adding insult to injury, he isn't even the main focus of the story, as Electro is on a nation-wide anti-drug crusade. Poor the Voice.

BONUS HONOURS: Professor Zog gets a telegram of congratulations from FDR!

MINOR SUPER-HERO 034: ELECTRO

(Marvel Mystery Comics 004-019, 1940-1941) 

Hey look, it's Electro, Marvel of the Age! I love that guy!

Or rather I love Electro's creator/ mental pilot, Professor Philo Zog (later amended to Zogolowski because heaven forfend that someone have a weird name). It's not often that a weird nerd with a scraggly beard gets to be the hero.

I also love Zog's plan: hire a bunch of husky young men to act as his agents in various parts of the US, who then call in Electro as necessary. They eventually get phased out in favour of more Zog-time but I love them while they last. Also, in their first appearance they're referred to as Zog's "Machine of Righteousness" and that's what I think of them as because as a name, it rules.

Zog later shows up in a period piece or two, but it's Electro who eventually gets brung back by J. Michael Straczynski in The Twelve, making this the inaugural edition of THE TWELVE REPORT, a review of just how our pals fared in that book.

Electro got done somewhat dirty by J. Michael: The incident that put the other eleven heroes in suspended animation also severed the mental connection required to drive the robot. and Zog subsequently died of mental withdrawal. It might have taken a while though? His daughter Elizabeth shows up in the series and she is definitely not drown or styled as the 60+ year-old she would have to be if Zog kicked the bucket in 1945.

As for Electro itself, it was basically a narrative device in the book, acting as a combo murder weapon and witness. Ultimately it ends up being driven around the Middle East by the Laughing Mask. Ho hum.

Maybe I'll work out a 1-12 scale of how well I reckon the characters in The Twelve ended up being treated but it's hard to do with only one of them, you know?

MINOR SUPER-VILLAIN 263: BUTCH

(Marvel Mystery Comics 004, 1940)

Probably the least of the Superstrong Giant Henchman types we've seen so far, Butch is very briefly the scourge of an unnamed city under the command of gang boss Brink, until he gets dropped off a building by the Angel. 

Nothing specifically bad about this guy - there's just not much that's specifically interesting about him. It might be fun to see him get brought back as an example of an early mutant but that's about it.

NOTES: APRIL 2023

One must always take note of what super-hero costumes were made of in the age before spandex. In this case, the Sub-Mariner is sporting wool trunks.

(Marvel Mystery Comics 004, 1940) 

MINOR SUPER-VILLAIN 262: DR MANYAC & THE GREEN FLAME

(Marvel Mystery Comics v1 004, 1940)

Dr Manyac here is a perfectly fine criminal scientist with a very good name. It's just too bad for him that he is in the very common position of being completely overshadowed by his henchmen:

THE GREEN FLAME! Very very cool looking guys who are also some of our first simple examples of evil opposites, as their green flame burns cold to contend with our pal the red-hot Human Torch. Using the threat of the Green Flame's cold causing buildings to crumble and collapse, Manyac aims to ransom New York for big bux.

Unfortunately for his plans, and especially for his henchmen, the Green Flame's suits aren't quite robust enough to stand up to the Human Torch's flame. They all end up roasted, while Manyac is carted off to jail, never to be seen again (until he's brought back and killed off in 2009, natch)

MINOR SUPER-VILLAIN 261: THE SACRED ONE

(Marvel Mystery Comics v1 003, 1940)

The Sacred one is a pretty bog-standard cult leader in a way that was cliched even in 1940: he's got a bunch of people in a castle in the New York countryside somewhere and they kidnap beautiful white women to sacrifice to their Fire God until the Angel shows up to murderize them. 

The only really interesting things about him are the questions that the loose plotting leaves you with: he has hypnotic powers - were these given to him by the Fire God or did he have them already and use them to set himself up as a cult leader? Are all of these guys sequentially using the same castle or is NY just lousy with them?

The biggest question (and the creepiest part of the story) is what exactly is the nature of the Sacred One's cult. Once he takes a header into his own pit trap, the cultists all silently line up and shrink down into nothingness. Is this the Sacred One's death curse? Some sort of ritual suicide? Did they never actually exist in the first place but rather were the creations of either the Sacred One or the Fire God? We will never know!

DYNAMIC ACTION MARTIANS!

(Marvel Mystery Comics 003, 1940) 

These Martian invaders who showed up for one Human Torch story in 1940 are definitely my favourite comic book aliens in a while, if only because of this extremely cool car stunt.

MINOR SUPER-VILLAIN 260: THE SIX BIG MEN

(Marvel Comics v1 001, 1939)

The Six Big Men ain't much, just a bunch of guys who teamed up to do the maximum amount of Crime possible in an unidentified American city. But I am including them in this list, for two reasons: 1. they're the first even marginal minor super-villains in Marvel Comics (I of course know about Timely Comics, pedants, but I round up) history, and 2. the Six Big Men are actually Seven Big Men and One Big Woman, and I love me some nominative misdirection.

So it's like this: the Six Big Men work for Dr Lang (above, middle, bottom) and his associate Lil, with an agreement to split all earnings evenly at the end of one year. Lang and Lil, preferring to reap the entire profit themselves, hatch a plot that involves Lang forming a citizen's group to combat crime and influencing that group to bring in bigger-deal-in-the--golden-Age super-hero the Angel to kill everyone.

And it almost works! The Angel kills basically everyone! The one flaw, of course, is that Lang does very little to cover his tracks and also drew attention to himself in the first place. Ah well, it's early days in the Timely Marvel Universe.

PANEL FUN

(Funnies 001, 1936)

Top notch dinosaur illustration. 

PANEL FUN

(Funnies 001, 1946)

Really great scared hair on the kid with the braids.

MINOR SUPER-HERO 033: THE GHOST OF FLANDERS

(Hit Comics 018-025, 1941-1942)

I know I talk about how wild the origins of various characters are a lot on here, and I don't think that I can justify declaring one or another "the most wild" anymore, but the Ghost of Flanders would absolutely have to appear on any reasonably comprehensive Top Ten Characters Who Will Amaze and Befuddle You With Their Wild Origins list.

The Ghost of Flanders is in reality Rip Graves, who enlisted in the US Army during WWI and was basically immediately captured (as the Battle of the Marne took place in July 1918) and spent the rest of the war in a prison camp. This is not especially wild, although it does allow us to know that Graves is 37, a bit older than your typical super-hero (and of course if some enterprising comics writer decides to bring back the Ghost of Flanders for some reason he will automatically be the oldest living WWI veteran)

The first really wild thing about Rip Graves is this: he is the Unknow Soldier, as in Tomb of the. Now, I looked up the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier the first time I read this story, and checked again just now, and not only is there, you know, a human corpse buried in it but it's one that they went to reasonable lengths to make sure was, you know, unknown (in short, they located six unidentified US casualties and then had someone choose one at random). "This guy who we know the identity of but don't have a body for" is almost exactly the opposite of that, in fact.

Wanting to serve his country but not wanting to own up to being alive because for some reason he believes that the powerful symbolism of the Unknown Soldier will be ruined if it isn't him specifically, Rip does a normal comics thing and decides to become a costumed vigilante. And what does every costumed vigilante need?

A secret HQ under a solemn national war monument! Yes, the first thing that Rip Graves does is dig himself out a little man cave underneath the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier, because it's his.

Other things about the Ghost of Flanders include:

-he is the only WWI-themed super-hero that I know of

-his calling card is a red poppy (natch)

-he uses WWI-era equipment including bayonets and a biplane, in a kind of natural extrapolation of something like the archer-hero and other users of archaic weaponry

-I can't say why he chose the unwieldy Ghost of Flanders name over the excellent Unknown Soldier, but it would take nearly thirty years for someone to take advantage of the excelent name that was just laying there.

In conclusion: the Ghost of Flanders, a bog-standard 1940s super-hero boom character in most ways, but one that makes me feel crazy to think about too much.