(Marvel Mystery Comics v1 021, 1941)
I like Prince Itor because he's a weenie. Not enough of those in the Golden Age. He's not even really the focus of this story, which ain't called "The Idol of Death" for nothing.
So: Morrison here owns the titular Idol and is loaning it to the Egyptian Museum, but the transfer process and time was leaked in the papers, which leads to at least half of he story being taken up with a heist that Prince Itor has absolutely no involvement in.
Itor himself doesn't get a lot of backstory: his family are presumably like those deposed European royals who are always mooching around high society, but for thousands instead of hundreds of years. Unless of course there is an ancient prophecy about the power of the pharaohs awakening in a completely unrelated family. Either would be good!
Itor does eventually get ahold of the idol, by the simple method of having his men take it off of the crooks who went to the hard work of actually stealing it. That pharaonic power turns out to have a kick to it, in the form of a bad case of monster-face.
Whatever powers the ancient monster-Pharaohs wielded do not get a full exploration, as Itor discovers pretty quickly that he can control the people around him. What follows is a pretty brief and unsuccessful attempt to destroy the Human Torch using a subwayful of commuters that ends when the Torch melts the idol and a fleeing Prince conveniently flings himself onto the third rail - no fuss, no muss.
But why did I call Prince Itor a weenie? Very simply it's because he's the kind of villain who hangs back and lets his employees do all of the work, whether it's stealing the idol or marching in mind-controlled lockstep against a man of living flame. He's the kind of bumbling aristocratic oaf who can't even escape without accidentally electrocuting himself - I love to loathe him. And as with every other good aristocratic oaf, he has a highly-competent aide to take care of all of the nitty-gritty for him
Nalda! The Jeeves to Itor's Wooster, if Jeeves was a pistol-wielding femme fatale in a cape and a pair of buccaneer gloves. Nalda! The kind of second-in-command that is clearly the power behind the throne. Nalda!
I was going to say that it's sad that Nalda only appears on a single page but no, I'm glad. That means that she survived the adventure and likely got away to empty Itor's bank accounts and set herself up in Madripoor or the like. She's probably still there, something like 105 years old, running her underground casino/ assassination service/ chain of cat cafes like a ruthless raisin. Godspeed, Nalda.
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