(Master Comics 015, 1941)
Mr Murder is your "pay or die" style of extortionist and a) has a pretty great name and b) is presumably in an early stage of his career as there is a lot more "die" going on than "pay".
Mr Murder also has a great understated costume: tunic, hat, cape, scarf, gloves. Just a bit off of what you might see someone actually wearing - nice and menacing in a Shadow sort of way.
And of course Mr Murder turns out to be Reilly, the loudmouthed lawyer from the beginning of the story, presumably using his position to determine opportune targets for extortion and employing my fave the rubberoid mask to disguise his identity. It's a fine outing over all but nothing special. The interesting stuff comes with Mr Murders further appearances:
Mr Murder reappears in Master Comics 027, 1942 and there are several weird things going on. The least of these is his decision to incorporate the rubberoid mask into his costume despite his identity no longer being a secret, but I guess that's no weirder than villains who continue to wear regular style masks in such circumstances.
More interesting is the fact that there seems to have been a Mr Murder/ Bulletman clash some time in between, during which a) Mr Murder found out Bulletman's secret identity and b) Bulletman was thought to have killed Mr Murder. As far as I can tell, this story was never published (I reckon that it's equally likely that a story was produced but never published or someone misremembered Mr Murder being in a story he wasn't), but the upshot of it is that Mr Murder is out for revenge and armed with the knowledge to do the deed. He kidnaps Jim Barr and almost succeds in bumping him off but has seemingly forgotten about the existence of Bulletgirl, leading to him getting his but kicked and dying for real.
OR DID HE? This marks our first encounter with the CRIME EXCHANGE, an organization run by future Minor Super-Villain the Crime Broker, the details of which are not germane other than the fact that at one point the Exchange members petition the Crime Broker to bump off Bulletman, a petition consisting mostly of deceased Bulletman villains. It's madness! A huge (dead) portion of Bulletman and Bulletgirl's rogues gallery, returned to life (or, less incredibly, sprung from prison) in a single panel! Madness!
Okay, maybe this is more exciting to me than anyone else but it is neat. And as someone whose official stance is that super-villains are more interesting when they're still alive I heartily approve.
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