Wednesday, September 11, 2024

MINOR SUPER-VILLAIN 611: THE COMMANDER

(Fantastic Comics 006, 1940)


It happened again. Space Smith and Dianna were just noodling along through space when they found themselves captured and transported to the surface of a strange world by strange aliens. In this case the world is the annoyingly named Vacuum Meteor and the aliens are the extremely cool Vacuumites.

Like the Robot Scientists before them, the Vacuumites don't seem quite sure what to do with their new prisoners - it seems to be an opportunistic kidnapping. Lucky for them they have the decisive mind of the Vacuumite Commander at hand.

The Commander orders that Space and Dianna be transformed into Vacuumites themselves using "vacuum ortho glows". This suggests some interesting things about whether Vacuumites are a species or a condition, like a Dungeons & Dragons undead type that arises when someone dies in a particular fashion. Are there freeze-dried space mummies in the Spelljammer setting? There should be.


Space and Dianna pull the old prisoner's trick of yelling about being sick and then konking your guard on the head when they come to check on you (which works way more often than it should - why do so many villains hire compassionate prison guards?). After that it's just a big brawl, during which the Commander makes an ill-advised unarmed charge ad a raygun-wielding Space Smith. An ignoble end for such a distinctive character.

(I just remembered that space is a magic gas or something in Spelljammer and so our theoretical vacuum mummies wouldn't work. Very sad)

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