Saturday, October 19, 2024

MINOR SUPER-VILLAIN 645: SNEELY

(Fight Comics 004, 1940)

Kinks Mason is deep sea fishing with some friend when one of them lands a swordfish that is covered in gold and jewels! Just where did these riches come from? The answer is unguessable!


Upon reaching the ocean floor, Kinks discovers that the swordfish was covered in pirate gold, and furthermore, he finds the pirate! Sneely (Pirate Terror of the Seven Seas, the Great, the Magnificent) is an old-time pirate who claims that he drank a magic potion that allowed him to live seemingly indefinitely underwater and who guards his ill-gotten treasure both personally and with a school of trained swordfish. Is attaining near-immortality and then spending it guarding a pile of shiny metal that only has value if you actually spend it on something a huge waste? Indeed it is! It's absolute dragon behaviour is what it is.

Sneely is exactly the kind of weird wild completely un-fleshed-out villain that you get for a character like Kinks Mason who a) isn't one of the real top-tier guys in the book he appears in and b) has a niche role. Every issue, Kinks dives into the ocean for 5 to 8 pages and he has to find a challenge to overcome down there and sometimes it's a, immortal amphibious pirate with the world's most Xtreme Hoarding Problem. 

Probably the best thing about Sneely is the one that never got capitalized on: that he's seemingly still alive at the end of the story, as Kinks Mason just konks him on the head with a thighbone before making off with the treasure. And while an immortal amphibious pirate squatting on a pile of gold at the bottom of the ocean is a bit of an underwhelming idea for a comic book, an immortal amphibious pirate who Wants His Treasure Back is a cool recurring enemy. I say BRING BACK Sneely, in concept if not as an actual character.

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