Tuesday, January 7, 2025

MINOR SUPER-VILLAIN 699: AGRA

(Planet Comics 002, 1940)


We are introduced to Agra when Earth-woman Ava bursts in to Auro. Lord of Jupiter's court to warn him that Agra intends to kill him. She really talks up Agra's prowess vis-a-vis elephant- human- and tree-slaying, and hopefully takes the time to describe his outfit which for all the world looks like it was designed by Mike Grell just after he finished with Disco Era Cosmic Boy.


Auro of course does not know the meaning of the word retreat, even after suffering a particularly gruesome-sounding wound at the fangs of an escaped gorilla that he can only blame himself for having in his palace in the first place

Agra and his band of hooligans soon arrive to force the confrontation, despite the protestations of Auro's followers. The important thing to not here is the stripe of hair running down each of these guys' heads, which is the sign that they are Jovians and makes it easy to tell when someone in an Auro strip is an Earth human or not. Except when the artist forgets. Or when it's clearly a generic jungle adventure with "AURO"  and "JUPITER" written in as appropriate. Also, I think that Jovian women probably have regular-style hair because Golden Age artists could not countenance drawing a dame without some flowing locks.


All this build up of Agra was of course just just to build up how mighty Auro is for not only defeating him one handed but doing it with a single punch. An effective narrative technique, albeit one that ends up in a high mortality rate for third-string super-villains in later years.

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