(Weird Comics 001, 1940)
The Sorceress of Zoom is just what it says on the tin: a sorceress from Zoom, which is a magical flying city that she lives in and controls. She's another of the Golden Age's surprisingly large number of headlining super-villains, only instead of being a mad scientist or a more conventional crook she is a mercurial magic woman who just kind of flies around harassing people. Sometimes she's almost okay and other times she's one of history's worst monsters - it's over all fun!
As has become the norm with these recurring villains, here is a litany of her crimes for 1940:
In her first outing, the Sorceress takes over a small American city for unclear reasons (a page is missing from the only available scan of the issue and I reckon that the answer lies there), but the main conflict involves the Sorceress' attempt to vamp a dude named Tom away from a lady named Janice.
Sorceress' Motivation: caprice, lust
Inhabitants of Zoom: This is the first appearance of the Sorceress of Zoom's most frequent henchmen, a group of unnamed gobliny humanoids
In Weird Comics 002, the Sorceress really ups the stakes. This might be her most villainous appearance, as she first attempts to get the king of Bango, a... European city-state? to surrender 300 people so that she can kill them and turn their corpses into her goblin-men, and when he refuses to do so, she razes the entire city and turns the slaughtered population of Bango en masse.
The only surviving Bangonian, Prince Paul, escapes to the nearby city-state of Zoda and when the Sorceress appears there, conceives of a plan to evaporate the cloud that Zoom sits upon - this marks the first of many times that Zoom is destroyed, but the Sorceress seems to be able to recreate it at will, so that's not as consequential as it seems.
I really enjoy the flying throne that the SoZ escapes on, so here it is.
Sorceress' Motivation: power
Inhabitants of Zoom: The same gobliny humanoids, now revealed to be necromantically created out of human corpses.
Weird Comics 003 really highlights the mercurial nature of the Sorceress' character, as she is fully the blameless protagonist here. She and her friend Allan are just hanging out in Zoom when a nefarious character called the Wizard attacks them and makes off with the entire dang city, forcing the Sorceress and the tuxedo-clad Allan to quest in search of it. The Wizard is number 1 of 5 upcoming Minor Super-Villain entries dealing with foes of the Sorceress, so more on him later.
Sorceress' Motivation: vengeance, good times
Inhabitants of Zoom: Seemingly just regular people, who are all slaughtered by the Wizard. The hazards of living in a magical city owned by a super-villain, I suppose.
In Weird Comics 004, the Sorceress attempts to ally with a fellow called the Wizard of Zoro to take over the US (? Possibly - a sense of place is not the strong suit of the Sorceress of Zoom comics), but he is too full of himself to work with someone else, making him the second of our future entries and giving the Sorceress a real opportunity to show off her flying, lion-driven carriage as she makes a brief tactical retreat.
The Sorceress once again threatens to return and steal someone's fairly generic man at the end of this one, and as far as is shown she never really follows up on these impulses.
Sorceress' Motivation: vengeance, lust
Inhabitants of Zoom: The coachmen above are the only ones shown, so presumably more regular people have decided to live on the edge by inhabiting a magical villain's lair.
Weird Comics 005 sees the Sorceress kidnapping the magical men who live in Nagpur, India, both to beef up her forces and to prove that she is better than them.
What the Sorceress doesn't count on is the fact that one of the magical men might have a magical son, and that magical son might effect a magical rescue. The magical men, once released, are able to prevent the Sorceress from making any more attempts to deprive them of their freedom.
This issue also attempts to inject some continuity and foreshadowing into the ongoing Sorceress of Zoom narrative with a bit of a cliffhanger about just what the general and the king in her cryo-chamber could be doing there. This is to my knowledge never revisited.
Sorceress' Motivation: pride, power
Inhabitants of Zoom: The gobliny humanoids are back!
In Weird Comics 006, a somewhat off-model Sorceress of Zoom attempts to take over the Middle East with the help of some dragons. This attempt is foiled by young Prince Ja'afar, who is gifted a protective amulet and a flying carpet by a friendly desert mage and invades Zoom to rescue his love, the Princess Shahzarad.
Sorceress' Motivation: power, lust
Inhabitants of Zoom: Slaves and dragons.
Weird Comics 007 sees the Sorceress transporting Zoom back in time to escape the chaos of the growing World War II. She ends up in Arthurian England, mixed up in a conflict between Sir Gareth of the Round Table (who she of course wants, carnally) and Morgana le Fay (upcoming minor super-villain 3/5), before being run out of town by Merlin.
Sorceress' Motivation: lust
Inhabitants of Zoom: Big beefy shirtless men, mostly.
The Weird Comics 008 story is the first of what I think will be a pattern of adventures going forward: the Sorceress rolls into some area and starts causing trouble, then gets into a scrap, then undoes some or all of the mischief that she caused and leaves. My theory is that this is what she does when she gets bored.
In this case, the Sorceress annoys a young couple and attempts to seduce the man away from the woman (who has been turned into flowers, natch), then attempts to conquer a nearby city before having a real tussle with upcoming villain 4/5, the Super-Scientist, and leaving (after turning the flowers back into a lady).
This issue also features the second time that Zoom is destroyed and recreated.
Sorceress' Motivation: lust, boredom, power
Inhabitants of Zoom: the very cool-looking Vapor Men.
Weird Comics 009 is another of these boredom issues, in which the Sorceress is ostensibly transporting some treasure out of the North African desert but really seems to just be having fun torturing the poor people who she has enslaved to do so. Eventually, she gets into a conflict with out final upcoming super-villain, Gobi, the Super-Wizard of the Desert, who wants to use the Sorceress' slaves as food for his vultures. Zoom is destroyed yet again this issue.
Sorceress' Motivation: wealth, boredom
Inhabitants of Zoom: None shown.
That's it for the Sorceress of Zoom in 1940: stay tuned for her 1941 adventures!
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