MINOR SUPER-VILLAIN 664: THE DEVIL

(Jungle Comics 007, 1940)

Camilla, Queen of the Lost Empire, having made the transition from capricious villain to noble hero and staved off a couple of attempts on her throne and her life, is getting ambitious. She is determined to descend into the Cave of Sighs, a local portal to Hell, and banish the Devil from her lands.

Together with the reformed assassin Caredodo, Camilla passes the Copper Gates of Hell after a brief encounter with one of my favourite things: an anthropomorphic personification! Specifically, they encounter Temptation, who almost ensnares poor Caredodo with her wiles and mug of delicious-looking potion before Camilla sends her packing.

Also there to greet them is Mephistopheles of Faust fame in a much more charming turn than comic book demons usually get to be, probably as a deliberate contrast to the main attraction, the Devil himself, in a wildly more grotesque form than one usually sees in comics before the late Sixties. Ordinarily, your Devils and Satans are a lot closer to Mephistopheles there than this soggy lump of flesh and even the more monstrous of the bunch are still red humanoids along the lines of MLJ's Devil.

The Devil wants Camilla's help to escape into the world of man and take over the place. Ambitious, sure, but a bit pedestrian for Satan himself. What use is temporal power to the Lord of Hell?

In a slightly odd turn of events, Camilla defeats the Devil by hewing a cross out of stone and holding him at bay with it. Since Camilla originally worshipped Thor and the other Norse gods and later restored her empire with the aid of the pantheon-unspecified god Bal, I had assumed that the Lost Empire was established some time before the conversion of the Norse to Christianity. I'd be tempted to blame that pill Jon Dale for converting her but she has engaged in some paganism since his departure from the strip, so I am forced to conclude that Camila subscribes to some sort of syncretic faith that incorporates elements of many religions. Fun!

(This is also the mission that ends with the Angel of Faith rewarding Camilla by transforming Caredodo from a Nottie to the Hottie Sir Champion, in case you were curious about when that happened)

MINOR SUPER-VILLAIN 556: THE DEVIL

(Wonderworld Comics 003, 1939)

Maybe it's because the MLJ version of the Devil is so fresh in my mind but... this is an underwhelming version of the Devil. He teams up with Death - and it's a measure of how lacklustre this Devil is that I'm going to deal with the Death separately rather than treat them as a duo - to eliminate their common enemy Yarko the Great. Death does all the legwork toward this goal so we'll discuss that later (I am however going to count them as our first Revenge Squad, one of the best things in comics).

Aesthetically, this is a classic Devil, though one missing the trident and tail. And like many interpretations of the classic Devil, it suffers from the fact that it looks like a guy in a costume, down to the fact that the horns seem to be incorporated into a cowl rather than being organic. And that can work! I've seen plenty of interpretations of the purposely foppish Devil getting one over on those who underestimate him. This Devil, by contrast, has a guy named Beppo with a knife and a skin-tone shirt.

The Devil does in fairness manage to capture Yarko by the simple expedient of having his other, non-Beppo henchman (Killer Kirby, if you must know) blindfold his magic eyes. The Devil attempts to roast Yarko alive in a special chamber but Yarko escapes by the simple expedient of wiggling his magic eyes out from under the blindfold, and any deathtrap that a guy can blink his way out of has got to be counted as a dud.

With Yarko free, the devil is immediately

BANISHED TO HELL

and it says something that the coolest part of his whole endeavour is the moment that he was soundly defeated. Frankly, he might as well have been a costumed gang boss as the Prince of the Damned, and it just occurred to me how wild it would be if he was just a guy in a costume trying to put one over on Yarko and getting banished to Hades for his efforts. Real of Fake, the Devil bit off more than he could chew.

MINOR SUPER-VILLAIN 532: THE DEVIL

(Blue Ribbon Comics 019, 1941)

This is the same guy as the Dictator but on his time off, I guess? Mr Justice kind of gave up on him after the Green Ghoul incident - maybe he just couldn't get up the energy to keep running a Nazi Germany analog.

I think he continues to pop up and empower Mr Justice foes but more importantly he has some very cute little trident-wielding imp goons. No hell-dimension is complete without them!

MINOR SUPER-VILLAIN 430: THE DEVIL

(Mystery Men Comics 007, 1940) 

I can't help but love this guy: yes he's a cheap extortionist who gives himself a scary name to enhance his death threats but he goes to the trouble of dressing up in a devil outfit even while sneaking around so that nobody can see him. And since he's the antagonist of a Wing Turner story and Wing Turner is a pilot-detective, the Devil is flying around in a fighter plane dressed in little horns and red briefs (and appears to be barefoot, which must be uncomfortable if flying a plane involves working any pedals). There's just something about a costumed pilot that is wildly endearing.

The Devil of course turns out to be Baldy Barry, a regular extortionist who jumps into a lava pit rather than be caught. Over the top for an extortion charge I reckon, but at least he was on brand to the end.

MINOR SUPER-VILLAIN 191: THE DEVIL

(Crack Comics 007, 1940) 

There is no textual evidence for this, but since this guy is dressed exactly like the unnamed boss of the Skull Gang (plus some rad horns) and uses the very similar tactic of dosing his minions (the Robbers from Hades - good name) with toxins that make them all shriveled and weird (and in this case more pliable and obedient), I like to think that it's the same guy back for another shot at making his fortune in the crime boss game, albeit without taking the very sensible precaution of, say, switching cities or otherwise trying to avoid the Clock. This time, alas, he meets his end, so we won't be treated to a green-hooded man with a tail leading squads of Demonic Monkey Marauders, or a green-hooded man with a tinfoil halo commanding his Larceny Angels. Sad days.