REAL PERSON ROUND-UP 021

They just love putting real folks and versions of real folks in comics and I just love finding them and putting them on my blog. 

Adolf Hitler:

An in-all-but-name version of Hitler gets mad at Citizen Smith for foiling his plans and plots. (Captain Fearless Comics 002, 1941)

Gang boss and Deacon foe Duke Adare's little toothbrush mustache is what initially drew my attention, even though that wasn't nearly as glaring a signpost of a character being a Hitler stand-in in the 1940s. As the story wore on it became clear that my instincts were correct, as Adare used overwhelming military force to overwhelm the lawmen of Midland City and loot its treasury. And then of course you get to the end of the story, where they're referring to him as a "would-be Crime Fuehrer". (Cat-Man Comics 005, 1941)

Minor appearances: 

Captain Fearless Comics 001, 1941 

Al Capone: 

Lou Pacone, gang boss and murderer of the Secret Circle's father, is yet another example of Al Capone's name being remixed to give someone a gangstery sounding moniker. (Choice Comics 001, 1941)

Axis & Allied Figures: 

"America's Air Army" was an extremely patriotic feature that was essentially US Army Air Force fan fiction about what would happen if and when the United States entered WWII, published just before they did. It's the tale of the US forces (with a little help from the Brits) curb stomping the Axis for about half an hour before we get this little scene, with Hitler surrendering while Goering, Walther von Brauchitch (recently relieved of duty when this comic was published), Cordell Hull (I think) and Churchill observe. (Air Fighters v1 001, 1941) 

FDR: 

The President gets kidnapped by Dr Sivana! And Rescued by Captain Marvel! (Whiz Comics 014, 1941)

Minor Appearances: Captain Aero Comics 001, 1941

Lord Haw-Haw: 

In his final Golden Age adventure, the Arrow aka intelligence agent Ralph Payne heads into Germany to apprehend the traitorous broadcaster "Lord Hawford." (The Arrow 003, 1941) 

Manuel Prado Ugarteche: 

Lance O'Casey and his pal Dan'l Doom wash up on the shores of Peru and get mixed up in a scheme to overthrow the country by the wicked El Tigre. They foil him and restore power to the rightful president, Alfredo Blanco, who is extremely not Manuel Prado Ugarteche, the Peruvian president in our version of 1941. (Whiz Comics 015, 1941)

Rudolph Hess: 

"Deputy-Dictator Brinker" lands in a farmer's field near Washington in what is certainly a reference to Hess' flight to Scotland but is in fact revealed to be part of a plan to invade the US. The whole thing is nearly undone by the fact that the FBI doesn't even bother to check on this seeming defection and just tells the poor farmer to deal with it. (Captain Fearless Comics 002, 1941)

Sherlock Holmes:

Dr Miracle is on the trail of a mystery, and who better to help than the summoned spirit of Sherlock Holmes Herlock Sholmes? Per the conceit of the story I guess this means that Sholmes was a real living guy at some point. (Champ Comics 012, 1941)

Unknown Dancers: 

Yet again we have an example of "this seems like a reference to something but I can't find specifics," in this case a dance team known as Velox & Costanza. The concept of a duo performing cultural dances from exotic locales crops up now and then as entertainment in comics but I'm never sure if the references to them are general or specific, and brief fads in live entertainment are among the trickiest things to casually research on the internet - it's more of a "comb through several years' worth of newspapers" kind of thing. (Whiz Comics 023, 1941)

Walter Winchell: 

As an example of why I include the Unknown entries in these round-ups: I had Walter Chinwell here listed as "Unknown Reporter" for something like two weeks before I came across Walter Winchell's name in a list of 1940s radio announcers. And Winchell is someone I had already heard of! (Silver Streak Comics 008, 1941) 

MINOR SUPER-VILLAIN 906: THE VENGEFUL FOUR

(Whiz Comics 021, 1941)

The Vengeful Four is an example of a phenomenon that I am not sure is common enough that I need to come up with a special name for it: the big-name villain (in this case Dr Sivana) teaming up with a selection of nobodies as if they were equals. The Four Cards represent one other example of this, and the Penguin is a part of another called the Birds of a Feather that we will cover once we hit the year 1942. Are there more? Will I need to make up a term for this? We shall see.

 

The non-Sivana members of the Vengeful Four include gang boss Biggy Brix, who crawls away from his busted-up getaway car and straight into an opportunity to get revenge on Captain Marvel for busting it up;

Captain Death, a heavily cloak-based villain who I posited might be the same as the Captain Marvel foe and pirate submariner of the same name nearly three and a half years ago and I'm still not sure either way;

And finally Herr Geyer, one of the not-quite Nazis from the end of the Smasher Spy saga, who seems to have taken Captain Marvel's interference much harder than the several beatings he got from Spy Smasher both before and after he recovered his moral compass.

Since Dr Sivana already knows that Captain Marvel is actually Billy Batson, he hits upon a plan that is brilliant in its simplicity: send his three compatriots out into the city to find and kidnap Billy. Honestly, he should be doing this constantly, and frequently is, come to think of it.

(there is a part of me that objects to the concept of Sivana sharing this valuable information with just anyone, but I must acknowledge that this is as a result of decades of poisoning by comic book writing. Of course the best thing to do with a super-hero's secret identity is to spread it far and wide, and jealously guarding it is something that only serves to keep the status quo. Still feels weird to read, though)

Thanks to the fact that there is an unofficial Billy Batson convention going on in town, all three junior members of the Vengeful Four, though successful in grabbing a Billy Batson, do not get the Billy Batson. Though a setback, this does provide them with three ready-made hostages to draw the fourth Billy in and soon all available Billys Batson are loaded into a classic industrial deathtrap: the sawmill.

The Vengeful Four, to their extremely small credit, don't stick around to watch four teenage boys get bisected. This allows the Billys the opportunity to escape by pooling their voices and sending out a combined "SHAZAM" that is louder than the sawmill, thus not only allowing Original Billy to transform but incidentally transforming the other three into the Lieutenant Marvels thanks, presumably, to some lazy spell-writing on the wizard Shazam's part. 

The small aircraft that the Vengeful Four are travelling in is no match for four speeding super-guys and is soon nothing but a pile of smouldering wreckage - this is after all during the early part of Captain Marvel's career when he has no problem with killing a sufficiently dangerous foe. Dr Sivana will of course return, but for Biggy Brix, Captain Death and Herr Geyer this is the end of the line.

SUPER-VILLAIN 001 UPDATE: DR SIVANA (1941)

Dr Sivana's 1941 Whiz Comics appearances! What's that lil' scamp up to now?

Sivana starts 1941 with a bang, by developing a liquid that can reduce someone's age by up to 30 years. This is a surprisingly useful tool in the super-criminal's arsenal, as a series of bank messengers, security guards, cops and Billy Batson soon find out.

Dr Sivan's ultimate goal is of course another attempt to take over the United States of America. He very reasonably assumes that, having dosed the bulk of the army and turned them into toddlers, he and his army of goons can just waltz in and take over. The flaw in his plan is revealed when Captain Marvel (Billy having found the antidote to the youth formula and escaped) rounds up a bunch of old Civil War vets and de-ages them to defend the country.

(BONUS: there's none of that "now return to the quiet dignity of being old" hogwash in this story: all of the youthened veterans stay young at the end and re-enlist to help with national defense in the face of WWII) (Whiz Comics 013, 1941)

Dr Sivana's next appearance features him being put on trial for repeatedly attempting to conquer the US. He is of course found guilty and sentenced to 77 consecutive life sentences totalling over 9000 years (and servable with the help of some of that youth serum). Two things happen at this trial: Dr Sivana demonstrates a new breakthrough in intangibility studies as he simply walks through a wall and away from his sentencing, but more importantly this is where we learn that his full name is Thaddeus Bodog Sivana!

Unlocking the secrets of intangibility really seems to ignite Sivana's love of the super-villain game. He embarks on a crime spree that includes bombings, espionage, the robbery of the "Fort Gnox" gold reserve and a series of kidnappings of high-level government officials that culminates in the capture of the dang President himself.

He also kidnaps Billy Batson mid-radio broadcast, and transports him to a room hewn out of living granite, deep under a mountain before he can turn into Captain Marvel. 

Capturing Captain Marvel turns out to be a classic case of villain's hubris, as he is able to use the Wisdom of Solomon to work out just exactly how Sivana has been doing his intangibility trick: by mathematically calculating the positions of all of the atoms in a surface and then slipping his own atoms past them. While effective, this method of travel proves to be difficult to do properly when one is being chased by Captain Marvel, as Dr Sivana's chin soon learns.

This method of travelling through matter also turn out to have another drawback: every time you use it you end up leaving a little bit of yourself behind, and after an extended chase with Captain Marvel, Dr Sivana has lost so much of himself that he loses all molecular cohesion and dissipates. (Whiz Comics 014, 1941)

A little thing like being turned into vapour can't stop a guy like Dr Sivana, however. He returns, dressed in an extremely unfortunate Old Chinese Man outfit, and lures Billy Batson into his lair with the help of an unwitting Beautia. Billy is rendered powerless here by what I consider to be Sivana's greatest invention: a little box that goes "ozzle ozzle" and drowns him out every time he tries to yell "Shazam." It's brilliant in its simplicity, and the kind of thing that only a villain who knows his enemy's secret identity can come up with.

Dr Sivana's lastest scheme involves raising a horde of the froglike Venusian Glompers on Earth and then using them to take over not just the US but the entire planet.

Billy eventually makes an escape attempt, and though he doesn't get far the ozzlebox is broken. Dr Sivana attempts to counter Captain Marvel by unleashing his beefy son Magnificus, but this turns out to be a Bad Move, as their battle causes a rockslide and Sivana is beaned by a boulder that is the same size as him.

Since Dr Sivana appears to be at death's door, Beautia finally feels free to reveal his origin: he was once an idealistic scientist who wanted to improve the lot of all mankind but found himself hounded by greedy capitalists who benefited more from the current state of things. Bitter and disillusioned, he took his two young children - Beautia and Magnificus - and moved to Venus, where they grew into kind and decent physical paragons and he shrivelled up into the evil little scientist we all know and love.

Sivana's kids take him back to Venus, to die, presumably. (Whiz Comics 015, 1941)

Dr Sivana returns without fanfare in the pages of Captain Marvel Adventures, and then back in his old stomping grounds of Whiz Comics he sets out to get revenge on Billy/Captain Marvel by mysteriously growing a big muscular body. Though he captures Billy without trouble, he again makes the classic villain's mistake of leaving him tied up to deal with later rather than finishing him off without delay, which of course leaves an opening for a friendly organ grinder's monkey to scuttle in and free him.

This is the first instance of Sivana becoming physically as well as mentally powerful and he really gets into it with some local bullies. It's a pattern that will reoccur throughout the years - becoming a big strong tough guy becomes almost as much of a preoccupation for Sivana as conquering the US is at some points, and he always seems to have a ball once he achieves his goal.

This time around, Sivana has achieved beefcake status by building himself a robotic exoskeleton, but sadly for him no mere machine is a match for the world's mightiest mortal. Better luck next time, Thaddeus. (Whiz Comics 020, 1941)

Dr Sivana makes one more appearance in Whiz Comics in 1941, but since it's as a part of a team, we will be covering it in a separate entry.