MINOR SUPER-VILLAIN 971: THE MONSTER

(Fantastic Comics 023, 1941)

The comic opens in media res, as a (the) Monster bursts into the hotel room of art critic Iona Hall and carries her off into the night. Cut to the Gorman Art Gallery the next day, where we see... Iona Hall!?

As you might have guessed, this isn't the real Iona Hall, and "famous art connoisseur" Dan Kenneth spots this when he is introduced to the false Hall by gallery owner Gorman. When Kenneth attempts to discover the reason for this imposture, however, he and the repentant fake are attacked by gun-toting goons and have to engage in a thrilling chase, and then, when he is able to ask the question a second time, the Monster shows up and carries away the double in the same manner as the original.

It's such a weird situation that Kenneth can't even convince the police to look into it lest he be thrown in the drunk tank for challenging their view of reality. He simply has to adopt a new identity as the vigilante Gladiator in order to knock the beast out and discover just what the heck is going on.

So what the heck is going on? It's perfectly simple: art collector Craven has a painting by the great artist Velasquez and wants to have both it and some more money. To that end here is his plan:

1. Bring in art critic Iona Hall
2. Kidnap Hall as the Monster
3. Replace Hall with lookalike June Starr
4. Have his crony Gorman sell the painting at auction
5. Buy his own painting for less than it's worth
6. Ask Dan Kenneth to give the painting the once-over for him
7. As the Monster again, steal the painting from Kenneth
8. Hold Kenneth responsible for the loss of the painting
9. Collect the money from Kenneth and enjoy it while the painting hangs in his home.

Some flaws in this plan include:

1. Iona Hall seems to be completely superfluous to the plan, unless she is there to authenticate the painting
2. Even if this is the case, kidnapping and replacing Hall is only necessary if the painting is fake, which it isn't
3. June Starr is an unwilling accomplice who acts against the plan at least three times - an unkidnapped Iona Hall is far preferable
4. The auction is completely unnecessary if Craven openly owns the painting - just ask Kenneth to clean it for you
5. Plus you've driven down the price by buying it cheap. Perhaps they sold it for the amount that they thought that they could get out of Kenneth, in which case they chose the wrong scam and they should have been doing:
6. Insurance fraud. The scam they should have been pulling was insurance fraud

All in all I must assume that Craven was just too excited about his cool monster suit and came up with a plan that allowed him to use it a couple of times, because that is the only lens through which this scheme makes a lick of sense.

Categorized in: Accessories (Personal Transport - Robotic Exoskeletons), Animals (Monsters), Narrative Footballs (Misc Origin Story Guys) 

MINOR SUPER-HERO ROUND-UP 094

Super-heroes, coincidentally arranged in ascending order of notability!

Kalkor:

A faithful priest of Isis c.1000 BC, Kalkor is restored to life at the same time as Nagana, the Queen of Evil, as a foil to her power. He is empowered with the same immortality and comic book magic as Nagana so that he may combat her effectively (and perhaps as a way for Isis to make up for crushing him to death as a byproduct of collapsing a temple on Nagana to put an end to her evil ways).  

Important note: though many Golden and Silver Age super-heroes may act like they have taken a vow of celibacy, Kalkor is one of the few who may have actually done so, as part of his Christianity-influenced version of Isis-worship. (Fantastic Comics 022, 1941)

Kalkor is not really a super-hero in the traditional sense - he doesn't roam around looking for guys mugging old ladies or Fifth Columnists sabotaging munitions factories. Instead, he follows Nagana around and foils whatever scheme she pursues in her ongoing effort to conquer the world. And like many characters who operate purely in reference to the actions of others, Kalkor is kind of dull.

In order to get around our era more easily, Kalkor adopts the funny-about-twenty-years-ago-our time alias of John Kerry. He also seems to shop at the same Big Coat Store as fellow Fox super-hero Samson.

Categorized in: Day Job (Priest), Origin (Divine Empowerment, Mystic Mutate, Resurrected Mystic Champion)

the Gladiator:

The Gladiator is Dan Kenneth, a "famous art connoisseur." This baffled me hardcore until I realized that there was a pretty good chance that he was in fact an art conservationist or something like that, and sure enough a critical aspect of the villain's scheme in his first outing is having Kenneth "recondition" a painting he has just bought, and in his second and final appearance they just go ahead and call him an art dealer.

Kenneth gets mixed up in an overly-complicated plot by the aforementioned client to steal his own painting and still get cash - not insurance fraud but a second, stupider thing, see the upcoming entry on the Monster for further details - that is in fact so ridiculous that he can't even convince the police to help him out. What else can he do but engage in a bit of vigilante justice in such a situation. He puts on a Roman gladiator outfit that he happens to have laying around, grabs his favourite cestus and bowling pin and sets out to meet his destiny. And then, as so frequently happens, the one-time foray into vigilante justice becomes a full-fledged hobby. (Fantastic Comics 023, 1941)

Categorized in: Activities (Gladiators), Day Job (Art Dealer), Powers (Weapons Master)

the Avenger:

The Avenger is maybe the third most popular Street & Smith pulp character, and as such was adapted to comics in the early 40s and again every time the old gang gets together for another shot at the comics page in DC Front Line or wherever. Alas, just like his pulp career, none of the Avenger's forays into comic books last very long, especially as compared to those of Doc Savage or the Shadow.

Maybe I'm wrong, but the problem with comic book adaptations of the Avenger always seems to be that they take a premise like "solder of fortune loses family to criminals and thus sets out to balance the scales, armed with face that can be moulded like putty, a gun called Mike, a knife called Ike and a diverse cast of assistants called Justice Inc" and boil it down to "unsmiling widower tackles depressing crime." (Shadow Comics v1 002, 1940)

Categorized in: Accessories (Sidekicks), Origin (Mental Mutate, Motivated by Loss), Power (Moldable Face)

Betty Ross:

Betty Ross, aka Agent X-13, is a government agent who first appears as the seemingly-elderly-but-really beautiful guardian of the curio shop that conceals the super-soldier facility where Steve Rogers becomes Captain America (okay, it's not 100% clear that this is Betty Ross in the original comics, but retcons have firmly established that it is). She goes on to take part in many of Captain America and Bucky's Golden Age adventures - more, in fact, than the original Cap/Bucky duo (retcons again, being deployed to explain how they kept having adventures after they were supposedly frozen and dead, respectively. Or frozen and frozen, depending on the retcon). Late in the WWII era she even adopts a costumed identity of her own: Golden Girl.

Betty plays a big enough role in these Golden Age comics that I was tempted to give her a full-fledged Super-Hero page such as characters like Lois Lane or Alfred will probably get but alas, she has been almost entirely replaced by Peggy Carter in comics published in the Silver Age and beyond. Is this because she shares a name with the Hulk's love interest (who she was made the great aunt of in yet another retcon)? Possibly! (Captain America Comics 001, 1940)

Categorized in: Accessories (Rubberoid Mask), Day Job (FBI Agent), Team Membership (FBI)