PROBLEMATIC ROUND-UP 007

Damn their problematic hides!

Rango: 

A former Vaudeville magician who employs a magical gem and some rubberoid mask blackface to establish himself as medicine man/bandit chief in Africa, Rango aka Harrigan is ultimately unmasked by Yarko the Great. (Wonderworld Comics 015, 1940) 

Unnamed Witch Doctor: 

This unnamed Haitian witch doctor has a very unusual scheme: blind entire American cities with a floating vision of some of his men and then loot those same cities of all of their diamonds. Why diamonds specifically? No clue. He is also notable for giving Zambini the Miracle Man a harder time than Satan himself, before eventually being killed, just like Satan himself. (Zip Comics 005, 1940)

War Hatchet: 

Fascist spies striking at the US by inciting Native American tribes to violence is unfortunately going to crop up more than a couple of times as we make our way through the comics of the Forties (and I reckon that the same plot will be recycled with Commie spies in the Fifties and Sixties, alas). This time, the plot is spearheaded by a fellow who calls himself War Hatchet, a European ex-pat turned bandit chief who has returned to the fold to do some espionage work for the dear old unnamed fatherland. 

As is often the case, War Hatchet makes an okay argument for the colonized to rise up against their oppressors, only with a bunch of murder appended and the unspoken coda that there will be new oppressors later on. Spy Smasher not only stabs him to death but chucks him into a fire afterward. (Spy Smasher 001, 1941)

the Yellow Horde: 

The Yellow Horde is a gang of guys in cool looking yellow suits who break into defense plants and shoot poison gas balls everywhere. They turn out to be Chinese, and while the name is arguably in reference to the cool suits I just can't bring myself to trust 1940s America not to get a little bit of racism in for fun.

The Yellow Horde's boss turns out to be an unnamed costumed Nazi who is pretending to be Chinese but also forcing the Horde into doing his bidding. why both? Who knows. Ultimately he gets beaten up by the Hood. (Cat-Man Comics 005, 1941)

MINOR SUPER-HERO ROUND-UP 076

Yet more super-heroes for your delectation.

the Black Widow:

There are a lot of Black Widows in comics, but Linda Masters is the first one who I have encountered who is actually a widow and not just a woman named after a spider as a way of emphasizing how creepy-deadly she is. And since her husband was Murdered by a Crime™, she expresses her grief by becoming a crimefighter.

We don't see a lot of the Black Widow's modus operandi during her single recorded adventure, but she is handy with a gun and a judo throw. She spends most of her time standing outside in an overcoat in the rain, so we don't even get much of a chance to observe her costume aside from the fact that it includes a black turtleneck with a particularly leggy spider logo on it. 

She is also at least a better detective than the police in whatever NYC-alike city she calls home, given that the entirety of her first adventure takes place while they are misreading the directions she gave them to the villain's hideout that she has already found. (Cat-Man Comics 001, 1941)

Categorized in: Animals (Arachnids), Colours (Black), Family (Widows)

the Flying Legion: 

Headquartered out of a hollowed-out mesa, this combination air rescue/air vigilante corps is notable mainly for the fact that every single member seems to have a nickname, from leader Chute Harmon to his aides Wolf, Slip and Piston. Perhaps it's part of the onboarding process. (Cat-Man Comics 002, 1941)

Categorized in: Generica (Legions), Professions (Aviators)

the Pied Piper: 

The Pied Piper is a super-hero whose origin combines two popular tropes: that of the member of the legal system who discovers that the justice they seek can only be found outside of the normal bounds of the law and that of the framed person who must operate outside the law to clear their name (BONUS: he is also an example of a much less common trope, that of the super-hero who has a little mustache). Specifically, the Pied Piper is Stephen Prentice, a lawyer who finds himself framed twice in rapid succession and must turn to his mastery of the pipes to expose the corrupt judge and political boss behind the plot against him.

(the second framing is for a pretty standard murder, but the first one does demand some comment. Prentice is framed for defending a guilty man for murder, with the really damning aspect being that he supposedly set out to do so while knowing that he was guilty. While I am admittedly not a lawyer I cannot imagine that this would be enough to ruin someone's career, even in 1941. Which is probably why they doubled down and also framed him for murder, now that I think of it)

As his name implies, the Pied Piper employs flute and recorder type instruments in his crimefighting, and while his first adventure heavily implies that he is using the power of suggestion to make his foes believe that the music has the power to compel them, subsequent stories make it clear that he is armed with one or more magical instruments acquired as part of his flute-collecting hobby.

Some examples of just what a man can do when armed with a magical flute:

- knock a man unconscious

- compel a man to give a confession

- kill animals 

- collapse buildings 

It really is a very useful item. (Cat-Man Comics 003, 1941)

Categorized in: Accessories (Musical Instruments), Famous Figures (Literary), Professions (Law)

the Hood: 

The Hood, in reality FBI agent Craig Williams, is a non-super-powered vigilante who had only one appearance in 1941, and while I'm sure that there is more to say about him, almost all of it will have to come in the due course of time.

Two things I can say about him are 1. his adventures are extremely dynamic and 2. he kind of looks like the Golden Age Atom. Chew on that for a while, I guess. (Cat-Man Comics 005, 1941)

Categorized in: Objects (Hoods), Professions (Law)

MINOR SUPER-VILLAIN 868: THE HOOD

(Wonderworld Comics 019, 1940)

The Hood, a mysterious figure (who leaves a note with an unfortunately cut-off symbol that I can only assume/hope is a hood-and-crossbones) is terrorizing an unnamed city with a series of murders - eight in one week! 

Going by the old wisdom that the murderer always returns to the scene of the crime, the Flame waits at the site of the latest murder and is rewarded when the Hood does just that. He is however unsuccessful in capturing the fiend due to the twin facts that a) the Hood thought to bring some guys along with him and b) an unfortunate woman happens by just in time to be taken hostage. 

The Flame and the never-named woman are taken prisoner and spend some time escaping while the Hood lines up his next victim, a store owner who lives near the Sea Clock mentioned in his taunting note. This is when we finally get some inkling of the Hood's motivations: far from being an ordinary homicidal maniac, he is instead forcing his victims to sign over their property to him before murdering them.

(I would just like to take a second here to roast the Unnamed City authorities for the sheer amount of consternation they evince at the notion of a "sea clock" when they live in a town that has such a large clock tower located on its waterfront)

The Hood is finally unmasked and turns out to be the Unnamed City Mayor's personal secretary, Jenkins, who the Flame had held in deep suspicion for the entire issue for using the word "extraordinary" to describe the killer. This sort of thing is always highlighted when it pays off, but how many times does a crime go unsolved because of such unwarranted suspicion of a person with a weird vocabulary or a tendency for malapropisms, hmm?

MINOR SUPER-VILLAIN 631: DABLO, LAST OF THE RAY MEN AND THE HOOD

(Fantastic Comics 011, 1940)

THIS. IS. GREAT. We open on the trial of Dablo, Last of the Ray Men, and immediately we must ask: who are the Ray Men? And let me tell you that there is no answer beyond "guys who could shoot rays." Dablo here shoots rays out of a big hole in his forehead but did they all do that? No clue! This is the kind of worldbuilding that people like Alan Moore will eventually get up to in the 80s - implying that there are weird and wonderful things all around by reference and allusion. It's really neat!

Whatever the Ray Men were, there are only one of them left and he, Dablo has just been sentenced to death by Judge Ord.

On the eve of Dablo's execution (via guillotine, by the way. Nobody's thought up a cool futuristic execution method by the Year 10 000. Also there is capital punishment in the Year 10 000) a mysterious figure who we will later learn is called the Hood appears and restores the Last Ray Man's ray powers, to the delight of all.

The Hood is pretty generic, but he meets the criteria for a minor super-villain. Obviously he must take a back seat to the Last of the Ray Men.

Come the morning of the execution and we finally get to see this famous ray that everyone's been talking about. It does not disappoint! Dablo blasts fools left and right before making off with Judge Ord!

This is a Sub Saunders story so of course Dablo has an undersea lair. Just who was this red-haired unfortunate? No idea, but I have a hunch that they met their end at the wrong end of a ray.

The back half of the story is unfortunately much more concerned with the Hood (who turns out to be Judge Ord, crooked and looking to take control of the unnamed future city the trial of Dablo took place in. Will future society reexamine their relationship to capital punishment once the corruption present at the very highest echelons of their legal system comes to light? Probably not), who does a header off of a cliff after revealing his plans to Sub Saunders. The far more dynamic and interesting Dablo survives, presumably to be re-sentenced to death by another judge. There ain't no justice.

MINOR SUPER-VILLAIN 465: THE HOOD

(Amazing-Man Comics 010-011, 1940)

The Magician from Mars' final foe is a two-issue affair, but the first one is a bit of a nothing story: a mysterious terror attack at an airport turns out to be the work of a villain named the Hood who has found a way to... play a loud sound into a glass ball and then use it as a grenade. It's a weird contrivance even by sci-fi super-hero comic standards. In any case, the Magician from Mars blows up all of the Hood's factories and they flee into space.

I do appreciate a villain who takes the time to dress their henchmen in proper minion outfits though. Plus this is some great we-don't-quite-have-the-visual-language-of-comics-worked-out-yet-but-we're-trying jumping around from the Magician from Mars.

Next issue sees the Magician from Mars returning to her home planet where the Hood is leading an attempted rebellion - fairly successfully in fact, until a nigh-omnipotent superwoman joins the fight on the side of Martian King Marsu and his dishy son Prince Taal.

Though the Hood is on the ropes and on the run, she takes the time to end the budding romance between the Magician from Mars and Price Taal by shooting the latter as he tries to defend our hero. And what's that? I said "she"? Yes, because the Hood is in fact a woman! And what's more an older woman! And even more shocking, she's Jane "Magician from Mars" 6em35's aunt!

All of these revelations are only a bit out of left field. Jane's aunt was a character in her first appearance and was even a minor antagonist in that story, but rather than attempting to install herself as an iron-fisted dictator she was instead a cruel and controlling guardian who kept her ward in check due to her very unusual super-weakness of... a genetic predisposition to like her relatives. Notably, this version of Aunt Kinza (yes she could have more than one aunt but why complicate matters?) does not appear to have magical powers. Sadly, there were no further Magician from Mars stories, so the path that Kinza took to become the Hood, like Jane's eventual revenge for her lost love, will remain an untold story.

ADDENDUM: This is a very good vengeance-swearing panel. Look out, oh vile aunt.

MINOR SUPER-VILLAIN 461: THE HOOD

(Mystic Comics v1 003, 1940)

The Hood is a dude in a sheet ghost costume who is seemingly the head of an extortion gang targeting bankers and ruthlessly killing any who defy him. And perhaps you've noted that "seemingly" and are wondering what it could mean. Well,

This ruthless banker-murderer... is actually a banker! He's Willard Thomas and his extortion scheme was a front for a murder scheme that would have left him, the last banker standing, holding the keys to some sort of joint banker bank account. This is an okay plan! I'm not sure what the dismount was going to be because Dynamic Man beat him up before he managed to kill all other local bankers but the Hood definitely put more thought into things than a lot of the jamokes one here.

MINOR SUPER-VILLAIN 250: THE HOOD

(Flash Comics v1 019, 1941)

Hey, it's the Hood! I'll be honest: I thought that the Hood was one of those super-villain names like the Masked Man that was super common and that we already had one or more guys with this name but here we are, 250 villains in and welcoming our first.

The Hood is Pratt Palmer, and he's a bog standard scientist-villain of type A: scientist who develops some astonishing new tech and turns it to crime (type B is of course the scientist who turns to crime after being rejected by the hidebound academics they go to for approval, while type C is your classic mad scientist meddling where humanity ought not to).

So yes, Pratt Palmer fakes his own death, forms a gang and is almost immediately captured by Hawkman. There's not much to recommend about him other than his fun bombastic villainspeak, which he really nails off the bat.

The really interesting thing about Hawkman's encounter with the Hood is his tech, which he calls Cold Light, and which functions as a kind of energy blob that wanders around semi-autonomously when not being directed. They don't really explore it much but I reckon that it's pretty cool. More weird tech in comics!