MINOR SUPER-VILLAIN 568: THE GORGON

(The Comics 002, 1937)

The Gorgon is not the most spectacular villain but does provide us with a couple of interesting contrasts to our last few entries. Firstly, we can contrast him with the Masked Czar and note how his lack of major identifying features enhances the anonymity afforded by a simple black mask.

I assume that he was called the Gorgon because "anyone who has seen his face is now dead" but it would have been nice to have it in the text of the story.

Indeed, the Gorgon's disguise was effective enough that he was able to operate in his capacity as the Assistant State's Prosecutor while also being a masked gang boss. It took fingerprint evidence for anyone to figure his game out.

The Gorgon also provides a bit of contrast with the Falcon here, as his adventure was also abruptly cancelled before the resolution, but where the Doctor Doom feature probably would have continued as a cat-and-mouse game between Doom and the Falcon, the conventions of Crime Doesn't Pay comics like Tom Beatty's are such that the Gorgon was going to be rounded up in two issues, tops.

MINOR SUPER-VILLAIN 565: THE BLACK WIDOW

(The Funnies 030, 1939)

The Black Widow is a sinister femme fatale spy chief in the classic mode, complete with cigarette holder, tight red dress and imperious attitude. A few things that make her fun:

-the vague European country she works on behalf of is Bosylvania, a country about which nothing is revealed aside from the fact that it has the best geographical suffix: -sylvania

-the Black Widow is in fact Princess Maxine of Bosylvania so her activities have an even greater potential for international incident than your typical spy, and certainly there's an even greater risk than usual of tying her to her employers.

-the Black Widow does not leave her castle HQ (located in the Castle District of the Northeastern US, presumably) for the duration of the story. This is because she knows how to delegate.

When Secret Service agent Tom Beatty and his teen pal Danny show up despite the bomb the Black Widow had placed in their plane she takes another pass at killing them using an assassin's teapot, which is always fun to see.

Beatty is eventually captured and though it doesn't turn out well for her I must say that any villain who takes the time for a bit of hero-taunting before their triumph gets a gold star in my book. Just stay well away from the bars!

Beatty is of course recaptured because this is a serialized story and getting captured is good cliffhanger fodder. The Black Widow and her cronies come really close to getting away but instead she gets horribly killed just off panel. I guess exploding princess heads were too much even for the heady days of the pre-Code Golden Age - we'll have to wait until the late 80s at earliest before we get an explosive decapitation in a mainstream comic if I'm any judge.