ALIENS AND SO FORTH ROUND-UP 013

You wouldn't believe how many of these I have.

Unnamed Planetoid-Dwellers: 

Blast Bennett and his pal Red run into these guys on a planetoid somewhere between Venus and Mercury and exclusively refer to them as "savages" even though they fly around in their own spaceship. Get off their planetoid, weirdos. (Weird Comics 003, 1940)

the Brainmen:

The Brainmen of the planet Larz are a bunch of large-headed jerks who have conquered... Earth? some time around the Year 5000, when Whiz Wilson shows up using his Futuroscope. My uncertainty above is due to the fact that the focus of the issue is very much on the fact that Americans have been enslaved, which is probably not meant to be a deeply ironic commentary on the long history of forced labour in the Land of the Free but they can't stop me from thinking it.

Whiz manages to acquire and distribute the "N-Gas" antidote to the pacification gas used to render the Americans compliant, but even a peasants' revolt is not enough to overthrow the might of the Brainmen, and he is forced to bring Brainman King Gar back to 1940 to use the threat of being beaten to death by a crowd of angry New Yorkers to ultimately win the day. (Sure-Fire Comics 003, 1940) 

Brutes:

Lumpy, oafish humanoid encountered by Jan and Wanda when they are blasted into another dimension by Dr Doom. Has no buttcrack. (Science Comics 008, 1940)

Bugmen:

The Bugmen are a belligerent species of insect-centaurs who occupy the Jovian jungles and regularly vex Auro, Lord of Jupiter until he bests their leaders, Ogre and Agh. I enjoy their huge tusks and also wonder just how much they get in the way. (Planet Comics 006, 1940)

REAL PERSON ROUND-UP 015

Time for another round! Of round-up!

Adolf Hitler: 

When time traveller Whiz Wilson journeys to the far future world of 1960 CE he gets mixed up in a scheme hatched by agents of this fellow, ruler of "the dictator realms of Europe." Is he meant to be Hitler or merely evoke him? Hard to say, but I for one think he's supposed to be Old Hitler. (Sure-Fire Comics 001, 1940)

He's not that much of a Hitler, but Don Ruizen, dictator of the South American country of Bolita, is absolutely a little guy with a toothbrush mustache who has started a ruinous war for his own enrichment (at the insistence of an oil company, but still). (Target Comics v1 001, 1940)

This is the back of Hitler's head in all but name - there's even a cut-off "fuhrer" in the first panel - from a fictional movie called The Maskless Axeman, about the dictator's very well-dressed executioner. (Target Comics v1 001, 1940)

Al Capone:

 Honestly not sure what percentage of guys like Boss Barone here are purposeful references to Al Capone and how many are just a result of the rhythm of his name entering the collective unconscious of comic book writers as sounding gang-bossy. (Target Comics v1 010, 1940)

Albert Lebrun:

It's the same old story: the White Streak is in Paris in 1940 and the President of France has been kidnapped. Do we count the fact that Albert Lebrun was President of France in 1940 higher than the fact that this unnamed president doesn't really look like Lebrun or vice versa? (Target Comics v1 005, 1940)

FDR:

Minor appearance by FDR to give the thesis of this White Streak adventure. (Target Comics v1 010, 1940)

Joseph Stalin:

He's unseen in the fake movie The Blue Zombie but Josef Malinsk (Joseph Stalin), dictator of Bolshemania (Russia) drives much of the action of the story when he orders the invasion of Coreland (Finland) and inspires the creation of the titular Blue Zombie (original creation). (Target Comics v1 006, 1940)

the Koh-i-Noor Diamond:

Once again "Kohinoor" crops up as shorthand for "a big gem," and this time it's even a diamond! As is often the case, the dang thing ends up being stolen and it's down to the Chameleon to recover it for its wealthy owner, if not the British Crown or the nation of India. (Target Comics v1 007, 1940)

the Mona Lisa: 

Whiz Wilson's exploration of the future takes him to Switzerland in the year 2040 AD, a land devastated by World War Four. He helps a band of Americans hold a castle stuffed full of treasure from a band of roving horselords, treasure that includes both the Mona Lisa and "the Venus statue" which I'm going to assume is the Venus de Milo and not, say, the Venus of Willendorf. (Sure-Fire Comics 002, 1940)

Robert Taylor: 

The smallest possible name check here: the never-seen Robert Baylor is almost certainly a reference to actor Robert Taylor. (Target Comics v1 002, 1940)

MINOR SUPER-HERO ROUND-UP 048

The triumphant return of Ace Magazines to the round-up!

Flash Lightning:

Educated and possibly also raised by Ancient Egyptian mystic the Old Man of the Pyramids, young Robert Morgan is eventually deemed worthy of the Amulet of Annihilation, a mystic artifact that grants him the powers of flight, super strength, bulletproof skin, the ability to hurl lightning bolts and sundry others (the amulet is also immediately forgotten about, as far as I can tell - the armband design remains a part of Lightning's costume design for the rest of his appearances but his powers are treated as integral).

Flash Lightning is eventually renamed Lash Lightning, and the word on the street is that this was done so as to avoid confusion with prominent lightning-themed DC Comics character the Flash. (Sure-Fire Comics 001, 1940)

UPDATE 1 

the Raven:

The Raven, like his fellow Ace Magazines hero the Black Spider, is your classic pulp style vigilante wanted by both the police and the underworld, with the added twist that he is primarily focused on Robin Hood-style monetary redistribution/ stealing from the crooked rich to return their ill-gotten gains to the bilked poor. At first, at least - over time the Raven starts dealing with more conventional super-threats and gangsters.

In addition to his loyal assistant Mike, the Raven's supporting cast includes Police Captain Lash - his boss, because the Raven is really Detective Sergeant Danny Dartin - and Lash's daughter/Danny's fiance Lola. Like the Black Spider before him, the Raven's love interest Lola eventually discovers the secret of his dual identity, which must have been a particular relief for the Raven because she, like her father and (supposedly) her fiance had up to that point been dedicated to the task of capturing the Raven and had come close to doing so once or twice.

Though the Raven's costume starts out as a huge hooded cloak of the type more commonly worn by villains, he eventually switches to a more conventional cape and cowl number, which is a shame, as the original look was much more distinctive. (Sure-Fire Comics 001, 1940)

Whiz Wilson:

Whiz Wilson is a time-travelling man, but one who very specifically only travels into the future. It's like my voice, complaining about how comic book time travellers just can't stop interfering in historical events, itself echoed back in time and helped to create a character mostly immune to temporal paradox, as long as he doesn't run into any older Whiz Wilsons in his travels.

Wilson's time harness also incorporates a space-travel functionality (as any time machine necessarily must lest one be rocketed off into the void instead of ancient Mesopotamia) and he very satisfyingly employs this as a teleportation device whenever he is in the future, though the mechanics of whether he is instantaneously transporting from one place to another or zooming very quickly between them vary according to the needs of the plot. (Sure-Fire Comics 001, 1940)

Marvo the Magician:

Marvo is another tuxedo-wearing magician from the same tradition that previously brought us such luminaries as Zatara. Like many of his peers he fills the time between stage performances by driving around aimlessly and meting out justice to the random criminals he encounters, with the two distinctions that a. he has a little monkey companion  named Tito and b. unlike many of his peers his powers do mainly seem to be illusions and not reality-warping chaos majicks. (Sure-Fire Comics 001, 1940)

NOTES - MAY 2025

Cops Shooting at Fleeing Suspects: 

The Raven, a nonviolent thief who crucial only steals ill-gotten gains from the wealthy and powerful, draws a lot of police fire over the course of his activities. (Sure-Fire Comics 002, 1940)

Treasury agent blazes away at a fleeing diamond smuggler in the middle of NYC. (Target Comics v1 004, 1940)

A Good Line to Exit A Burning Building With:

Especially if you have no intention of being a waffle. (Sure-Fire Comics 002, 1940)

Insufficiently Advanced: 

This "aging machine" has to be the most low-rent bit of alien tech ever featured in any bit of fiction. Just locking someone up for fifty years isn't a particularly impressive feat of extraterrestrial engineering, so-called King of the Brainmen. (Sure-Fire Comics 003b, 1940)

The March of Progress:

A fun exercise in just how recent the Satanic Panic and its preoccupations were: this puzzle, in which a goat-man demonstrates how to draw an inverted pentagram, is presented as a fun activity for kids, something that would have caused an American parent from c.1987 to spontaneously combust with the speed at which they would have been travelling to contact the authorities/the news media/the evangelical church. (Famous Funnies 054, 1939)