Showing posts with label fake villain. Show all posts
Showing posts with label fake villain. Show all posts

Monday, December 9, 2024

MINOR SUPER-VILLAIN 680: MADAMOISELLE MORGUE

(National Comics 006, 1940)

Madamoiselle Morgue is an interesting case, because technically she does not exist. I mean, technically none of the characters I write about here exist, but even within the fictional world within the story, she is a false person.

See, Scar Celleni, big time New York gang boss, has decided that the key to success is to wage all-out war on the police and that the optimal first move in this war is to assassinate prominent police officer Sally O'Neil. Thankfully for Sally she is the protagonist of the strip and she is saved by the timely intervention of her police badge. Faking her death, Sally reinvents herself as French femme fatale Madamoiselle Morgue, with her three brothers and father serving as her gang of masked henchmen. Presumably non-speaking henchmen at that, as the O'Neil clan really put the Irish in "stereotypical Irish-American cops."

The Madamoiselle Morgue persona is not a particularly deep one, but it doesn't really seem like it needs to be. Scar Celleni is more than willing to believe that his reputation precedes him to the extent that a domino-masked babe would come all the way from France to get in on his rackets.


Would I describe the next part of the plan, in which Madamoiselle Morgue/ Sally O'Neil suggests that the combined gang rob a bank and then arrests everyone once they are inside, as entrapment? Yes, yes I would. It's a really good gotcha moment, though.

Friday, October 13, 2023

MINOR SUPER-VILLAIN 361: THE THROTTLER

(Master Comics 019, 1941)


Imagine my excitement when I saw that Zoro the Mystery Man was facing a guy called the Throttler so soon after his bout with the Choker: a theme! A villain theme! Huzzah!


And imagine my disappointment when I discovered that the Throttler moniker was a fiction developed by two butlers to cover for their fairly inept kidnapping scheme. There wasn't even any throttling!

Still, I do have to tip my hat to them on one front: in a super-hero universe, pretending to be a guy with a special name and a gimmick is absolutely the way to give your ransom note a bit more gravitas. Too bad for them that it's also absolutely the way to get beat up by a guy with a pet cheetah.

MINOR SUPER-VILLAIN 992: THE VAHINES

(Jungle Comics 013, 1941) The Vahines, aka the Tiger-Women of Wildmoon Mountain, have a plan: kill every other woman in the world, which wil...