Tag Archives: superheroes

December 31, 2022 · 12:01 am

MLJ COMICS SUPERHERO PANTHEON

For this weekend’s light-hearted, escapist superhero post, Balladeer’s Blog will feature MLJ, the company that later became Archie Comics.

FoxTHE FOX

Secret Identity: Paul Patton, newspaper reporter and news photographer.

Origin: When his co-worker Ruth Ransom got kidnapped, Paul Patton felt he could fight crime AND enhance his journalism career by first donning a costume and thwarting criminals as the Fox and then getting a “scoop” on those adventures, complete with photos. And this was decades before Peter Parker made a living with news photos of his exploits as Spider-Man.

First Appearance: Blue Ribbon Comics #4 (June 1940). His final Golden Age appearance came in 1942. 

Powers: The Fox was at the peak of human condition. He had acrobatic skills greater than Olympic athletes and was a master of all forms of unarmed combat. His stealth skills were the equal of any burglar or ninja. The white eye-lenses on his mask permitted him to see in the dark.   Continue reading →

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December 17, 2022 · 3:54 am

NEDOR COMICS SUPERHEROES

This weekend’s light-hearted, escapist superhero blog post takes a look at the Golden Age superhero line-up from Nedor.  

Cavalier

THE CAVALIER

Secret Identity: Rance Raleigh, owner of an antique and curio shop

Origin: In Raleigh’s store was a portrait of the Duke de Chantreigh, sometimes said to be an ancestor of Rance. When that portrait would frown it was a supernatural sign that danger was coming. Rance would then suit up as the Cavalier and go into action. The first time was when Jake Miles, who was investigating munitions factory sabotage was hit by a truck outside Raleigh’s shop before he could tell him what he had discovered. 

First Appearance: Thrilling Comics # 53 (April 1946). His final Golden Age appearance came in 1948 

Powers: The Cavalier possessed the strength of a normal athletic male but was highly skilled with a sword and at unarmed combat. In addition he often used esoteric weapons and relics from his shop, just like the Golden Age Hawkman would wield artifacts from his museum. Continue reading →

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December 10, 2022 · 5:13 am

A CHRISTMAS CAROL: LUKE CAGE AND THE TEEN TITANS

Christmas Carol-A-Thon 2022 continues, this time combined with the weekend’s light-hearted, escapist superhero blog post. This item looks at A Christmas Carol getting adapted through two separate stories – first with Luke Cage/ Power Man and then with the Teen Titans.

luke-cage-christmas-carol

LUKE CAGE, HERO FOR HIRE Vol 1 #7 (March 1973) 

Jingle Bombs was the real title of this holiday tale which pitted superhero Luke Cage aka Hero for Hire aka Power Man against the one-off supervillain called Marley. Like a Guest Villain from the Adam West Batman show Marley uses a campy Christmas Carol motif for his nefarious plan … yet, oddly the story is kind of quaint.  

On Christmas Eve, Luke Cage is hanging out with his then-girlfriend Claire Temple, a doctor who worked at a clinic in the New York ghetto. Later on in the series Claire would be the center of a romantic triangle between Luke Cage and another of Marvel’s black superheroes – Black Goliath, Hank Pym’s former lab assistant who used Pym’s inventions to turn to giant-size and back. 

As night approaches Luke sees a ruckus outside the clinic: a man in Dickensian 1800s clothing is using his walking stick to beat a little handicapped boy named Timmy. Our hero goes out to save the little boy and is attacked by the strange man, who identifies himself as “Marley.”   Continue reading →

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December 3, 2022 · 12:01 am

SUPERHEROES OF CENTAUR COMICS

This weekend’s light-hearted, escapist superhero blog post examines the Golden Age superhero pantheon of the company called Centaur Comics.

Air ManAIR MAN

Secret Identity: Drake Stevens

Origin: Drake Stevens’ father, Ornithology Professor Claude Stevens, was murdered and when the police were getting nowhere Drake donned a costume equipped with various technical gimmicks and set out to bring the killers to justice.

As always happens in comic books Drake decided to continue fighting crime under his new nom de guerre Air Man.

First Appearance: Keen Detective Funnies #23 (August 1940). His final Golden Age appearance came in 1941.

Powers: Air Man’s costume boasted feathers filled with an experimental anti-gravity gas as well as a jet-pack. In addition to that he sported guns plus a Chemical Belt loaded with egg-shaped explosives. On top of that Air Man was highly skilled at unarmed combat and had Olympic-level gymnastic abilities. 

Comment: Air Man was one of those Golden Age superheroes who didn’t hesitate to kill off his adversaries when the situation called for it.  

Blue LadyBLUE LADY

Secret Identity: Lucille Martin, novelist

Origin: Returning from a trip to China on board a luxury liner, Lucille Martin was given a priceless statue by a Chinese woman named Lotus. She was told to guard the statue from some men who were pursuing Lotus and by way of payment the Chinese woman also gave her a blue ring.

When the men pursuing Lotus killed her, Ms Martin accidentally discovered that the ring gave her super-powers. She donned a costume, called herself the Blue Lady and brought Lotus’ murderers to justice as the start of a crime-fighting career.  

First Appearance: Amazing-Man Comics #24 (October, 1941). Her final Golden Age appearance came in 1942.

Powers: Accidentally breaking the blue-bird shaped gem on the Oriental ring released a gas which bestowed upon the Blue Lady the strength of ten men, invulnerability and the ability to teleport via blue mists. She could also generate those blue mists to hide in and to disorient her opponents. In turn, other gasses were the Blue Lady’s weakness.  Continue reading →

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November 26, 2022 · 1:01 am

SPIDER-WOMAN: HER EARLY STORIES

This weekend’s light-hearted and escapist superhero blog post will look at Marvel’s original run of the Jessica Drew version of Spider-Woman.

marv sp 32MARVEL SPOTLIGHT Vol 1 #32 (February 1977)

Title: Dark Destiny

Villains: Hydra

NOTE: The origin of the Jessica Drew character presented in this issue, which claimed she was a creation of Marvel’s hero-villain the High Evolutionary, was soon retconned. In the new version, her father was a scientist working with the High Evolutionary, who injected her with experimental chemicals and spider DNA to save her life from radiation poisoning, and that was how she gained her super-powers.

           Those powers: Spider-Man level strength, bioenergy “venom blasts” that she shot from her hands, wall-crawling abilities and limited flight through her web-wings.

spider-woman picSynopsis: Misled into working for Hydra, Spider-Woman is sent on a mission to assassinate S.H.I.E.L.D. chief Nick Fury on the Riviera. Nick survives her initial assault and then uses news and intelligence reports to show her how she was deceived into thinking that Hydra was a revolutionary organization rather than a criminal cabal.

Jessica, furious over the way she was used, leads a S.H.I.E.L.D. assault on the Hydra base from which she was sent to kill Nick Fury. After the base is shut down and all the Hydra agents are captured, the heroine declines to join S.H.I.E.L.D. and goes off to contemplate what she wants to do with her life. Continue reading →

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November 19, 2022 · 12:00 am

MARVEL MYSTERY COMICS: SUB-MARINER, THE HUMAN TORCH AND MORE (1939-1940)

cap original human torch and sub-marinerThis weekend’s light-hearted, escapist superhero blog post will examine the early years of Marvel Comics, which was called Timely Comics back in 1939.

Their first superhero series was titled Marvel Comics, which was changed to Marvel MYSTERY Comics beginning with the second issue.

mar c 1MARVEL COMICS Vol 1 #1 (October 1939)

Title: The Human Torch

Synopsis: A human-looking android is created by scientist Phineas Horton and made known to the public. Bizarrely enough, the android’s body bursts into flames upon contact with the air (it’s the little things, really) so this misnamed Human (Android) Torch is sealed up tight to prevent it from running amok.

1939 human torchThis figure escapes, learns to control its ability to “flame on” and “flame off”, and defeats the crime boss Anthony Sardo and his gang. When Phineas Horton hints at using his android creation to make money, the Torch rebels and flies off to function in the world on his own. Continue reading →

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November 12, 2022 · 12:01 am

PALADIN: NEGLECTED MARVEL SUPERHERO

paladin realizingThis weekend’s light-hearted, escapist superhero blog post deals with Marvel’s enigmatic mercenary Paladin, whose activities on behalf of his clients often put him on both sides of the law.

He has no connection to the Paladin character from the Have Gun Will Travel radio and television shows.

dd 150DAREDEVIL Vol 1 #150 (January 1978)

Title: Catastrophe

Villain: The Purple Man (Killgrave)

NOTE: This was the first appearance of Marvel’s Paladin. To this day they have not revealed his real name, but he sometimes uses the aliases Paul Dennis and Paul Denning. Paladin is as agile and acrobatic as Daredevil, wears resilient body armor that does not restrict his movements and wields a Stun Gun.

          That weapon’s ray-blasts stun and scramble the nervous system, so they are effective even against super foes but have no effect on unliving matter. Through some STILL unexplained biological mutation or scientific enhancement, Paladin is strong enough to lift an entire ton. Continue reading →

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November 4, 2022 · 4:01 pm

MARVEL TWO-IN-ONE

This weekend’s light-hearted, escapist superhero blog post comes a little earlier than usual. This one examines various stories in the Thing’s team-up series titled Marvel Two-in-One after two adventures in Marvel Feature.

mf 11MARVEL FEATURE Vol 1 #11 (September 1973)

Title: Cry: Monster

Villains: The Leader and Kurrgo

Synopsis: The Thing and the Hulk get pitted against each other as part of a conflict between the Hulk’s archenemy the Leader (lower right) and the Fantastic Four’s old foe Kurrgo, the former dictator of Planet X. The Leader chose his greatest foe the Hulk as his champion in this fight, while Kurrgo chose the Thing, a member of his team of enemies the Fantastic Four.

LeaderThe villain whose champion wins the battle will win the prize – abducting BOTH monsters to serve them in their plans. In the Leader’s case, to take over the Earth, and in Kurrgo’s case, to conquer and once again subjugate his people.

While the battle goes on in a ghost town in the American west, Kurrgo cheats by secretly amping up the Thing’s strength via periodic cosmic energy transmissions. This causes the Leader to declare Kurrgo the loser by default. Meanwhile, the Hulk and the Thing battle Kurrgo’s high-tech robot. Continue reading →

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October 29, 2022 · 1:26 am

CREATURE COMMANDOS

For this weekend’s light-hearted, escapist superhero blog post we’ll do the DC characters called the Creature Commandos.

wwt 93WEIRD WAR TALES Vol 1 #93 (November 1980)

Title: The Creature Commandos

Villains: Nazi soldiers

Synopsis: This story introduced Project M, a fictional 1942 War Department effort to unleash supernatural monsters upon the Axis armies. The members of these Creature Commandos:

*** Warren Griffith, an institutionalized teenager who irrationally thought he was a werewolf, so the scientists of Project M turned him into a real, biological man-wolf who could become his monstrous self at will. 

*** Marine Private Elliot “Lucky” Taylor, who blew away much of his body by stepping on a land mine. Government scientists used patchwork body parts to reassemble him into a huge, yellow-skinned Frankenstein’s Monster figure.

cc 1*** Army Sergeant Vincent Velcro, who was given a choice of 30 years of hard labor for crippling a superior officer or being a human guinea pig for chemical injections derived from bat blood. The injections turned him into a science-spawned vampire.

*** Lieutenant Matthew Shrieve, Army Intelligence, a normal human placed in charge of the Creature Commandos. 

In their first mission, the Commandos are sent into France to attack Castle Conquest, where the Nazis and French collaborators are designing android duplicates of high-level politicians from Franklin Roosevelt and Winston Churchill on down. The plan is to use the nearly completed robots to replace the originals and surrender to the Axis Nations. Continue reading →

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October 15, 2022 · 12:01 am

X-MEN vs XENOMORPHS (THE BROOD)

st transfFor this weekend’s escapist superhero post Balladeer’s Blog will take a look at the way the Marvel Comics writers became so enamored of the alien menace in the first Alien movie that they did their own imitation/ homage of it in the form of an insectoid alien race called the Brood.

The Brood could implant embryos inside captives and as those embryos matured, they would transform the host into another Brood creature. The X-Men eventually fought bunches of the Brood all at once but remember – as derivative as the Brood were that X-Men serial came BEFORE the movie Aliens in 1986.

First up, however, comes the earlier story in which the writers “paid homage” to Alien by way of a member of the Lovecraftian race of demons called the N’Garai (Marvel’s imitation of Cthulhu & company). They made this N’Garai resemble the xenormorph in Alien and used the single word title Demon. Kitty Pryde even made subtle references to Alien during the story.

xm 143X-MEN Vol 1 143 (March 1981)

Title: Demon

Villain: An unnamed demon of the N’Garai race

Synopsis: This odd Christmas story opened up with a flashback to the end of the X-Men’s very first encounter with the N’Garai back in X-Men #96 (December 1975). It skipped over Iron Fist’s clash with the N’Garai as well as Satana’s battle with them.

Somehow another N’Garai demon has gotten loose in upstate New York and is roaming the forest on Christmas Eve. A romantic couple show up to chop down a Christmas tree for themselves but fall victim to the demon.

brood picCut to Xavier’s School for Gifted Youngsters, where Wolverine, Nightcrawler and Angel go off on dates with Mariko Yashida, Amanda Sefton and Candy Southern, respectively. Storm, Colossus and Professor X leave in the professor’s Rolls Royce to pursue their plans for the evening and this leaves the newest member of the team – Sprite (Kitty Pryde) – alone for a few hours.

Sprite winds up being attacked by the nameless N’Garai demon. It pursues her throughout the mansion and the creature’s resemblance to the menace in Alien reminds Sprite that the crew in that movie used flamethrowers against the monster.  Continue reading →

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