“My car is right down there, you know.”
Master Comics #1
Fawcett Publications (March, 1940)
We have another new comic to read. How long we’ll be reading it is up for debate. Going over the summaries on Comic Book Plus I already don’t see anything all that exciting. Still, it’s the first issue and I can go in with an open mind. These are the guys giving us the original Captain Marvel so maybe it’ll work out. Let’s start reading and find out, because there’s a lot of comics to go over since they’re mostly around 4-6 pages each.
Master Man
Not a superhero identity. It’s just his name. Like McLovin. Stronger than horses, wiser than wisdom (okay), kinder than kind, quicker than quick, stronger than strong or something…and all thanks to the vitamins he took as a kid from a random wandering doctor. There’s a lesson for the kiddies. Then again, this is the same company whose most popular hero was a child who followed a complete stranger into a subway station. Someone goes to his castle outside the city and asks for his help against mobsters who have a plane they can drop bombs from and over the course of the story do the “burn the orphans to get the hero” and “kidnap the mayor’s daughter” bits. He stops them, only missing the torch being tossed into the orphanage so the story can have him save everybody because those vitamins also made him bullet and fireproof…and his adult clothes somehow. I know it’s a debut but it’s a really boring one.
The White Rajah And The Jeweled Crown Of Ramistan
David Scott gets lost in the jungles of India. Unable to find his way home and his dad believing him dead and thus leaves India heartbroken, David grows up in the jungle, becomes India Tarzan, and we get to our story to finish his origin. A dying rajah decides to make him the next king because we need a concept, but first David has to recover the crown when headhunters steal it because we need a story. So now India Tarzan is India Kit Walker. What exciting adventures will he have? Wish I cared.
The Devil’s Dagger
We have our first traditional costumed crimefighter (unless you think what Master Man wears is a superhero costume and not just odd fashion sense from a guy with a lot of power but no sign of income). We also have a villain and an editor who wants to expose both because the mobster’s a bad guy and the hero is a news story that couldn’t possibly ruin his attempts to stop the mobster by exposing his secret identity and ruining his life. Carterville is in trouble. And the editor doesn’t even know that his rich man’s son turned reporter, Ken Wyman IS The Devil’s Dagger, aided by his driver and white Kato, Pat Gleason. Ken also gets to meet a few pretty girls stopping the mobsters from destroying a diamond making machine before the reader even learns about his alter ego. Will he stop the Marlow gang or take his father’s job offer at the bank? I almost care. Almost.
Morton Murch: The Hillbilly Hero
I’m willing to blame either the scan or the fiche they used for not being able to read much of the dialog in this one. The narration is easier to read. Not that it makes a lick o’ sense, by thunder. So…just out of nowhere Morton makes a DIY hot air balloon that takes him to an uncharted island where everything is peaceful and advanced…but they don’t know how to create flying machines. Just by making a hot air balloon, the country’s hot queen falls for him, and even more when he stops a bunch of enemy planes. And now he’s homesick. Outside of Morton’s exaggerated hillbilly speak and him ordering a bathtub he ever used until using it as the basket for the balloon this is not treated as a comedy, especially in the artwork. I don’t even know what to make of this one.
You know what’s a terrible name for your sea and underwater going hero?
Shipwreck Roberts
Is he that bad a sailor? Not helped that his partner is “Deep Sea” Doodle. (Read that fast out loud and you might get it.) Roberts dives for undersea treasure and has adventures. In this adventure Doctor Drown (at least he’s the bad guy) is sinking ships and our poorly named heroes (also not comedy) have to stop him. We actually get something of a namedrop one one of Drown’s goons say that only a “master man” could stop their sea monster army. Will this series just be these three going at it? I’ll never know.
Frontier Marshal
Bill Crane is Marshal of Big Savage after his father is killed. He’s also a college man. He just has to get rid of the “Marshal” who is working for the bad guys, stop his campaign of faking trouble to ruin Bill’s rep, and stop him from robbing the bank. Lucky he gets a deputy and secretary to help him. I’m not sure any of this is how you get a new Marshal. Sounds more like a town Sheriff, and even that’s up for debate. I just know that I didn’t get into this story, but the scans are clearing back up.
Mr. Clue
That’s his name because he’s that good at solving crimes. He’s not even “John Clue” or something. With his catchphrase of “only one clue–if it’s the right one”, he solves the mystery of a murdered mayor. It’s not a case you can really solve, as that one clue is kind of vague. Mostly it’s just cartoonish attempts to kill Mr. Clue and some hunches I couldn’t follow. This comic doesn’t have a…no, not gonna do it.
Streak Sloan
Of course we need our non-costumed crimefighting reporter, though our “boy reporter” looks almost 30. He helps the Coast Guard stop pirates in Alaska and gets the big scoop because of course he does. It’s not terrible. It’s just not very interesting.
El Carim
At least they admit his name is “miracle” spelled backwards. This is the obligatory magic hero. His only weaknesses: needing to study “distance waves” so his magic machine can find people, and bad guys who jump on him from low level balconies. Why was the target in our story kidnapped? No idea.
Rick O’Shay
Oh, like ricochet. And he’s a soldier of fortune. Oh, Golden Age. Please change. Or at least get better at it. Rick and his faithful Arabian servant Mekki, because we need to get ALL the Golden Age clichés in (though we missed the black and oriental stereotypes and adventuring female), go to the African desert to take down an evil Arabian chieftain. This could have been a normal story if not for the shrunken soldiers and giant cats. Even with that oddity the story was…okay.
overall
Two maybe okay stories and a bunch of uninteresting ones. I considered waiting at least another issue to see if things were better without the need for introducing, but I couldn’t get invested in most of these stories. All the obligatory Golden Age concepts they could got shoved in here but none of them are really memorable and only two were almost but not quite interesting. Too many weak attempts at pun names, too. I think I’m out on this one unless someone convinces me otherwise.
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