Popular Comics #49 - pt. 2

I believe I had given the Power Dive stunt a bonus to hit when I made the Aviator class, but I've since learned in playing Dawn Patrol that power dives are for gaining speed, as done here. I don't presently have a rule to cover this, other than how a piloting skill check allows you to go a little faster than normal.

Once again, we're given a teasing clue that the Masked Pilot is either someone very famous or very influential, or both. Or he's carrying Doctor Who's psychic papers.

Penguin Pete, which is really a better adventure strip than it has any business being, reminds us that a "miss" in combat doesn't necessarily mean you missed your target, it's just that you caused no damage. Although I could have arrows do less damage to alligators...?

Don't forget that mobsters can wreck things, just like any non-superhero Heroes, with just two dice instead of three. That should be enough to smash a rowboat...though I could give them a +1 bonus when wrecking with their tails, or just mention that alligators can wreck things behind them with their tails.

We're going to spend the rest of this blog post spending more time looking at Captain Tornado than it probably deserves, but maybe we'll learn something about creating fictional civilizations.

Rule #1: Dress the natives exotically. Don't be afraid to make your Heroes confront a male guide wearing a thong-backed banana hammock.

Rule #2:  Rather than try to imagine new technologies, you can recreate modern conveniences through different means and still make a society look advanced. Here is a mechanical elevator. Also note the locals live in a place that resembles the courtyard of a fancy hotel.

Phosphorescence is a real thing, of course, but some unknown process must amplify it so it operates as sunlight. Of course, it's also possible that all the grass in this cave is astroturf, and the trees are fake sculptures, just to give them the feel of being aboveground. 

That the door "mysteriously opens" feels somewhat laughable today when every store has automatic sliding doors, but while the concept of automatic sliding doors is very old, the way to make this work electronically was not invented until 1954 -- so this is actually "futuristic" tech in 1940!

Note the trope of how visitors always get to visit rulers directly, instead of being made to interact with some underling who reports back to the ruler (which seems like it would keep the ruler much safer).  

Holy cow, this page is pretty terrible. "I'm free, white, and 18 and he can't boss me"? Really Jane? 

And while that's pretty overtly racist, that's nothing to how terrible this alien caste system is, with its two slave castes who either get their tongues cut out or aren't allowed to ever see light. 

If I didn't already hate this evil alien race enough, now we find out that they rip the wings off of giant butterflies and wear them. I guess we also find out from this that these aliens are hollow-boned, allowing them to fly.

The concept of species degenerating to the point where they no longer understand their ancestors' technology can be traced at least as far back as H.G. Well's Morlocks.

And we learn from this page that water pressure, instead of electricity, is how they work their technology. I wonder if water pressure could run a plane...?

(Scans courtesy of Comic Book Plus.)

Popular Comics #49 - pt. 1

The radio drama allegedly always used true cold cases from the FBI files, and the Gang Busters comic strip at least started out the same, but how true is that by 1940? I can't find any evidence of an actual FBI agent John Winston, though Winston being the middle name of John Lennon is, admittedly, clogging my search results, and there's no reason why the name couldn't have been changed to protect a still-active agent's identity.

Richmond, Virginia is of course a real place. I can't find a Calvert Bank in Richmond, but there is a Calvert Drive in Richmond, and perhaps there was once a bank there? 

The Tri-State Gang was real. According to the Sword and Scale website, their crime spree ran "through Pennsylvania, Maryland, and Virginia during the early to mid-1930’s."

By this page, the scene has shifted to Baltimore, Maryland. The names of the streets seem to have been changed to ...protect the innocent streets. Although there is a Harvey Street in Baltimore, it is commercial instead of residential, and doesn't intersect with an Elm Street. 

The map hardly seems necessary, since the maneuver of blocking the intersection with cars is really not elaborate. 

The story of the Tri-State Gang is actually pretty interesting, but you wouldn't know it by this rushed retelling. Indeed, the Gang Busters comic strip often has a bland sameness to its stories.

So we'll skip ahead into Martan the Marvel Man. I'm pleased with what this installment is trying to do, showing us Martan and Vana getting to know Earth, but I'm skeptical that they would immediately understand our comedy as quickly as they do here. Even more interesting is that this is an alien invasion story, but with the twist that Martan and Vana are on the ground with regular people and get to see how they react and deal with it.

The locations are worth mentioning here. It's unusual that the aliens land somewhere in New Jersey and San Francisco and not more obvious targets, like Chicago, New York City, or Washington, D.C. Likewise in Germany, the aliens skip Berlin and are landing in less important areas of northern Germany.  

On a page I'm not bothering to share we also learn that the invaders are Martians, but the story ends with us still not even having seen the invaders yet. Maybe next time!
 

I am leery of this page because of the gruesomeness of that final panel, but two points here: one -- and we've seen this elsewhere before (and done better) -- is the idea of mistaking dinosaurs for dragons, or having dinosaurs and dragons be one and the same thing. It's a fanciful idea today, but much less was known of dinosaurs in 1940, so it would be easier to equate them with fantasy creatures. 

Second, and going along with how less was known about dinosaurs, pterodactyls are here displayed acting like carrion-eating vultures, when they were actually fish eaters, more like seagulls and albatrosses.  

Again, pretty gruesome, but I appreciate that the author knew the poisonous fumes are at least as dangerous as coming into contact with the lava (oops, Jurassic World 2 seemed to have forgotten that!). I would say anyone within 10' would need to save vs. poison or take ...let's say 2-8 points of damage from it, per combat turn within that distance.

Rekra is a weird name, but it actually is a name! I'm not entirely sure from where, but Google searching seems to be pointing to it being Slovakian. So this Slovakian spy has a gas gun and gas mask. Well-outfitted! This is a variant gas gun too, one that sprays paralyzing gas instead of sleep gas (both are chemically fanciful so, why not?). 

Oil line to motor broken is a good random complication in aerial combat (though this time it's being faked by plane thieves!). 

Out of the Sun was an aviator stunt in 1st edition Hideouts & Hoodlums, and here is used to give the Masked Pilot a surprise bonus while tailing the hijackers. 

This could be the earliest mention of Nicaragua in comic books. It's interesting that Nicaragua, being a neutral county in this story, gets to keep its name, but the villainous country is called "Vulcania." It's pretty easy to figure out which country that is, as El Salvador is known as the Land of Volcanoes. Although ruled by a dictator, Nicaragua was at least officially on the side of the allies during WWII. Although Nicaragua's dictator, Somoza, was corrupt, he wasn't as bad as El Salvador's dictator at this time, Matanza, who had more than 30,000 of his people killed.

(Scans courtesy of Comic Book Plus.)