Fawcett 1941 Week--Master Comics #16 (Part 2)!!

We're back, and here to look at the back half our July 1941's Master Comics #16, as we see the kind of stuff that actually made an anthology comic tick. Who are some of these B (and C) characters?

Well, let's with the hero who was the cover boy for this particular issue:

I've always wondered--is the Army paying writers? Because you never hear anyone called "One Man Navy" or "One Man Air Force."

Anyhoo, Private Jack Weston didn't have any powers, or even an interesting origin. He was just a guy in pretty good condition who'd put on a patriotic costume and go fight bad guys.

Oh, and that terribly phallic splash page isn't symbolic--Minute-Man really does ride the crotch-rocket in this.

First off, though, his arch-enemy--"Illyria, the Queen Spy" escapes from prison:

Yeah, that's what I paid my dime for!!

So Illryia sets up yet another plan at her unnamed masters' behest to "make America fall":

Yup, she's going to blow up the crowd at a Fourth Of July celebration. Diabolical, sure--but enough to bring down America??

But Jack is a man of action, and he chooses the studliest action possible:

But he has one weakness:

Yup--he has the Queen Spy at gunpoint, and lets her swim away. Doofus!!

Minute-Man was one of the lucky Golden Agers who got a taste of Silver and Bronze. He appeared in the SHAZAM! book of the 1970s, and Jerry Ordway used the (now much older) Jack Weston as a retired hero and current government agent in Power Of Shazam. Yay!!

And then Geoff Johns had him--and his entire family--grotesquely slaughtered to kick off the most recent Justice Society series. Good on you, Geoff.

That's going to be the last of our memorable characters. What follows is a bunch of D-listers, starting with:

Who?

Oh.

Yeah, even though this was written by Otto Binder, this series never moved one inch beyond its origin as a Flash Gordon ripoff...well, OK, there was one interesting thing this month:

A Vacuo-Dynamic Thermo machine??? Really?

Hey, don't mock--the sucker works:

Silly Frigians, bringing ice to a fire fight!!

Who's next in the parade of unremembered?

Yes, The Companions Three--a trio of friends (Don, Spike and Nifty--yes, Nifty) who traveled the world looking for adventure. Just think of them kind of like the Warriors Three--but less godlike, and without a fat guy.

Look, they fight a gorilla:

They get duped into helping some rat steal his country's crown jewels. A country with...hmm, how shall we say it...not the toughest border security in the world:

Oh my god, waist-high electrified barbed wire!! Thank heavens they were never invaded by a country who had ladders!!

Still, it is a chance for the Companions Three to show off their manly athleticism:

And again:

Enough of those three. Next?

Buck Jones was an actual stunt man and cowboy actor, with more than 160 film credits and the lead in the "Marshall Buck Roberts" westerns. Still, when the comics' credits tell us "Acted In And Written By Buck Jones," I think we can take that with a grain of salt (GCD credits the art to Ken Battlefield, no listing for script).

The story this issue involves a villainous Mexican trying to steal a ranch from a kindly American rancher:

Sigh...Pedro hires Mexican bar wench Rosita to enact one of the most foolproof real estate swindles of all time. Step 1: get him drunk. Step 2:

D'oh!!

Let's just say that this story doesn't do anything to ease racial tensions in the area:

Don't worry--Marshall Buck Jones arrives to save the day and keep the Hispanics out of the neighborhood.

Buck Jones, the real person, died in a fire the following year.

Last on our hit parade?

Zoro with one R--perfectly fine for the purposes of copyright law!!

We never learn to much about Zoro The Mystery Man. He wears a cape, he has a sword in his cane, and he has a pet cheetah named...Cheeta. And he travels around rousting bad guys.

In this case, it's a Scooby Doo mystery, as a "hideous creature" is trying to scare the natives away from working at an Amazonian rubber plantation:

Well, Zoro believes in fighting fire with fire, so if the bad guy wants to pull the "magic demon" act, well, two can play at that game:

And, in an ending you wish you could have seen more often on Scooby Doo:

No, not a white man!! (He was a disgruntled ex-employee out for revenge. And he would have gotten away with it, too, if it weren't for those...)

Oh, and the fiery demon animal?

Man, don't let PETA know about that!

And that brings us to the end of Master Comics #16, a veritable grave yard for forgotten back-up strips and heroes consigned to limbo. Hey, it's hard to do a good anthology comic--you've got to take chances, and sometimes they don't work. But at least they were trying...