A new question has come in!

The full question – “Out of all the defunct/available superheroes in the public domain, why did Planet Money pick Micro-face?  It’s dumb.  He has a microphone strapped to his face, Jeremy.  Especially when they had that Frogman and Doorman to consider.  Those are better.  What would you pick?”

I heard that Doorman actually wasn’t available.  I would imagine that they chose Micro-face because they’re doing a podcast and they liked the idea of incorporating a microphone.  Plus they were probably going for dumb.  That’s kind of the wheelhouse of what people are doing these days.  I remember back in the olden times before the covid a guy said to me he said “You should watch BLANK it’s so stupid!”  And I told him that I preferred not to watch stupid things and he said “But it’s SUPPOSED to be stupid!” 

The other day someone blogged at me in the blogs asking why cringe has become such a big part of comedies these days.  I don’t really know, but I assume it’s a similar type of thing.  I guess people like things that are stupid because it makes them feel better about themselves?  Plus wasting money is fun right?  Spending millions of dollars to make a movie that is “supposed to suck” creates jobs?  And is good for the economy? 

I had never heard of Micro-face, because why would I, but he seems kind of interesting. 

Tom Wood was a factory worker and a failed inventor. When his brotherwas killed by gangsters, Tom promised to avenge Jim’s death.  What did he do to get that revenge?  He invented a “Micro-Mask” – a full-face mask that contained a built-in microphone which allowed him to amplify and throw his voice, a hearing amplifier, and “photoelectric lenses” that gave him x-ray vision. He could also attach telephone wires to his mask to make phone calls. Tom offered the invention to the U.S. government, only to be turned down.

So he can talk real loud, throw his voice, has enhanced hearing, and x-ray vision.  That’s pretty thin as far as superpowers go and with that he’s going to take on organized crime?  That takes some balls.  I think his costume is kind of cool– the face-holes make it look like a scary death mask of some kind.  Micro-face uses his X-ray vision to find out the mobsters are running numbers, which is an illegal lottery you know (was there a legal lottery in 1943?  I don’t think so).  With his super hearing Micro-face finds out about an art heist and about the mobsters various mistresses. 

Then something happens.  Not clear what exactly.  He for sure foils the art heist by throwing his voice all around and confusing people.  Then for some reason the lottery scam . . . has something happen that the mobsters are upset by.  Then Micro-face snitches to all the mobsters wives about their side action.  Which they make out to be a big deal but I feel like if you’re a mafia wife in the 40’s you don’t have much power in those relationships.  So far I think Micro-face is doing a pretty good job of screwing things up for the mob.  When I think “avenge” I think murder, but constant harassment over many years really is better revenge. 

Micro-face the disappears for a couple issues, as does the headliner Boy King who had all the powers of a boy and all the powers of a king, in favor of “Gun-man” which shows that even in the 40s they were under pressure to make things “dark and gritty”.  Micro-face does show up again a few issues later but the mob plot seems to have been dropped and he’s just trying to deal with balancing a girlfriend and doing unspecific Micro-face stuff.  He crosses paths with an evil guy that has some kind of machine that makes loud noises but that is never resolved.  Micro-face makes 10 appearances and then is gone. 

So I assume Planet Money chose him to be kitschy and “ironic” but in terms of 40s comic books he’s not so bad.  If you have a mint condition comic of Micro-faces first appearance the internet says that’s worth $2400.  Is it really though?  And will that go up now that Planet Money is doing a thing? 

You might be surprised how much time I’ve spent thinking about public domain superheroes.  Actually if you know me you probably wouldn’t.  Back in the old times of the internet when there really wasn’t anything to do on it I stumbled across Public Domain Superheroes and I thought it was going to be an awesome thing where people were posting comics using those people.  But it wasn’t, it was just a wiki (before wikis were a thing) of different public domain superheroes.  Although it did have a section that tried to explain how you could legally use them in a real comic that I think was total bullshit. 

After I came across that I spent a few weeks combing through the site to find some PD super people I liked and then I started an outline of a comic for them.  Then I realized I was never going to make a comic book and went back to writing about wrestling and sci-fi stories that really went nowhere and had no protagonist. 

I think if I were going to do something today I would choose Miss Fury, who is the first female superhero created by a female writer (maybe).  Miss Fury was also one of the first comic characters that people got all bent out of shape about because sometimes was dressed pretty saucy.  They were also mad because she was a single woman doing stuff.  Some would Miss Fury led to the creation to the widely reviled comic code. 

Miss Fury is actually Marla Drake, wealthy socialite.  What happened is Marla went to a party and was shocked to see that another woman was wearing her same dress!  The horror.  So what did she do?  Well, at the suggesteionof her French maid she took off that dress and put on an African panther skin that her uncle had left to her.  I mean in that situation who wouldn’t do that? 

And wouldn’t you know it, that panther skin suit fit her just right – only thing was it was magic.  And it wasn’t the good kind.  It had been enchanted with black magic in the past to give you panther-speed and panther-strength and nightvision and claws and the like, but because of the evil magic involved every time you used it you get bad luck all over you.  That’s something I like, you can use powers but there’s a price to be paid. 

So Miss Fury tracked down murderers and Nazis (of course) and the like but she generally tried to do it without her super-panther suit because of the bad luck thing, only resorting to that when she couldn’t get the bad guy just by being a skilled sleuth, athlete, acrobat, karate lady and also being very rich – which is the best super power.  She had a whip sometimes because all comic women have to have whips to make it sexy? 

She looks exactly like (some versions of) Catwoman, when was Catwoman invented?  Who ripped off who?  Or was the lady in a black catsuit with a whip already established by someone else?  According to the internet American servicemen used to paint Miss Fury on the sides of their planes, which seems plausible. 

I think what I would do is have Marla be an old lady and her grand-daughter finds the old magic panther suit and then we’re off to the races with a legacy character. 

What I don’t understand is why comic book people think there are panthers in Africa.  They have leopards there, and I believe a panther is “just” a freak leopard that’s all black but I think that only happens in America.  Because genetics? 

The full question – “Out of all the defunct/available superheroes in the public domain, why did Planet Money pick Micro-face?  It’s dumb.  He has a microphone strapped to his face, Jeremy.  Especially when they had that Frogman and Doorman to consider.  Those are better.  What would you pick?”

I heard that Doorman actually wasn’t available.  I would imagine that they chose Micro-face because they’re doing a podcast and they liked the idea of incorporating a microphone.  Plus they were probably going for dumb.  That’s kind of the wheelhouse of what people are doing these days.  I remember back in the olden times before the covid a guy said to me he said “You should watch BLANK it’s so stupid!”  And I told him that I preferred not to watch stupid things and he said “But it’s SUPPOSED to be stupid!” 

The other day someone blogged at me in the blogs asking why cringe has become such a big part of comedies these days.  I don’t really know, but I assume it’s a similar type of thing.  I guess people like things that are stupid because it makes them feel better about themselves?  Plus wasting money is fun right?  Spending millions of dollars to make a movie that is “supposed to suck” creates jobs?  And is good for the economy? 

I had never heard of Micro-face, because why would I, but he seems kind of interesting. 

Tom Wood was a factory worker and a failed inventor. When his brotherwas killed by gangsters, Tom promised to avenge Jim’s death.  What did he do to get that revenge?  He invented a “Micro-Mask” – a full-face mask that contained a built-in microphone which allowed him to amplify and throw his voice, a hearing amplifier, and “photoelectric lenses” that gave him x-ray vision. He could also attach telephone wires to his mask to make phone calls. Tom offered the invention to the U.S. government, only to be turned down.

So he can talk real loud, throw his voice, has enhanced hearing, and x-ray vision.  That’s pretty thin as far as superpowers go and with that he’s going to take on organized crime?  That takes some balls.  I think his costume is kind of cool– the face-holes make it look like a scary death mask of some kind.  Micro-face uses his X-ray vision to find out the mobsters are running numbers, which is an illegal lottery you know (was there a legal lottery in 1943?  I don’t think so).  With his super hearing Micro-face finds out about an art heist and about the mobsters various mistresses. 

Then something happens.  Not clear what exactly.  He for sure foils the art heist by throwing his voice all around and confusing people.  Then for some reason the lottery scam . . . has something happen that the mobsters are upset by.  Then Micro-face snitches to all the mobsters wives about their side action.  Which they make out to be a big deal but I feel like if you’re a mafia wife in the 40’s you don’t have much power in those relationships.  So far I think Micro-face is doing a pretty good job of screwing things up for the mob.  When I think “avenge” I think murder, but constant harassment over many years really is better revenge. 

Micro-face the disappears for a couple issues, as does the headliner Boy King who had all the powers of a boy and all the powers of a king, in favor of “Gun-man” which shows that even in the 40s they were under pressure to make things “dark and gritty”.  Micro-face does show up again a few issues later but the mob plot seems to have been dropped and he’s just trying to deal with balancing a girlfriend and doing unspecific Micro-face stuff.  He crosses paths with an evil guy that has some kind of machine that makes loud noises but that is never resolved.  Micro-face makes 10 appearances and then is gone. 

So I assume Planet Money chose him to be kitschy and “ironic” but in terms of 40s comic books he’s not so bad.  If you have a mint condition comic of Micro-faces first appearance the internet says that’s worth $2400.  Is it really though?  And will that go up now that Planet Money is doing a thing? 

You might be surprised how much time I’ve spent thinking about public domain superheroes.  Actually if you know me you probably wouldn’t.  Back in the old times of the internet when there really wasn’t anything to do on it I stumbled across Public Domain Superheroes and I thought it was going to be an awesome thing where people were posting comics using those people.  But it wasn’t, it was just a wiki (before wikis were a thing) of different public domain superheroes.  Although it did have a section that tried to explain how you could legally use them in a real comic that I think was total bullshit. 

After I came across that I spent a few weeks combing through the site to find some PD super people I liked and then I started an outline of a comic for them.  Then I realized I was never going to make a comic book and went back to writing about wrestling and sci-fi stories that really went nowhere and had no protagonist. 

I think if I were going to do something today I would choose Miss Fury, who is the first female superhero created by a female writer (maybe).  Miss Fury was also one of the first comic characters that people got all bent out of shape about because sometimes was dressed pretty saucy.  They were also mad because she was a single woman doing stuff.  Some would Miss Fury led to the creation to the widely reviled comic code. 

Miss Fury is actually Marla Drake, wealthy socialite.  What happened is Marla went to a party and was shocked to see that another woman was wearing her same dress!  The horror.  So what did she do?  Well, at the suggesteionof her French maid she took off that dress and put on an African panther skin that her uncle had left to her.  I mean in that situation who wouldn’t do that? 

And wouldn’t you know it, that panther skin suit fit her just right – only thing was it was magic.  And it wasn’t the good kind.  It had been enchanted with black magic in the past to give you panther-speed and panther-strength and nightvision and claws and the like, but because of the evil magic involved every time you used it you get bad luck all over you.  That’s something I like, you can use powers but there’s a price to be paid. 

So Miss Fury tracked down murderers and Nazis (of course) and the like but she generally tried to do it without her super-panther suit because of the bad luck thing, only resorting to that when she couldn’t get the bad guy just by being a skilled sleuth, athlete, acrobat, karate lady and also being very rich – which is the best super power.  She had a whip sometimes because all comic women have to have whips to make it sexy? 

She looks exactly like (some versions of) Catwoman, when was Catwoman invented?  Who ripped off who?  Or was the lady in a black catsuit with a whip already established by someone else?  According to the internet American servicemen used to paint Miss Fury on the sides of their planes, which seems plausible. 

I think what I would do is have Marla be an old lady and her grand-daughter finds the old magic panther suit and then we’re off to the races with a legacy character. 

What I don’t understand is why comic book people think there are panthers in Africa.  They have leopards there, and I believe a panther is “just” a freak leopard that’s all black but I think that only happens in America.  Because genetics?