Radio Recap: The Avenger

The radio series the Avenger is a bit of an odd bird. I've looked at a few attempts to examine the program online and they don't quite agree with each other. The confusion seems to stem from a radio serial in 1941-42 called the Avenger, followed by a 1945-46 syndicated program with the same name. I'm looking at the syndicated program.

First, it should be noted that the Avenger was a pulp hero published by Street & Smith, the same people who published the Shadow, who had a very successful radio program. It seems the Avenger was never a top Street & Smith hero the way the Shadow, Nick Carter or Doc Savage were (and are) but he's enjoyed a decent following over the decades and has never been entirely forgotten. You may recall that a few years ago I looked at two issues of the 1970s DC Comic version of the Avenger (Justice Inc.) by Jack Kirby, here and here.

As presented in the 26 episodes of the syndicated radio show, the Avenger - Jim Brandon - is a police chemist who goes beyond the obligations of his career to solve crimes in his spare time. He aided by his female companion Fern Collier and has to prove himself each week to his skeptical superior Inspector White. His chief tools in his investigations are the telepathic indicator which allows him to pick up people's thoughts and the diffusion capsule which covers him in the "black light of invisibility."

If you know much about the pulp hero you'll be taken aback by that description because it doesn't sound like the Avenger at all. Telepathic powers? Invisibility? A female companion who knows his secrets? An incompetant police official? It all sounds like the Shadow, doesn't it? And the comparisons keep coming such as when he opens each broadcast by saying, "The road of crime ends in a trap that justice sets; crime does not pay!"

I think the pulp hero would have made a pretty good radio hero as he was. His schtick involved his ability to change his appearance and adopt other guises. Give that role to a hungry radio actor and I'm sure they'd love putting on a different voice every week! Instead the Avenger was made so much like the Shadow that you would assume he was a rip-off. Or perhaps there were a lot of Shadow scripts which had been rejected and with a few modifications were turned into Avenger stories.

But the Shadow went big - the Shadow's distinctive laugh, the over-the-top theatrical villains with mad ambitions. Even if you think the show is camp, you have to admit, the Shadow is great camp. But the plots on the Avenger are pretty modest. The only attempt at giving the hero a distinctive sound is the noise made when (once per episode) he takes his diffusion capsule to become invisible. However, the noise sounds like a champagne cork popping and that's unintentionally funny.

I have doubts as to whether the makers of the program were really that invested in what they'd made. Much is made in the first episode of how Brandon's telepathic indicator gives him an insight into crimes that the rest of the police force don't have. But that same episode shows the limitations: he picks up the impresions of a murder but doesn't know who was killed or where. It's only after going to examine a body with Inspector White that he gets the idea it's the victim of the murder he sensed earlier.

The problem with the above set-up is that it requires Brandon to have two inciting incidents. First he gets a vague sense of a crime, then he's part of a police investigation into the crime. It should be enough that as a police chemist he'd get brought in to examine crime scenes! One episode even indicates that Inspector White knows about the telepathic indicator so one wonders why he doesn't simplify his life and tell him he's the Avenger too. Pretty soon the show stopped using the telepathic indicator and instead Brandon and Fern would stumble into crimes the same way as Lamont and Margo on the Shadow - they'd be on vacation when a murder is committed, for instance.

The Avenger is a failure; a bit of an interesting failure, but if you haven't heard every episode of the Shadow, you should listen to all of those first - the standard of quality is much higher on the Shadow. If you do decide to give the Avenger a spin, be advised that the series was packaged for syndication with several 90-second organ interludes where the commercials would be added. Be ready to speed through those breaks, they do become tiresome.

Unearthed: Justice, Inc.#3

Welcome back to another installment of Unearthed and a last look at Jack Kirby's Justice, Inc., as published by DC Comics in 1975. This time, the issue at hand is #3 and the story "The Monster Bug!"

I have to say, I don't think too much of this cover. Perhaps some of it is a little disappointment - noticing at first glance the car and the prominent words "Monster Bug" I'd hoped this story would involve the Avenger battling a VW Beetle; however, the word "bug" refers to a virus.

Besides the lack of lovebugs, Kirby's cover has only 2/3rds of the page and it feels too constricted. There'a also something very overpowering about Al Milgrom's inks over Kirby's pencils. The monster figures seem almost too heavy - the monsters don't seem to stand apart, but merge into a multi-coloured blob. Ah, but that's only the cover!

The story opens in a pharmacy run by Fergus MacMurdie and his wife. The monocled figure Colonel Sodom (of the New Hampshire Sodomites) has come to obtain chemicals needed to win "the coming war" with germ warfare. Fergus refuses to comply and begins to fight Sodom and his men; to Fergus' luck, our hero the Avenger (and his subordinate Josh) has also arrived on the scene and helpfully informs us Colonel Sodom is an enemy of the Shadow (author Dennis O'Neil wrote both comics for DC).

In the midst of the fight, Sodom's vial of germs are dropped and MacMurdie's wife is infected; she transforms into a monster and one of Sodom's men kills her in self-defense. Sodom himself escapes as Fergus vows revenge; the Avenger and Josh invite Fergus to join the ranks of Justice, Inc., promising together they'll get Sodom; Fergus agrees. They journey to the Justice, Inc. headquarters in Manhattan and soon Fergus is busying himself in the lab. Josh's wife Rosabel reads up on Fergus and discovers he's more than a mere pharmacist, but a chemist who had once been nominated for the Nobel Prize. Between Josh & Fergus in these two issues, there seems to be a pattern in Justice, Inc. stories where the Avenger recruits people who (for some reason) are operating in low-income menial jobs rather than the prestigious roles their backgrounds would suggest.

The Avenger takes the time to introduce Smitty to Fergus (still no explanation of Smitty's speciality; still no assigned role for Rosabel). At this point, one notes Smitty & Fergus are both giant, red-haired men, which is needlessly confusing; to help us, the colourist has outfitted both men in green clothing. The Avenger thinks Sodom's next target will be the chemist Allan Ash, so he intends to bait the villain by impersonating Ash. While Fergus toils on a cure for Sodom's germs, Rosabel places a newspaper notice about Ash visiting an automobile show to draw out Sodom; the disguised Avenger goes to the show, accompanied by Smitty & Josh. The plan works, but when Sodom sees he's been trapped, he drops another vial of his germs, turning innocent bystanders into monsters which attack the Justice, Inc. crew. Although Sodom escapes, one of his men surrenders and reveals Sodom's base is at Tiro's Gun Shop.

While the Avenger heads to the gun shop, Smitty & Josh are sent to protect the real Allan Ash. To do this, Josh masquerades as a simple janitor to surprise Sodom's men; this prompts Smitty to wonder how Josh can "pretend to be so stupid." Josh's justification that his people "have been practicing for two hundred years" might have been a progressive line of dialogue at some stage, but even by 1975 it's an awfully patronizing idea to come from a white guy. Black people might not all be stupid? What a shocker! Colonel Sodom's not the only one to drop his monocle!

The story moves now to the gun shop where Sodom is returning, for some reason having abandoned the men he sent to collect Ash (Sodom didn't see Smitty & Josh stop them). There's a fantastic billboard in the street near the gun shop, depicting a giant face blowing smoke. The billboard is for "King" cigarettes, probably an in-joke on behalf of the series' beloved penciler.

The Avenger and Fergus fight their way into the gun shop; although the Avenger shoots Sodom's men he notes they aren't dead, having only creased their skulls. Strangely, although he does kill frequently (such as last issue's Skywalker), the Avenger does make a point of avoiding bloodshed when he can. Sodom confronts Fergus and the Avenger, threatening them with another vial; when Fergus tries to charge him, Sodom shoots him in the hand. The Avenger pins Sodom's coat sleeve down with a knife so Sodom throws the vial, but the germs do nothing to the Avenger - Fergus succeeded with his antidote and administered it to he and the Avenger in advance. Sodom pulls the Avenger's knife from his coat and tries to kill the Avenger, but stupidly inhales the fumes of the vial he just dropped; Sodom turns into a monster and, confused by the King cigarettes billboard outside the window, the now-simplistic creature leaps out the window and falls to his death.

It's a very sudden end to the comic - you have to read it yourself for the full effect. The last page consists of: 1) Sodom steps into the vapors; 2) Sodom becomes a monster; 3) Sodom sidesteps the Avenger to lunge at the billboard; 4) Sodom bursts through the window; 4) Sodom flies halfway across the street; 6) Sodom falls toward the ground. Although there's not actually anything more to say, it feels as though O'Neil & Kirby ran out of pages

Thoughts: At this point, the series seems to be building its cast issue by issue. The members of Justice, Inc. don't receive much focus, but this is primarily the Avenger's show anyway. I do feel it's an improvement over the previous issue with less emphasis on mystery and sudden leaps in deduction.

The one point where an attempt is made to develop the other cast members is, unfortunately, the business about Josh and "his" people. Josh is a pretty decent African-American hero, it's a pity that these stories were written in such a way that "a black man - with a brain!" is repeated each issue as though it were a novelty. Novel amongst pulp magazine heroes, perhaps, but not exactly a revelation to anyone intelligent enough to read these comics.

Also, although the death of Fergus' wife is his motivation in this story, I wish she'd been given a name; Fergus' repeated references to "Wife" makes it sound as though she were a stranger.

Although the ending is quite abrupt, Kirby seemed to be doing his best on this book - drawing people mutated into monsters definitely plays to Kirby's strengths. Kirby is the reason to seek these issues out - the story is pedestrian, but that keeps the plot from getting in the way of Kirby's visuals.

Unearthed: Justice, Inc.#2

Before I begin the review, let's talk about the Avenger; he's a pulp hero who appeared in Street & Smith magazines from 1939-1942 - a fairly brief tour of duty, yet he's been brought back via the medium of comics several times, courtesy of DC Comics. Most recently, he appeared in 2009's First Wave; he also appeared in DC's Shadow comic books and in his own mini-series around 1989; the series we're looking at began in 1975 and lasted only four issues. Launching as a companion book to DC's Shadow series, it seems as though whenever someone dusts off the Street & Smith back catalog he's given a mandatory revival. His DC books have been called Justice, Inc. after the Avenger's team, rather than himself - probably because of potential difficulties from either Steed & Ms. Peel or the Maria Stark Foundation.

Although I haven't read the Avenger's pulp stories, nor have I read issue #1 of this series, I don't think that's a necessarily a problem. Not being a comic book character by origin, the Avenger comic book incarnations have to seek new audiences by matter of necessity as his original demographic are all either in rest homes or cemetaries. Also, the first issue was written by Dennis O'Neil & Al McWilliams while as of this second issue Jack "King" Kirby is the man on deck. "Kirby is here!" should have been proclaimed on the cover. Let's check out that cover now, yeah?

Kirby's name isn't advertised per se, but you can't miss it - this is during the years where Kirby's signature had become an obtrusive seal. This is a good cover, although I don't think the pose of the "Sky Walker" is quite correct - he seems to be simply hovering mid-air, not walking. Oh, right, I should also mention the Avenger, the series hero - he's the man on the left.

We begin this fast-paced action-packed tale with a title splash page, something Kirby had mastered about 30 years prior (but seldom used in the Marvel super hero books) while the story begins on page 2. Helpfully, the title page informs us this is an adaptation from a story by Kenneth Robeson. We open on a train which derails due to someone sabotaging the track. The Avenger and someone named Smitty happen to pass by in their airplane and land to help the survivors. However, they find a gang of looters pillaging the bodies of the dead train passengers. After being roughed up, the looters admit they weren't responsible for the derailing but simply took advantage of the situation. However, they're all distracted by the presence of a man walking on the sky above them. As the skywalker disappears into the clouds, the Avenger tells Smitty they need to fly their plane to Chicago.

At the Chicago manor of inventor Robert Gant, we meet his African-American butler & maid, Josh and Rosabel. A gang of men in trenchcoats enter the manor and shoot Gant to death; seeing this, Josh tries to fight the killers bare-handed; he's helped by the Avenger & Smitty. Introductions are made and although at first Josh changes his dialect to a "minstrel show" voice, the Avenger recognizes Josh is wearing a Phi Beta Kappa Key on his suit, meaning he's actually quite intelligent; resuming his normal voice, Josh begins to learn about the Avenger and both he and Rosabel are welcomed to join Justice, Incorporated as they hunt the men responsible for Robert Gant's death. In an aside, Smitty tells Rosabel how the Avenger is really Richard Henry Benson and how his face was frozen in grief after his wife and daughter were killed. We're beginning to learn about the Avenger, although we still don't know why the derailed train and skywalking man led him here.

Checking Gant's laboratory, the Avenger learns Abel Darcy had been financing Gant's experiments and Darcy owned the train which was derailed. The foursome head downtown to confront Darcy, but mid-transit they see the Skywalker, just as a skyscraper suddenly collapses into rubble. The Avenger tells Smitty, Rosabel & Josh to help the survivors while he carries on to Darcy. The Avenger bursts into Darcy's office and questions him about Gant. Darcy says Gant had been developing a new type of steel for railroads; this was evidently all the Avenger needed to know and he exits, enters a hotel and uses a makeup kit to disguise himself as Darcy. When Darcy leaves his office, the Avenger takes his place there and searches the office, finding documents which explain everything (unfortunately we're still in the dark), but a gang of hoodlums enter the office, having ascertained "Darcy" is really the Avenger; thus, a fight breaks out.

The Avenger's makeup takes a bad dent during the scuffle, but Josh arrives (disguised as a janitor) to join the fight; however, the gang overcome the two men with a gas grenade. The gang tie the men up and leave, playing a message for them from Darcy (I guess Darcy knew the Avenger would return and recorded this immediately after their encounter?). Darcy informs him the Skywalker will be coming to destroy the building housing Darcy's own office. Darcy intends to extort Chicago for millions by threatening to destroy their skyline. The Avenger & Josh get our of their ropes and leap from the building to its neighbour before the Skywalker destroys it.

At last, the Avenger explains what's been going on: Gant created a sound ray which can cause steel to vibrate into pieces and Darcy tested it on the rail which was destroyed. Darcy also ordered Gant's death to protect the secret (although since the Avenger somehow knew Gant was the inventor of this sound ray without any sleuthing, that was a waste of time). Gant's other great invention is an invisible metal which has been used to create an invisible airplane - that's what the Skywalker has been standing upon (and now Paradise Island will lose their monopoly on invisible jets!). In fact, the Skywalker is Darcy himself.

The Avenger returns to his airplane and pursues the Skywalker, firing armor piercing shells which hit the Skywalker, causing him to accidentally activating the sound ray; the sound ray destroys his plane from the inside and the Skywalker falls to his death.

Following the story, there's a text piece "Justice Inc. in the Movies?" Although author Allan Asherman is confident the Avenger would soon have his own feature film, 40 years later it remains a pipe dream. The article is mostly fan-casting the film because in the primitive days of 1975, there was no Wizard magazine.

Thoughts: Kirby delivers an excellent series of action-filled panels, but there's way too much plot in this book, probably because of its origins as a novel. The trail which led the Avenger from the train crash to Chicago isn't apparent and it takes too long to connect the train crash, death of Gant, Darcy and the Skywalker together. Kirby's fine action-based story is not complimented by O'Neil's dense mystery-based plot.

Additionally, we don't get a very good look at the Skywalker because he barely appears in the story and is always at a distance, seen from the heroes' perspective until the finale, so the revelation he's actually in an airplane is interesting, but unprecedented. We're also never given a proper introduction to Smitty, nor is Rosabel ever seen to possess a talent or knowledge which justifies her membership in Justice, Inc. If the mystery were toned down - perhaps by omitting the train crash & robbery and instead opening at Gant's manor - there might have been more room to better establish the protagonists and antagonists.

So far as the story goes, I most enjoyed Josh's brief turn to "minstrel show" dialogue and his quick reversal when the Avenger found him out as a college man. That was a neat touch of period race relations.

I can't overstate Kirby's contribution to this comic; I fear with a lesser talent - an artist incapable of delivering information in a concise, energetic, highly visual manner - O'Neil's laborious plotting would have rendered this book impenetrable.

Next time: More of Kirby and the Avenger in Justice, Inc.#3!