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Today, we look at when the first time that two previously established supervillains teamed up together in a comic book.
In “When We First Met”, we spotlight the various characters, phrases, objects or events that eventually became notable parts of comic lore, like the first time someone said, “Avengers Assemble!” or the first appearance of Batman’s giant penny or the first appearance of Alfred Pennyworth or the first time Spider-Man’s face was shown half-Spidey/half-Peter. Stuff like that.
The other week, longtime reader Nicole requested that I share the first time that Superman fought Joker without Batman and the first time that Batman fought Luthor without Superman and I answered that last week, however, the subject heading she used for the e-mail was “First Time Villains Crossed Over,” which obviously I now know meant the first time that Superman and Batman’s arch-rivals crossed over to fight against the other hero, but I, of course, thought at first that she was asking when two villains teamed up for the first time and so, hey, let’s find out the answer to the question that Nicole never actually asked!
THE FIRST TIME TWO SUPERVILLAINS SHARED A STORY INVOLVED TWO VERY FAMOUS BATMAN VILLAINS
It is important to remember that comic books during the Golden Age were very much based on the anthology concept. The advent of the comic book in the United States was as a collection of comic strips, reprinting the adventures of the most popular comic strips in the world. Therefore, early on the fights between comic book companies were really over which company had the best deal with the best comic strip syndicate. This setup influenced the very setup of comic books, as since the books were collections of different strips, you really couldn’t do a full book with one character, as you would run out of strips too quickly. So obviously each book was an anthology. In those days, there would be occasional original features designed to fill in the pages needed to make everything fit the page count, so when comic books started to becoming original works, that format still remained the same, the books would be filled with short features starring a variety of different characters. And just like how Dick Tracy wouldn’t show up in Flash Gordon, the features were all treated as distinct entities at first, so there wasn’t any crossovers between the various characters.
Not only that, but since the stories were often done as standalone stories, there was rarely carryover from one story to the next. The basic setup of the book would remain the same, of course, but it was rare for Comic X to reference something that had occurred in Comic Y. However, when some characters became so famous that they received their own solo titles (which were done as mini-anthologies featuring multiple stories with the main character in them), it was obvious that people WERE into these characters and thus a LITTLE bit more continuity began to seep into the series, so you’d have Superman facing off against recurring villains, for instance.
The first time a Batman villain came back again (not counting two-part stories) was in 1940’s Batman #1, where Hugo Strange returned to torment Batman again. That same issue (by Bill Finger, Bob Kane, Jerry Robinson and George Roussos) also introduced a couple of other notable villains, the murderous Clown Prince of Crime, the Joker…
and the daring female thief, The Cat (soon to be Catwoman)…
In the second issue of Batman, we got the first time that two returning villains met each other. At the end of the Joker’s SECOND appearance in Batman #1, he was badly injured (originally, he was FATALLY injured, but editor Whitney Ellsworth, who I wrote about recently, reversed the death of the Joker) and so Batman #2 sees a bunch of crooks kidnap the Joker to save his life and get him to work for them…
Meanwhile, Batman inquires with The Cat if she knows where the Joker was taken and she gives Batman a good clue…
The Joker, of course, quickly took control of the gang that saved his life. Catwoman, knowing that Batman was occupied with the Joker, then went to go steal some jewels, but the Joker then surprised her…
Robin showed up and when Joker got the upper hand, Catwoman notably tried to save Robin’s life. Luckily, Batman did that…
So Joker and Catwoman were very much NOT a team in that first story together.
THE FIRST SUPERVILLAIN TEAM=UP WAS AGAINST AN UNLIKELY SUPERHERO
Throughout 1940, more and more superheroes started debuting, with Doctor Fate taking his first bow in More Fun Comics #55 (by Gardner Fox and Howard Sherman). In that first two-parter, he fought the villainous Wotan, who planned on destroying the Earth…
In the end, Wotan was defeated and sent to a prison in the middle of the Earth…
A year or so later, Doctor Fate was now the lead feature in More Fun Comics and in More Fun Comics #69, we met Ian Karkull, a villainous scientist who discovered how to turn crooks into shadows. They could commit crimes, turn into shadows and then return undetected and even if you found them, you couldn’t hurt them in their shadow form. At the end of the story, though, Karkull decides to use the treatment on hismself and is then trapped in shadow form…
In the following issue (still by Fox and Sherman), Wotan sort of sends his spirit out to try to find someone to free him and he runs into Karkull, of course…
The two team up and plan a way to destroy Doctor Fate…
In the end, though, the tables were turned on them and Doctor Fate easily kills them (I think Fox spent too much time doing the set-up for this story, because the climax came QUICKLY0…
And that was the first supervillain team-up! The team-ups of established villains came fast and furious after this, but that’s perhaps a story for another day!
If anyone wants to know about an interesting comic book first, just drop me a line at brianc@cbr.com!
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