Alex Ross' Project SuperPowers

...here are a dozen Golden Age comic book covers featuring at least two (or more) heroes and heroines on EACH one!
Click HERE to buy!

Click HERE to buy!

V-Man
American Eagle
The Eagle & Buddy
American Crusader
Captain V
Man of War
The Flag
Super-American
U.S. Jones
Major Victory
The Conqeror
Yankee Doodle Jones!
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12 dynamic, classic covers from the Golden Age of Comics featuring characters resurrected by Alex Ross for his new Project SuperPowers series!

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Choose from several designs (including his FIRST appearance) on shirts, messenger bags, mousepads, mugs & other kool kollectibles by clicking here for the "Solo Heroes" section!

Before Green Arrow!
Before Hawkeye!
Before Alias the Spider!
There was...The Arrow!
First appearing in Funny Pages V2N10, The Arrow was US Intelligence Agent Ralph Payne, who feeling constrained by government rules and regulations, decided to use his archery skills to deal with lawbreakers who otherwise would get away with crimes!
He wore either a red or blue hooded costume without a mask (which color depended on what worked better with the cover's color scheme) , though the artists would hide his face with shadows or angle him so his face wouldn't show to the reader.

Choose from several designs (including his FIRST appearance) on shirts, messenger bags, mousepads, mugs & other kool kollectibles by clicking here

Choose from several designs (including his FIRST appearance) on shirts, messenger bags, mousepads, mugs & other kool kollectibles by clicking here
He's one of the few characters revived by BOTH Alex Ross in Project SuperPowers & Erik Larsen in Savage Dragon!

NOW AVAILABLE The Classic Black Terror 12-Month Calendar for 2010!

Created and written by legendary sci-fi writer Edmond Hamilton, Captain Future I was a futuristic Doc Savage-type pulp hero with an entourage of aides including robot Grag, shape-changing android Otho, and Simon Wright the Living Brain.
An "ultimate-human" type hero with Olympic-level physical abiilties and genius-level mind, the Moon-based Cap, aka Curt Newton, battled evil all over the universe.
Strangely, when his publisher put him into comics, Cap was rechristened "Major Mars", even though he was still Curt Newton, and the other characters remained the same!

That publisher then created an entirely NEW comic book hero and assigned HIM the "Captain Future" name!
Captain Future II was present-day scientist Andrew Bryant who exposed himself to a combo of gamma and infrared radiation which granted him super-strength, flight, and energy-emitting powers! (instead of frying him like bacon, which is what would happen if it were you or me!)
In a unique twist, if he over-extended his powers, Cap would have to return to his lab and "recharge" himself!

This version is the one revived by Alex Ross in Project SuperPowers.
Interesting graphic note: in Alex Ross' redesign, Cap Future II now wears a reversed Project SuperPowers logo "S" on his chest!
And, he's apparently going to be revealed as a modern incarnation of the lighting-hurling Greek god Zeus (which would explain the reversed "S", which looks like a "Z"!)

Check both of them (including Cap I's FIRST pulp and comic apperances, AND Cap II's FIRST appearance) out on shirts, messenger bags, mousepads, mugs & other kool kollectibles by clicking here!

NOW AVAILABLE The Classic Captain Future 12-Month Calendar for 2010!

Silver Streak Comics was unique in two respects;
1) It wasn't named after it's lead character, like Flash Comics or Blue Bolt Comics.
(In fact, the hero known as The Silver Streak didn't even come along until issue #3, and then he was just a backup strip!)
2) The lead character was a villain!
And what a villain he was!
The Claw was the first great villain of the Golden Age!
He was a, literally, inhuman scientific genius with powers of size-changing, hypnotism, and numerous other abilities depending on the needs of the story! (In the Golden Age, these things tended to be a little, well, loose.)
In his first few appearances he was barely defeated by various international secret agents who would stumble upon his various operations, but The Claw himself would always escape to plot again!
While the foul fiend dominated the front of the book, several heroes made their debuts in backup features in the first few issues, among them a mute fellow in a weird half-yellow / half-blue costume who used a boomerang!
His name was DareDevil, and he would not only finally defeat The Claw, but steal the lead slot away from him!
But that's a story for another time...

Choose from several designs on shirts, messenger bags, mousepads, mugs & other kool kollectibles by clicking here

Created in Silver Streak Comics #6 by writer / artist Jack Binder, brother of noted pulp sci-fi writers Otto & Earl Binder, DareDevil was Bart Hill, rendered speechless as a boy when he witnessed the murder of his father!
The silent lad learned how to use a boomerang, and, when he became an adult, adopted a costume in order to avenge himself against evil in it's various forms. Not a bad origin tale, overall.

Jack Cole, who later would create Plastic Man, took over the strip in the next issue, tossing out everything except the boomerang and the name Bart Hill, creating the first comic book retcon!
He also modified the costume, making the yellow sections bright red.

Cole then decided that his revamped hero would make the perfect ongoing counterpoint to The Claw (Silver Streak's ongoing villain), so as of Silver Streak Comics #7, he pitted the two against each other in an ongoing battle that lasted five issues, which ended with The Claw finally being captured!
At that point, DareDevil was given his own title, DareDevil Comics, with the greatest real-life villain of all as his first opponent--Adolf Hitler!
With the aid of other heroes, including The Silver Streak, DD managed to stalemate Der Fuehrer.

Cole went on to other projects, and writer / artist Charles Biro took over the strip.
Biro gave Bart an entirely new origin, having the orphaned kid raised by Australian Aborigines and trained by them to use boomerangs!
Bart Hill settled down to a typical life of an acrobatic superhero whose new secret identity of a policeman enabled him to serve the law by day, and justice by night...until the Little Wise Guys came along in #13!

Jocko, Peewee, Scarecrow, and Meatball were a kid gang whom Officer Hill encountered while on patrol.
Sensing they were inherently good kids gone wrong, he took them under his wing, guiding them into more socially-acceptible activities, like spying on saboteurs.
It was like having a whole team of Robins or Buckys (sans costumes) to help in his ongoing war against evil!
During one of their adventures against a rival gang, Meatball was killed.
A rival gang member, Curly, feeing guilty about Meatball's demise (though he didn't cause it) reformed, and joined the Little Wise Guys.

The kids gradually took over the book as DareDevil went from lead hero to mentor / advisor to occasional guest-star, disappearing altogether as of #80.
DareDevil Comics continued until #134 in September 1954.
Ironically, it was the same month Showcase #4, featuring The Flash started the Silver Age of Comics!
Talk about "missed it by that much!"

Since Marvel Comics has a trademark on "Daredevil", the Golden-Age character now has different names in his various appearances. (When AC Comics revived the character, they called him RedDevil, although his costume is half-blue!)
It's similar to the situation when Marvel trademarked the disused name "Captain Marvel" for Kree captain Mar-Vell (and several other characters since). When DC Comics revived the Golden Age Captain Marvel, the book had to be titled SHAZAM! although the character was still called "Captain Marvel" inside.
So they COULD call him "DareDevil" on the inside, just not on the cover. (And any licensed products would have to use the "Death-Defying 'Devil" name.)

Choose from several designs (including his FIRST cover appearance) on shirts, messenger bags, mousepads, mugs & other kool kollectibles by clicking here

He's one of the few characters revived by both Alex Ross in Project SuperPowers and Erik Larsen in Savage Dragon!! NOTE: Larsen is calling him "Dynamic DareDevil" to differentiate from the other revived versions!

NOW AVAILABLE The Classic Dare Devil 12-Month Calendar for 2010

Project SuperPowers #1 threw me for a loop!
Dynamic Man, a Golden Age hero, who like the original Human Torch is a robot/android, is now apparently evil?
Note: In several 1940s stories, he was also to be a normal human who was, shall we say, "chemically-enhanced"! (continuity was not a big selling-point back then.)
Choose from several designs (including his FIRST cover appearance) on shirts, messenger bags, mousepads, mugs & other kool kollectibles by clicking here.

"Criminals are a cowardly, superstitious lot, so my disguise must be able to strike terror into their hearts."
Radio announcer Tony Trent, decided to fight crime after having witnessed a murder committed by gangsters disguised as cops.
But what could he do with no evidence and criminals who have an unbreakable, but phony, alibi?
Since a bat didn't fly thru his window, he decided to use a fright mask and pretend to be a creature of the night to scare the criminals into confessing.
The tactic proved so successful, Tony managed to use it for over 60 issues of Big Shot Comics as The Face, as well as two issues of his own title before discarding it, and continuing until Big Shot Comics ended as just a hard-hitting investigative reporter, operating without unusual garb or gimmicks.

He's been revived a couple of time since then...
In the 1980s, Ace Comics' What is...The Face?, drawn by comics legends Steve Ditko and Alex Toth ran four issues.
In 2007, as part of Alex Ross' Project SuperPowers series, The Face (now called Mister Face) was one of the heroes trapped in a mystic urn in the 1940s, but released in the present day with enhanced powers, and is unable to remove the mask!
In addition, he can force people who look at his visage to experience their greatest fears!
Plus, he's now a member of the "Big Shots" team!

Choose from several designs (including his FIRST cover appearance) on shirts, messenger bags, mousepads, mugs & other kool kollectibles by clicking here.

Our story starts in June of 1941...and in 1775.
At a critical point of the American Revolution, George Washington himself entrusted messenger Bruce Carter with vital information.
Carter was captured, tortured, and killed by the British, taking his military secrets to the grave, and vowing to return when danger threatened the Colonies.
Flash-forward to 1941, Cabot's great-great-grandson Bruce Cabot III, a rich idler obsessed with history sees patterns forming that will lead to the USA soon becoming involved in the World War raging in Europe and Asia! But what to do? He's only one man, albeit an extremely rich layabout!
The ghost of his ancestor appears and leads him to a trunk in the attic of the Cabot estate, where Cabot III discovers his ancestor's personal effects, including his cape!
Donning the cloak, Cabot III is granted amazing powers including super-strength and limited invulnerability. (He can't be killed, but he can be stunned.)
Wanting to disguise himself, Cabot rummages thru the attic and dons a tricorn hat, breeches, buckled shoes, a domino mask, and a shirt which he sews an American flag decal to!
Thus garbed, the newly-christened Fighting Yank takes on local saboteurs for "unnamed foreign powers" until December 1941, at which point, the "unnamed" spies became German and Japanese operatives!
In a twist, besides giving Cabot III his powers, the Revolutionary War ghost pops up to warn or advise his decendant about danger, and even occasionally transport the Fighting Yank garb to the non-costumed (and thus helpless) Carter III, who apparently didn't wear it under his street clothes like most superheroes!

Fighting Yank fought the Good Fight, first in Startling Comics, then his own title and the anthology America's Best Comics, until 1949, when superheroes gave way to an explosion of horror, crime, and Western comics.
He was revived in 2001, when Alan Moore brought him back, but quickly killed him off, so he could introduce a NEW Fighting Yank; Bruce Cabot III's daughter, while Carter III took over his ancestor's role of ghostly aide to the present Fighting Yank!
In 2007, Alex Ross revived the Fighting Yank as the lynchpin for the new Project SuperPowers line of comics which incorporates numerous characters from defunct comic companies into a cohesive universe!

Choose from several designs (including his FIRST & FINAL appearances) on shirts, messenger bags, mousepads, mugs & other kool kollectibles by clicking here.

NOW AVAILABLE The Classic Fighting Yank 12-Month Calendar for 2010

Super heroes and Himalayan monasteries seem to go hand-in-hand.
In the Golden Age, next to exposure to something radioactive, being raised from childhood or trained after you crash-landed as an adult by Tibetan lamas was the primary factor in the creation of superheroes (and more than a few supervillains)!
Look at The Shadow, Amazing-Man, The Green Lama, etc, and later; Iron Fist, The Shroud, Dr Strange, and Dr Doom. (Even The Batman and Doc Savage visited lamaseries during their teens to train!)

Baby orphan Gary Preston was raised by a group of mystic priests to be an example of the pinnacle of human mental and physical development.
In addition, they trained him to control any fire in his immediate vicinity as well as regulate his own body temperature from normal to just short of bursting into flame himself! (He eventually learned how to do that, too!)
He was armed with a technologically-advanced pistol-sized flamethrower with a self-renewing fuel supply, since he couldn't create fire, just manipulate it.
And, as a final gift, he was taught how to enter flames without harm, then teleport himself to anywhere else in the world there was a fire, and appear, unharmed, from within it!
Thus armed and outfitted in a yellow and red costume, Gary returned to the Outside World as...The Flame!
(And before you ask, he arrived on the comics scene several months before The Human Torch debuted in Marvel Comics #1!)

His first appearance (and origin recounted above) was in WonderWorld Comics #3, created by writer / artist Will Eisner (The Spirit) and artist Lou Fine, who also did most of the covers!
The Flame went on to become one of Fox's top three superhero stars, as evidenced by his starring role in all seven issues of the anthology comic Big 3, which he shared with The Blue Beetle, Samson, and later, V-Man.
He also had his own title for eight issues.
He remained the lead feature in WonderWorld Comics until #33, the final issue, in 1942.
There was a brief revival in the 1950s, then he disappeared, not to be seen, except in comics reference books, until 2007 when Alex Ross revived him as one of the many Golden Age characters returned to action in the new Project SuperPowers mini-series and Erik Larsen guest-starred him in Savage Dragon #141!

Choose from several designs (including his FIRST appearance) on shirts, messenger bags, mousepads, mugs & other kool kollectibles by clicking here.

NOW AVAILABLE: The Classic Flame 12-Month Calendar for 2010

Besides comics, wealthy playboy Jethro Dumont also had a regular pulp series and his own short-lived radio show!
(Yes, I know the Blue Beetle also had a short-lived radio show, plus a newspaper strip, but he's only appeared as a background character so far!)
The Green Lama had previously appeared in pulp magazines, specifically Double Detective Magazine! (He never had his own title, like The Shadow or Doc Savage.) and in Prize Comics #7 which cover-featured the Black Owl. But we have his first cover appearance in Prize Comics #8 AND his first cover appearance in Double Detective!
Choose from several designs (including his FIRST and FINAL appearances, and several pulp covers) on shirts, messenger bags, mousepads, mugs & other kool kollectibles by clicking here.

NOW AVAILABLE The Classic Green Lama 12-Month Calendar for 2010

Comic book scientists are incredibly clumsy.
They spill or ingest chemical concoctions that would kill any ordinary human, but always end up granting them amazing powers!
Such is the case of Harry Thurston, who developed a chemical that would convert any matter it touched to water.
And, of course, he spilled it on himself, turning his arm to liquid. Thankfully, labmate Bob Blake used another chemical to revert Harry's arm.
Deciding to take things a step further, Bob Blake then had himself injected with the chemical, making his whole body turn to water and using his force of will to control the level of transformation from human to liquid and back to human.
Like most scientists who gain weird powers, he becomes a costumed hero to fight enemy agents and crooks.
Strangely, he strapped a .45 automatic to his belt when he first dons his costume, but never used it! (And whatever happened to Harry Thurston, who had the good sense not to inject himself with dangerous chemcals?)
With his ability to both become and control water, HydroMan was a remarkably-effective crimefighter, as long as he avoided sub-zero temperatures which would freeze him solid (his Achilles heel!)

HydroMan never had his own comic, but he was the cover feature for the first year or so of Reg'lar Fellas Heroic Comics.
Note: HydroMan was created by Bill Everett, who later went on to create some other water-based heroes for Timely/Marvel including The Fin and some little-known guy called Namor, The Sub-Mariner.
Oh, him you've heard of...

While Marvel has a villain called "Hydro-Man" (note hyphen), it seems weird that this particular name change was made.
Both Marvel & DC have:
Sandmen (DC has several different ones)
Captains Marvel (Marvel has several different ones!)
Scarecrows (Marvel has two different ones!)
and several other character names in common. (Usually one is a hero, the other a villain)
So I'm a little confused.
(See my DareDevil listing below for more name-change comments)
Choose from several designs (including his FIRST appearance) on shirts, messenger bags, mousepads, mugs & other kool kollectibles by clicking here.

Debuting in Exciting Comics #51, Miss Masque was another of the line of rich socialites-turned-masked crimefighters in the Golden Age which included The Shadow, The Batman, and The Green Hornet!
Diana Adams had no superpowers or abilities, just her keen deductive mind and a pair of .45 automatics.
And, unlike her male contemporaries, she didn't have a sidekick or aides!

Clad in bright red cape, mini-dress, gloves, and slouch hat, she pursued criminals and saboteurs thru several issues of Exciting Comics, appearing on the cover only once (#53) during her run, before transferring over to America's Best Comics, where she teamed up (on the covers) with other heroes, most notably The Black Terror, even though they didn't appear together inside the comic! (They all had separate strips!)
Also, she seemed to lose parts of her wardrobe when she changed homes, as her fedora disappeared along with the midriff of her costume, making her predate the trailer-trash look of Britney Spears by decades! (Maybe it was her summer ensemble!)
When superheroes faded away after the end of World War II, so did Miss Masque.

Since the 1990s, she's been revived by several publishers, most notably, by writer Alan Moore of Watchmen fame in DC Comics' "America's Best Comics" imprint (ironic, eh?), and artist Alex Ross in Project SuperPowers as well as a mini-series under her new code-name of Masquerade as part of a team called The Scarlet Sisters with the red garbed Lady Satan and Woman in Red!

Choose from several designs (including her FIRST appearance) on shirts, messenger bags, mousepads, mugs & other kool kollectibles by clicking here.

Who did you think it was? Captain Parmenter, Sgt. O'Rourke & Corporal Agarn?
BTW, a new DVD of the F TROOP tv series is out. Corny as hell, but lots o' fun! "It is...BALLOON!" (In-joke you'll get if you watch the DVD!)
And now I can't get the damn theme song out of my head!!! "The end of the Civil War was near, when quite acc-i-dent-al-ly..." (That's how it was broken down in the lyrics!)

Prize Comics' Monster of Frankenstein began life in Prize Comics #7 (the same issue that introduced The Green Lama to comics) and continued over several years going from a relatively-straight sequel to the Mary Shelley novel to all-out comedy, all drawn by the same artist, Dick Briefer (who also created the series The Target & the Targeteers.) and continuing to the point when Prize Comics became Prize Western Comics.
By then, he had his own title, also played for laughs, which ran for 17 issues.

Of particular note was Prize Comics #24, where The Green Lama, Yank & Doodle, and other Prize Comics heroes teamed up as The Prize Fighters to deal with the assumed threat of The Monster, much as various Marvel heroes tend to team up to try to tame The Hulk from the 1960s onward.

By the mid-1950s, with horror comics a hot genre, The Monster was revived as a straight horror title with #18 and running thru #33, with Dick Briefer still at the artistic helm. This is the period Golden Age fans still speak of in respectful hushed tones (although technically, it's not the Golden Age).
Old-timers may also note the logo was adapted for the first (and only) issue of Calvin Beck's Journal of Frankenstein, a b/w magazine which was retitled Castle of Frankenstein for the remainder of it's run. (It was one of the better competitors to Forrest J. Ackerman's long-running Famous Monsters of Filmland).
There have been several reprints of the Briefer material including Ray Zone's 3-D Zone, Michael T. Gilbert's Mr. Monster's Hi-Shock Schlock, and most recently, Idea Men Productions' trade paperback (ISBN-10 1419640178, ISBN-13 978-1419640179)

Choose from several designs (including his FIRST "horror" appearance) on shirts, messenger bags, mousepads, mugs & other kool kollectibles by clicking here

NOW AVAILABLE The Classic Monster of Frankenstein 12-Month Calendar for 2010

Comics in the 1940s were noted for, among other things, a tendency to see what worked, then take elements from it, mix it with a few other things and see if that new version would sell!

Sometimes the recombination sold better than the original!
For example: Batman's still going strong as a multi-media phenomenon, but most of his "inspirations", including The Shadow and Zorro, are marginal pop culture characters today (though, in the past, both had periods when they eclipsed Batman)!
On the other hand, The Owl was one of those who, while interesting, didn't quite hit the heights.

Nick Terry, a police detective who felt the law was too easily manipulated by racketeers and gangsters (and their lawyers) decided that operating outside the law on behalf of justice would be the way to go!
(Any number of Golden Age heroes, including The Whisperer, Black Hood, Guardian, and DareDevil, had the same concept of one who upholds the law having to indulge in extra-legal methods to achieve true justice.)
He became a Caped Creature of the Night to battle criminals (like Batman, The Shadow, and The Sandman, among others.)
Nick also used a plethora of themed weapons and gimmicks (including an Owl-Mobile, and Owl-Light) not unlike Bat-you-know-who and Green Arrow. (Although since he wasn't a millionaire like most of the aforementioned characters, it's never explained how Nick affords all this stuff!)
His nosy reporter girlfriend (Can you say "Lois Lane" or "Vicki Vale" boys and girls?) eventually discovers his dual identity and forces him (ala Captain America's Bucky) to make her his similarly-costumed sidekick, Owl-Girl! (think HawkGirl, but with hyphenation!)
One of his unique features (he did have a couple, don't get snarky) was that he wore a full-face cowl with sight-enhancing lenses, predating a similar style later worn by Spider-Man!
And, he does have a very distinctive look! You won't mistake him for anyone else!

The Owl didn't have his own title.
Instead, he was the cover-feature of Crackajack Funnies for over a year before being downgraded to the back of the book in Popular Comics for another year before being cancelled.

But, that's not the end of the story...

In the 1960s, with the pop-culture success of Marvel Comics and the Batman tv series, superheroes were in vogue again!
Curiously, while Marvel, DC, and Archie revived their Golden Age characters, other publishers with old heroes chose to do new characters instead...with one exception!
Gold Key now owned the Dell super-heroes, and though they did several short-lived new characters, they did revive their Golden Age character most similar to Batman.
Guess who?
The Owl finally got his own comic!
And because they felt it should be as much like the tv Batman as possible, Gold Key camped it up beyond belief...
It only lasted two issues.
And except for a cameo appearance, The Owl fluttered into oblivion...

Choose from several designs on shirts, messenger bags, mousepads, mugs & other kool kollectibles by clicking here

NOW AVAILABLE The Classic Owl 12-Month Calendar for 2010

Wrongly-convicted and sent to the electric chair, Dick Martin somehow survived electrocution and gained electricity-based powers which he then used to escape and bring the real criminals to justice to prove his innocence!
He then donned a costume and fought crime and saboteurs by using his electromagnetic powers to fly, deflect bullets, and zap baddies in the pages of Startling Comics!

Choose from several designs (including his FIRST appearance) on shirts, messenger bags, mousepads, mugs & other kool kollectibles by clicking here
One of the characters revived by both Alex Ross in Project SuperPowers and Erik Larsen in Savage Dragon!

Long before Thor started swinging Mjolnir in the pages of Marvel Comics, another mythological demi-god strode the four color pages of the Golden Age, dispensing justice.
Samson smashed his way thru the cover of Fantastic Comics #1 in 1939, keeping the cover slot for the book's entire run!
Most of the covers were illustrated by classically-trained Lou Fine, one of comics' best draftsmen, perfectly-suited to drawing a mythological hero!

At first, Samson was just a super-strong guy who wore shorts and sandals and beat up baddies. But, when he received his own comic book a year later, readers were clued into his origin.
In Samson #1, we learned that he was a direct descendant of the Biblical hero, possessed of his ancestor's powers (Super strength, speed and invulnerability)...and his weakness!
Yes, if his hair was cut, he'd lose his strength! (You'd be surprised how many criminals carried around a convenient pair of scissors!)
Fortunately, his hair grew at an accelerated rate, so that his periods of incapacitation tended to be days, if not hours!
(Hey, it was the 1940s. Outlandish explanations for these things were the norm.)

When he gained his own book, he also picked up a sidekick; David, an orphan he rescued from a crashed plane.
David had no superpowers and served as a sounding board for the hero and occasional hostage for Samson to rescue.
Samson kept going for several years until the publisher cancelled Fantastic Comics and tossed Samson out of his own comic, retitling it Captain Aero, and featuring a Blackhawk-like patriotic aviator!

But, you can't keep a good hero down!
Not one, but TWO publishers have recently revived him!
First, Alex Ross made him a lead character in Project SuperPowers
Then Erik Larsen brought him back in The Next Issue Project, which revives long-dead comics series and continues their numbering (and their storylines) from their last published issue in the 1940s! (In the case of Fantastic Comics, which ended with #23 in 1942, Larson published The Next Issue Project: Fantastic Comics #24, starring Samson, in 2008, 66 years later!)

Choose from several designs (including his FIRST appearance) on shirts, messenger bags, mousepads, mugs & other kool kollectibles by clicking here

Created by Dick Briefer (who also created the Monster of Frankenstein series from Prize Comics) The Target was a scientist who created a suit of flexible bulletproof metal and used it to fight evil.
His sidekicks, the Targeteers were his alter-ego's business partners, as well.

The trio wore costumes of the same design, but in different primary (red, yellow, blue) colors.
All three each had a giant bulls-eye design on their chests, which tended to draw enemy gunfire in amazing amounts.
(It's never explained how the metal also absorbed the kinetic energy of the bullets that hit the trio. An isotope of Vibranium, perhaps?)
The Target himself was the one in yellow, but some colorists tended to confuse who was who in group shots of the similarly-designed, but differently-colored (red, yellow, blue) heroes...

Interestingly, The Target didn't make his debut until issue #10 of Target Comics. (The previous issues featured a hero called The White Streak, who faded shortly after The Target made the scene.)

Choose from several designs (including his FIRST & FINAL appearances) on shirts, messenger bags, mousepads, mugs & other kool kollectibles by clicking here

According to Project SuperPowers #3, V-Man is not only alive, but is/was the "significant other" of Miss Masque/Masqerade! (Interesting, since they were published by two DIFFERENT companies in the 1940s and NEVER met!)
Choose from several designs (including his FIRST appearance) on shirts, messenger bags, mousepads, mugs & other kool kollectibles by clicking here where you'll find V-Man and a whole legion of flag-draped heroes!

Choose from several designs on shirts, messenger bags, mousepads, mugs & other kool kollectibles by clicking here!

Featuring Samson, The Flame, V-Man, and The Blue Beetle (original version).
Choose from several designs on shirts, messenger bags, mousepads, mugs & other kool kollectibles by clicking here!

Choose from several designs on shirts, messenger bags, mousepads, mugs & other kool kollectibles by clicking here!
All the heroes who appeared in this title are now members of the "Super-MysteryMen" team!