Celebrity Mastermind - "The History of DC Comics"

[Peter Wrexham]

Mastermind is a British TV quiz show where members of the public are subjected to two rounds of questions against the clock.  The first round is one and a half minutes long on a specialist subject of their choice.  The second, general knowledge round is two minutes long.  There's no monetary prize, just a trophy for the series winner.

There is also a Celebrity version of the quiz, where the contestants compete to win a financial reward for a charity of their choice.  In a recent edition of Celebrity Mastermind, the contestants and their specialist subjects were:

• Andrea McLean (author and broadcaster) - "The Sound of Music"
• Colin Hoult (actor and comedian) - The history of DC Comics
• Rhys Stevenson (TV presenter) - The heart
• Hannah Cockcroft (Paralympic champion) - The "Shopaholic" novels of Sophie Kinsella

As is normally the case with "Celebrity" shows, I've never heard of any of these people.  However, I was naturally interested in Colin Hoult's chosen subject.  Here are the questions he was asked.

1. Detective Comics Incorporated was formed in 1937 by Harry Donenfield, Jack Liebowitz and which former military officer?
2. The Batman, created by Bill Finger and Bob Kane, first appeared in a 1939 issue of Detective Comics in a six page story entitled "The Case of the..." what?
3. The 12-part "Watchmen" saga, first published in 1986, was written by Alan Moore and illustrated by which artist?
4. Issue 73 of More Fun Comics introduced the Green Arrow and which other long-running superhero character, described as the king of the seven seas?
5. The cover of a 1943 issue of Action Comics depicts the Terrible Toyman using what device to escape the clutches of Superman?
6. In 1940, the psychologist William Moulton Marston created which female superhero, claiming that he was "responding to comics' blood-curdling masculinity"?
7. In the epic story "Crisis on Infinite Earths", multiple DC heroes from various parallel worlds team up to fight which immensely powerful arch-villain?
8. The Olympic athlete Jefferson Pierce became DC's first African-American character to star in his own comic book in 1977, when he created what alter ego for himself?
9. The humourous adventures of The Inferior Five featured a team of lacklustre superheroes comprising White Feather, Merryman, The Blimp, The Dumb Bunny and which other character?

If you think that some of these questions are easy, imagine trying to answer them on TV, sitting under a spotlight, and working against the clock.  On the show, the buzzer for the end of the 90-second time limit went off during question 9.  Colin was allowed to answer - a catchphrase of the show is "I've started, so I'll finish".  Unfortunately, he got it wrong!

I'll post the answers in a few days time.

[Rob Staeger (Grodd Mod)]

I've got answers for them all -- but question 9 (Awkwardman) took me a while, and I'm not certain of my answers to 2 (Chemical Syndicate?) and 4 (Pogo stick?). 

[Richard Willis]

The Baron said:

We have a long history of "celebrities" on game shows and quiz shows here in the U.S,  In my experience, the "celebrities" tend not to be "A-Listers". 

That's because the A-Listers are working real acting jobs for decent money. These celebrities were getting union minimum for their appearances.

[Peter Wrexham]

Here are the answers as given on the show, together with a description of how both contestant Colin Hoult and I fared.

1. The "former military officer" who co-founded DC inc was Malcom Wheeler-Nicholson.
   [Colin got this right; I had no idea]
2. Batman first appeared in "The Case of the..." Chemical Syndicate.
   [Colin guessed "Crazy Man";  I knew this, but couldn't bring it to mind in time to answer]
3. "Watchmen" was illustrated by Dave Gibbons.
   [Colin and I both got this right]
4. The "king of the seven seas" introduced in More Fun #73 was Aquaman.
   [We both got this right]
5. The Terrible Toyman escaped from Superman using a pogo stick.
   [Colin got this right; I desperately guessed a hula hoop!]
6. The female superhero created by William Moulton Marston was Wonder Woman.
   [We both got this right - did anyone not get this?]
7. The villain of "Crisis on Infinite Earths" was The Anti-Monitor.
   [We both got this right]
8. Jefferson Pierce's alter-ego was Black Lightning.
   [We both got this right]
9. The missing member of The Inferior Five was Awkwardman.
   [Colin guessed "The Turtle"; I had seen this question before I watched the show, and knew the answer, but would probably have had difficulty remembering the name against the clock]

Colin's score was 7 correct answers out of 9.  He also had no passes, which is taken into account if there's a tie.  I got 5, or maybe 6.

After two rounds of questions each, it was a very close result between the four contestants.  Two had scored a total of thirteen points, and two had fourteen.  Colin Hoult was one of those on 14, with no passes.  As the other contestant who finished on 14 had passed on two questions, Colin was declared the winner.

I think we can all be proud of an excellent performance from a comics fan, as can his chosen charity, Sarcoma UK.

[Luke Blanchard]

British comic books go back further than US comic books. An example is Film Fun (first issue 1920). In the US what developed instead were newspaper strips and Sunday comics sections.

The first US attempts at comics periodicals were unsuccessful, or not lastingly successful. Embee Distributing Co. published Comic Monthly in 1922, which reprinted newspaper strips. Dell published The Funnies in 1929-1930, with mixed original content. Humor Publishing published three comics in 1933, with single feature original content. One of the issues, Detective Dan, can be found at Comic Book Plus. It has ads for an intended second issue.

Famous Funnies started in 1934. Eastern Color was a printer which had been producing successful premiums reprinting newspaper strips. Reportedly, these were the idea of Max Gaines. The Famous Funnies name first appeared on one of the premiums, Famous Funnies a Carnival of Comics, in 1933. In 1934 Eastern Color did a tryout Famous Funnies issue with Dell, Famous Funnies, Series 1. Then it started an ongoing Famous Funnies itself. This used a half-tabloid page size. 

Wheeler-Nicholson started comics publishing in 1935 with New Fun. This was a tabloid, but his next title, New Comics, was a half-tabloid. New Fun was renamed More Fun, then taken down to the smaller size and renamed More Fun Comics. In late 1936 New Comics became New Adventure Comics on the covers, but the name wasn't changed in the indicia until 1937. in 1937 Detective Comics started. The stable then gave the three titles a common trade dress. The DC badge wasn't introduced until 1940.

By 1937 there were other players in the industry. Detective Comics wasn't the first genre-focused anthology: that was rather Detective Picture Stories (first issue 1936), from Comics Magazine Company. But it was the title that established what became the standard format of the Golden Age anthologies: a line-up of regular features of varying lengths, but not all that many as the longer features got a fair number of pages (commonly over ten) and the only really short items were the text stories and fillers. Detective Comics #1 had nine main items. A new co-owned company was founded to publish the title, Detective Comics, Inc.

The stable's next title was Action Comics, but by the time it appeared Wheeler-Nicholson had been forced out. The first issue had eight main items.

The line adopted a DC line badge in 1940. By that point there was an associated company, All-American Publications, headed by Gaines. The badge first appears on the Detective Comics, Inc. titles, then on the All-American Publications ones a couple of months later.

Gaines sold his share of All-American Comics to the other stable in the mid-40s and established EC. His son Bill took over the company after he was killed in a boating accident. Detective Comics was renamed National Comics Publications, then National Periodical Publications, but it continued to use a DC line badge, so everyone called it DC. Jenette Kahn had the company renamed DC Comics in the 1970s to match how it was known.

Some creators who went on to have long careers got started in the industry very early. Jerry Siegel and Joe Shuster placed an early version of Superman with Humour Publishing in 1933, but it ceased publishing comics before the issue appeared. Their first published work appeared in New Fun #6.

[ClarkKent_DC]

The only ones whose answers didn't come to mind immediately are 5 and 9; after a bit of thought, I remembered the answer to 9. So 5 is the one I completely don't know.

[Richard Willis]

Luke Blanchard said:

Famous Funnies started in 1934. Eastern Color was a printer which had been producing successful premiums reprinting newspaper strips. Reportedly, these were the idea of Max Gaines. The Famous Funnies name first appeared on one of the premiums, Famous Funnies a Carnival of Comics, in 1933. In 1934 Eastern Color did a tryout Famous Funnies issue with Dell, Famous Funnies, Series 1. Then it started an ongoing Famous Funnies itself. This used a half-tabloid page size. 

Wheeler-Nicholson started comics publishing in 1935 with New Fun. This was a tabloid, but his next title, New Comics, was a half-tabloid. New Fun was renamed More Fun, then taken down to the smaller size and renamed More Fun Comics. In late 1936 New Comics became New Adventure Comics on the covers

As I understand it. the Famous Funnies titles were reprinted newspaper comics. They sold very well. When comics to reprint ran out the titles New Fun and New Comics began with all-new material. As you said, the title New Comics became New Adventure Comics, which in turn became the famous DC title Adventure Comics, continuing the numbering from New Comics.

[Luke Blanchard]

Wikipedia's page on Wheeler-Nicholson has a quote from 50 Who Made DC Great about how he found the rights to the popular strips all were tied up. The claim might be based on something he said, or someone else's recollection. But it might instead be a guess that has become conventional wisdom. I can't say.

Wheeler-Nicholson was differently-positioned to Eastern Color. It was a printer, so what it needed was content, an ability to distribute the comics, and the money to finance the project. I assume that's why it did the try-out issue with Dell. Wheeler-Nicholson was a writer who wanted to start a comics periodical. What he had to offer was the idea and his ability to generate content. He'd previously self-syndicated an adaptation of Treasure Island, and he wrote some of the material in his comics himself.

Harry Donenfeld, who got control of his comic book line, was a printer/publisher.

New Comics became New Adventure Comics on the covers a bit before its indicia changed. That was a year after New Fun's change to More Fun, and a couple of months before the start of Detective Comics, so I suspect the change was related to the launch of the new title. When the line's cover-format was regularised, at the point when the indicia name changed, the "New" part of the logo became a small element to the side, so when it was finally dropped (in 1938, half a year after the launch of Action Comics) it didn't make much visual difference.

The "More" on the covers of More Fun Comics was similarly placed - its cover style from #11 was the basis of the look the line adopted in 1937 - and in fact the "New" on its opening issues was placed that way too.

[Mickey McLaurin]

2 and 5 were the only ones I didn't know.  Having read the Batman story multiple times, I'm surprised I didn't have that one committed to memory.