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and Lady MacBeth* was a fictional character.
I think what you mean is, the "Lady Macbeth" we know is a fictional creation of Shakespeare's. Gruoch ingen Boite, the historical Lady Macbeth, really did exist. And in a world where Atlantis really sank (possibly twice
), King Arthur and the Knights of the Round Table existed, and Dr. Frankenstein was an historical figure, we have to be open to the possibility that Macbeth happened closer to Shakespeare's version in the DCU.
Yeah, Ms. Borgia likely wasn't much like the person portrayed in pop culture, either.
I thought I remembered that there were actual historical models for MacBeth and Lady MacBeth. At the time, Shakespeare was pandering to Elizabeth I and her family (the Tudors), so a Scottish bad guy was fine. Richard III's portrayal was also fine, since he was a member of the Plantagenet family, also out of favor.
I just realized that this run of Action Comics can be read on DC Universe Infinite, which I have. So now I can actually read along with you.
Oh, very good! (I wonder if this is why DC reprints so few achival collections these days...?)
ACTION COMICS #323 - "The Kryptonian Killer!"
The conclusion to "The Enemy Supergirl!" contains many of the tropes characteristic to Supergirl tales: over-exaggerated powers of the United Nations; a mountain; irony. Ravenne launches some skull-shaped early warning satellites into orbit around Feminax, but they don't really play much of a role in the story until... but, no, I'm getting ahead of myself. After the obligatory recap of the previous issue's story, Ravenne tricks Supergirl into imprisoning herself within a block of ice. If you're wondering how she accomplished that, she fired a thermo gun at Supergirl, forcing her to use her icy super-breath to save herself. But because her powers are distorted by the prism-jewel, her breath "recoiled" and froze her instead. She cannot break free because her super-strength is likewise distorted, transferred to whatever she attempts to use it against, including the bars of her prson cell. (Don't ask me how that works.)
With Supergirl held motionless, Ravenne uses a "hypno-dominator" to transfer the evil of Lucrezia Borgia, Mata Hari and Lady MacBeth to Supergirl, who regrets the actions she is forced to take but remaions powerless to resist. Her first mission, seet by Mata Hari, is to steal the United Nations' plans for the defense of Earth, but she is to do it secretly the the U.N. does not know of the theft. Stopping at an old theatrical warehouse, Supergirl dons a picuresque disquise. "With this exotic costume," she thinks, "everyone thinks I'm a member of an oriental delegation." (She looks vaguely mid-European to me.) She seduces (kisses) the guard, who thinks, "Mmmm! I'm enjoying this too much to tell her she's mistaken me for someone else." In the throes of passion, Supergirl presses a bar of soap against the key to the "U.N. Plan Room" the guard wears on his belt, and later fashions a duplicate key and steals the plans.
Her next task, set by Lucrezia Borgia, is to "create the most deadly poison in the universe... a fiendish brew that will even kill super-beings!" She sets about gathering the chemicals needed, including a plant that has been "nourished by a Kryptonite meteor lying under the earth." Then Lady MacBeth orders her to test the poison on one of her super-pets. Using telescopic vision, Supergirl locates the super-animals as they finish a space romp and asks for a volunteer to test "a potion which has an amazing effect on super-beings." Comet volunetts, drinks the poison and drops dead. Then Lady MacB. orders her to test it on a super-human. Flying to the Fortress of Solitude, Supergirl uses the zone-o-phone to find a volunteer, offering freedom to anyone who tests it if he should happen to survive. Py-Ron, who is being punished for turning "humans into weird, bird-like monsters" volunteers, figuring "even death is better than continued exile in this eerie place!"
He drinks the poison and dies, writhing in pain, after which Supergirl buries his body in the Arctic snows. Now it's time to kill Superman. She lures him to the Fortress with the promise of a new chemical she has discovered which will gives them the added power of invisability. To prove it, she vanishes in front of his eyes! But she folled him by projecting herself into the Phantom Zone with a projector fitted with a timing device which would return her to the real world after a short time. Superman drinks the poison and dies, writhing in pain. She regrets her actions and he forgives her, but then she is ordered to drink the poison herself, which she does. On Feminax, the popyulation rejoices with fireworks which form images of Superman's foes (Brainiac and Luthor are shown). Then Ravenne removes her veil and reveals herself to be "an old hag" (which is not all that shocking as far as "reveals" go).
But at that moment, back on Earth, Superman and Supergirl revive from the "poison," bot wondering how they survived. Just then, Super-Horse, very much alive, reveals his presence and explains that he was invulnerable to the poison because his powers are magic-based. After pretending to die, her flies back into the past to consult with his friend Circe, who tells him how to use his x-ray vision to "alter the atomic structure of the poison" in such a way that "the victim will feel pain, but will merely go into a state of suspended animation for a few hours." Supergirl brings Superman up to speed, and he declares that the women of Feminax are "too dangerous to remain free."
Soon afterward, Superman is shown flying to Feminax and destroying the early-warning satellites on his way. Then, plunginging down to the surface, he uses his super-strength to "speed the planet's rotation on it's axis, thus creating tremendous winds and tides!" If you think such an action would do more than merely cause a nuisance, you're right, because doing so kills all life on the planet. As Superman stands on the ruins of a building, Supergirl arrives and admonishes him for going "against our code to kill" (I think she means "not to kill"), but he denies it. Suddenly, another superbeing arrives. It is Py-Ron, dressed in a duplicate of Superman's costume except that it has a stylized "E" on the chest instead of an "S". He explains that he has had the super-suit for years, ever since he once escaped from the Phantom Zone and ran amok as "Evil-Man." When he awoke buried in the Acrtic snow, he thought Supergirl might renege on her promise to grant him his freedom because the concotion he drank wasn't really poison, so he set out to "redeem" himself by destroying Feminax which he thought would earn himself the right to be freed.
But Supergirl disagrees. "No! you had already earned your freedom by keeping your bargain with me. Though all the girls on that planet were gguilty of dreadful crimes, you shouldn't have killed them without a trial!" Superman adds, "By your heartless action, you proved you don't belong in the outer world. I'm sorry, but I must return you to the Phantom Zone! Farewell, Pyron!" The notion that the very act Py-Ron took to earn his freedom actually resulted in his imprisonment, that is ironic. It is doubly ironic because he needn't have taken any further action at all. And, as quick as the narrator is to point out "irony" that really isn't, nothing is said about it (which is in itself somewhat ironic).
Jeff of Earth-J said:
ACTION COMICS #323
"The Kryptonian Killer!"
Py-Ron, who is being punished for turning "humans into weird, bird-like monsters" volunteers, figuring "even death is better than continued exile in this eerie place!"
They mention that Py-Ron was sentenced to 50 years in the PZ. They weren’t all supposed to be life sentences. In continuity, did they ever address this?
Then Ravenne removes her veil and reveals herself to be "an old hag" (which is not all that shocking as far as "reveals" go).
So the population of Feminax aren’t just feminist, they are ageist.
Supergirl brings Superman up to speed, and he declares that the women of Feminax are "too dangerous to remain free."
Soon afterward, Superman is shown flying to Feminax and destroying the early-warning satellites on his way.
This is why the skull-satellites were introduced. The caption sneakily doesn’t say that Superman was doing this, but that “a picturesque figure streaks toward Feminax” with a long-view of the figure in blue and red. “Picturesque” was also how a disguised Supergirl was described before she jumped the guard.
Then, plunging down to the surface, he uses his super-strength to "speed the planet's rotation on its axis, thus creating tremendous winds and tides!" If you think such an action would do more than merely cause a nuisance, you're right, because doing so kills all life on the planet.
Evil-Man does this by pushing against a mountain. He should have gone through the mountain rather than cause the planet to speed up rotation.
I'm sorry, but I must return you to the Phantom Zone! Farewell, Pyron!" The notion that the very act Py-Ron took to earn his freedom actually resulted in his imprisonment, that is ironic. It is doubly ironic because he needn't have taken any further action at all.
This saved the writer from having to punish however many women (not girls) were on the planet. Send them all to the Phantom Zone using an enormous PZ projector? This also spared the editor from letter writers who would question punishment without trial.
I was surprised that the story resulted in the deaths of the entire sisterhood. Like all people who act as censors, the Code member who approved this mass murder inconsistently signed off on this. The Code required that criminals be punished, but not like this. Some movie directors (cough -Tarantino - cough) will put much more blatant scenes in a movie to be caught, allowing what was really wanted to be allowed.
They weren’t all supposed to be life sentences. In continuity, did they ever address this?
I will leave this for our resident Silver Age Superman expert to address.
This is why the skull-satellites were introduced.
Ah, yes. Of course. I suppose now I'll have to watch for the term "picturesque figure".
ACTION COMICS #324 - "The Black Magic of Supergirl!"
One day, as Supergirl patrols Earth, she passes an Oriental bazaar and encounters a turban-wearing fakir named Abdul performing magic tricks: the old levitating rope trick, lying on a bed of nails, snake charming. But he loses control of the cobra and it attacks, fatally biting him. His turban becomes dislodged, revealing two small red horns protruding from his forehead. He admits that he is a "demon" and, in gratitude for at least attempting to help him, gifts Supergirl with a box containing the ring which gave him his powers. The box comes with a scroll explaining the ring's powers, but the parchment is so brittle a small piece of it break off, which neither of them notice. He requests that she replace his turban and tell no one of his horns, lest he be denied the "sacred funeral rites." Then he succumbs to the snake venom and later, as Supergirl departs, she observes his remains being cremated on a funeral pyre.
Back at Stanhope, she opens th box (which immediately causes a lightning storm) and reads the partial parchment, noticing that the last line is missing:
To him who rubs the Satan ring,
The power of magic it will bring!
But use not thrice the evil power
Lest you turn demon withing the hour.
And demon you'll remain, till fire...
That seems easy enough. All she has to do is not use the magic ring. She closes the box and the storm stops. Then she hears an emergency broadcast over her transistor radio: "Attention, Supergirl! While assisting in an undeground atomic test, Superman was trapped by a Kryptonite meteor which was uncovered by the nuclear explosion! Please come immediately!" Supergirl herself can;t get close to the Kryptonite herself, of course, nor can she summon her robots because the atomic writer's fiat "would knock out their circuits," and Superman's lead suit is at the cleaners. I have no idea where the hell Comet is; out "romping" in space, I guess, with the other super-pets. Under those circumstances, who can blame Supergirl for using the Satan ring? Superman is "too dazed to know what's going on" and afterwards, Supergirl is too ashamed to admit she used black magic to save him, so she keeps it secret.
The next day,a howling snowstorm is in danger of wrecking a bridge unless Supergirl does something fast to save it. The cliché is for condemed prisoner on death row to await a last-minute from the governor to save his life, but this state's governor is much more "hands on" and is travelling to the prison to pardon an innocent man in person. Now he's caught on the bridge. The storm has taken out the telephone lines, and cell phones haven't been invented yet. I don't know how long the governor has been stuck on the bridge already, but there are only 30 seconds left to save the man's life, and the bridge repairs are going to take some time. Under those circumstances, who can blame Supergirl for using the Satan ring?
The next day, Supergirl flies to Medvale to visit her foster parents for mid-term break. No sooner does she arrive than she and Edna witness an explosion on the north end of town. Using her super-vision, Linda verifies that it was Fred's laboatory which exploded. (Waitaminute... I thought he was an electrician...?) She flies to the hospital with Edna only to learn that Fred has suffered extensive brain damage making it impossible to operate. Under those circumstances, who can blame Supergirl for using the Satan ring?
Uh, oh! That's the third time. Glancing at her reflection in a nearby window, Linda realizes she has grown a pair of horns and quickly slips on a head scarf to cover them up. The longer they grow, the greater her compulsion to commit evil. The next day, Supergirl (now "She-Devil") witnesses a bank robbery, but uses her black magic to help the thief escape. Soon, in a swampy wilderness, she makes a witch's brew in order to raise a "mighty, evil super-deamon." Superman arrives on the scene and causes a pair of skeletal hands to appear, blinding him (see cover). Even his x-ray vision cannot penetrate the magic, and Superman panics. "She-Devil" does feel remorse, however, and sends Superman back to the Fortress of Solitude (which he is able to find by using his super-hearing to tune in on "certain interplanetary clocks [he] has there").
Seeking a way to break the spell, Supergirl returns to the Asiatic bazaar where she finds Abdul alive and no longer a demon. Just then she glimpses a wind-blown piece of parchment and guess which one it is? The final couplet now reads...
[And demon you'll remain till fire]
Will cleanse all evil on your pyre
I'm not entirely certain how Abdul was restored to life after being bitten by a cobra (or how he survived the funeral pyre for that matter), but now Supergirl sets off on a quest to rid herself of the demon curse. Her fist stop is a volcano, but imersing herself in lava doesn't work. Next she goes to a mountaintop and allows herself to be struck by lightning, but that doesn't work either. (No mountains were harmed in the making of this story.) After that she flies into the friggin' Sun, but no joy. Finally she flies into the "Fire-Falls of Old Krypton" and that works. If you think the survival of Argo City with its "pocket of air" is implausible, wait until you hear this. "When the planet exploded, it hurled the falls into space, where the flames turned into a kind of Kryptonite, like all other parts of Krypton." Now the falls exist as a spontaneously-generating phenomenon on an asteroid falling through space.
Back on Earth, Supergirl resolves to rond up the bank robber she helped escape and superman speculates that "perhaps that's why superstitious people burned witches... they were trying to drive out the demons which posessed them." The Satan ring and scroll were destroyed by the heat, and the Supers vow not to discuss it again.
ANNOUNCEMENT: In a little while, Tracy and I will be heading out to spend a couple of days in a cabin on a lake in celebration of her 50th birthday. We plan to be back to our regular routine on Wednesday, but on Tuesday we'll be out-of-pocket, so there will be no new "Silver Age Supergirl" post tomorrow.
They weren’t all supposed to be life sentences. In continuity, did they ever address this?
I will leave this for our resident Silver Age Superman expert to address.
I presume that's my Silver-Age emergency signal going off.
With regard to Mr. Willis' question, let's point out first that the Phantom Zone, as with suspended-animation orbit before it, was reserved for the most serious crimes against Krypton society---a classification akin to capital crimes here in the U.S. This is evident in the relatively small number of Phantom Zone prisoners, in proportion to the several-billion population of Krypton.
From this can be inferred that, either, Krypton was such an advanced society that minor crimes were rare, and that those stray offenders were subjected to social education programmes which rehabilitated them---or, Krypton had a more standard penal system for the punishment of minor criminals. Or, perhaps, both. We know there were police on Krypton; ergo, there must have been jails, if not prisons.
As to the question of banishment to the Phantom Zone being a life sentence, many of the more notable offenders, such as Jax-Ur and General Zod, were sentenced to the Zone for life (essentially, under the conditions of the Zone, an eternal punishment). However, other offenders were given finite, if lengthy, sentences, after which they would be released back into the corporeal world upon completion. However, Krypton exploded before any of those sentences elapsed.
The first time this matter was addressed occurred in "The Super-Revenge of the Phantom Zone Prisoner", from Superman # 157 (Nov., 1962). In this tale, Superman is presented with the first Phantom Zone prisoner to complete his term of sentence, Quex-Ul. The Man of Steel opts to release Quex-Ul on Earth. This is not the best of ideas, as Quex-Ul claims to have been falsely convicted of his crime and he bears a grudge against his accuser, Jor-El. Unable to take vengeance against the father, Quex-Ul decides to take it out on the son, and on Earth, he has the super-powers to do it.
We learn that the more sensible method of releasing Phantom Zone prisoners in Kandor has been put into place in "The Man from the Phantom Zone", from Action Comics # 336 (Apr., 1966). Here, Ak-Var is released into the bottled city when his thirty-year sentence is up.
In "The Secret of Kryptonite Six", from Action Comics # 310 (Mar., 1964), it's established that Kandor has formed a parole board which convenes once a year to consider the cases of the Phantom Zone prisoners. In the story "Half a Hero", from Superman # 223 (Jan., 1970), the board grants the early release of two Zone inmates, Vax-Nor and Kur-Dul.
Hope this helps.
We learn that the more sensible method of releasing Phantom Zone prisoners in Kandor has been put into place in "The Man from the Phantom Zone", from Action Comics # 336 (Apr., 1966). Here, Ak-Var is released into the bottled city when his thirty-year sentence is up.
On page 3 of "The Man from the Phantom Zone" in,Action Comics #336 (which I just read for the first time) Superman says that Kryptonian law says that those released must go to their native city. This was handy, because all the other native cities were gone. I guess they expanded this for the future.
Releasing Phantom Zone prisoners with completed sentences into Kandor was a good solution.
Waitaminute... I thought [Fred Danvers] was an electrician...?
He was an electrical engineer.
. . . In celebration of [Tracy's] 50th birthday.
Happy birthday to her---and many more of them! Enjoy your getaway.
In a little while, Tracy and I will be heading out to spend a couple of days in a cabin on a lake in celebration of her 50th birthday.
Cool! Have a good time!
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