Bulletman #1 is an issue of the series Bulletman (Volume 1) with a cover date of June, 1941.
Synopsis for "The Black Spider"
Years earlier, convicted murderer Jules Rey was deported to his native France and imprisoned in a dungeon, where he went blind, went mad, and befriended a number of large, deadly spiders. His favorite spider is Suzy; she's about as big as a mouse. Now he has returned to the USA, assembled a gang, and set up a hideout under a hollow oak tree in the forest near the city. He has a list of persons whom he blames for his imprisonment; Sergeant Kent, Susan Kent, and Jim Barr are on that list. The Black Spider's modus operandi includes sending written threats to his victims, kidnapping his victims, bringing them to his hidden lair, and having his spiders kill them, then removing the bodies to be found elsewhere. It's inefficient, and his henchmen are morons, so it's only a matter of time before Jim Barr figures out what's going on and who's behind it. While he's examining the police files and figuring this out, however, Sgt. Kent is abducted, right out of police HQ. Barr spots one of the gang, changes clothes, and aerially follows him to the secret base. Susan Kent sees this, changes clothes, and follows Bulletman. They arrive in time to rescue Sgt. Kent, then subdue the henchmen and kill Suzy. Bulletman smashes the underground hideout until it collapses, amid which the Black Spider is killed.
Appearing in "The Black Spider"
Featured Characters:
Supporting Characters:
- Sergeant Kent
Antagonists:
- The Black Spider (Dies)
- his gang:
- Limpy
- Luke
- Tiger
- two others
- his gang:
Animals:
- Suzy, a spider (Dies)
- many other spiders
Other Characters:
- Judge Hatpath (Dies)
Locations:
Items:
Synopsis for "The Deviltry of Dr. Mood"
One evening Dr. Mood, renegade Secret Service officer, along with two henchmen, visits an important admiral at his home and kidnaps him at gunpoint, plus pistol-whips his wife. The next day at police headquarters, Sergeant Kent and Jim Barr have a conversation about this, then Kent goes to redeploy his cops while Barr changes clothes and flies out in search of the kidnappers.
Meanwhile at Dr. Mood's hideout, Admiral Willis is being tortured; Mood wants a set of secret plans and he's tired of not getting it. But "miraculously Bulletman has found the killers" and is right now bursting in thru a big glass door. Several henchmen are on the scene with submachineguns; Bulletman punches them out of his way, and tears apart one of these guns with his bare hands. But the admiral has gotten raked with bullets and is dead. Then Bulletman hears some thumping from the next room, breaks in, and finds, and recognizes, the chained up Dr. Mood, of the U.S. Intelligence Service, whom he naturally rescues. Mood explains that he was abducted along with Willis; Bulletman buys his story, and flies away.
The next day at PDHQ, Susan Kent learns that Bulletman has had a solo adventure, and she is not pleased. So now they both suit up and fly off in search of the ringleaders of the kidnap gang.
That night, Dr. Mood makes his way out into the countryside, where he enters a small cave, leading to a much larger cave, chortling all the while about how much cleverer the Fatherland is than America. Inside the cave is a secret army base, under Mood's command, with infantry and tanks. Dr. Mood gives the order, tonight they will attack New York City. And they do! A whole lot of tanks make it across the bridges and into Manhattan, wreaking destruction and inflicting civilian casualties the whole way.
Bulletman and Bulletgirl fly onto the scene. Bulletman lands in front of one tank and challenges it; the crew tries to run him down. He rips apart their tank with his bare hands, then he and Susan carve a swath of mayhem thru the armored tanks and their crews. Dr. Mood watches this with binoculars until it's obvious that his troops won't win, then orders them to retreat at full speed.
As Bulletgirl is surveying the carnage, she is sneaked up on, by a giant tank, and is run over, but due to the power of the gravity helmet is only severely shocked and knocked unconscious. Unnoticed by Bulletman, some soldiers grab Susan and whisk her away. (Bulletman at that moment was busy chasing down and busting up the fleeing tanks, only a few of which got away.) But now the missing Bulletgirl has got his full attention, and he's done kidding around, this is war.
Back at the secret cave, Bulletgirl recovers consciousness, learns that Dr. Mood is an enemy agent, and is suspended over a fire pit from a derrick, for some recreational torture. Bulletman flies into the cave and smacks all of the bad guys around, while Dr. Mood tries to cut the rope suspending Susan above the fire, which he does manage to do, but Bulletman catches her in mid-drop. Then he turns his attention to Dr. Mood, who frantically offers to squeal on himself and everybody else, while he stealthily fumbles a dagger into his hand, but he's nowhere near quick enough to use it on Bulletman, and down he goes. Bulletman and Bulletgirl leave Mood, and his strewn-about henchmen, for the approaching police, and quickly leave.
Next day at Police HQ, Jim and Susan and Sgt. Kent have a conversation about the mysterious Bulletman, whom the Sergeant would like to meet and whom Jim insists is just a myth.
Appearing in "The Deviltry of Dr. Mood"
Featured Characters:
Supporting Characters:
- Sergeant Kent
Antagonists:
- "the Great One" (Behind the scenes)
- Dr. Mood
- his gang
- Dr. Mood
Other Characters:
- Admiral Willis (Dies)
- Admiral Willis's wife
Locations:
- Earth-S
- New York City
- nearby cave, big enough to conceal a small army. See also Crack Comics Vol 1 12.
- New York City
Items:
Vehicles:
- tanks, dozens of them
Synopsis for "The Man Who Learned Bulletman's Secret Identity"
Bull Morello escapes from prison and rebuilds his old Murder Syndicate. Meanwhile low-level thug Ratty learns Bulletman's secret identity and rushes to tell Morello about this important secret. Bull agrees that the secret is important, and calls in two gunsels to kill Ratty, with submachine guns. Then he brings three gunmen with him as he walks into Police Headquarters, to abduct Jim Barr. They catch Jim in the locker room, changing clothes, with his Gravity Regulator Helmet in his hands, in plain sight; they notice the helmet and mention it. Barr puts up a fight, but gets head-walloped unconscious with a heavy glass flask. They carry him away, unobserved or at least unconfronted. They leave the Gravity Helmet behind.
Back at PDHQ, Susan Kent figures out what's going on, changes clothes, and flies out to search for Jim. Jim is meanwhile being worked over by the thugs, then dragged to a meeting with "the Voice," who indulges in some prolonged gloating. Bulletgirl has by this time found this hideout, and bursts in, and there's a big melee. After that, Bull and his punks are all knocked out and the Voice has fled.
Back at Police Headquarters Sgt. Kent is getting upbraided by District Attorney Candidate Higgens. They leave the Precinct House and are confronted by a team of gunmen with a big car; they kidnap Kent and pretend to kidnap Higgens. Bulletman and Bulletgirl show up and disrupt the abduction, then aerially follow one fleeing felon back to the same dumpy building where Jim Barr was held prisoner earlier. They crash their way inside it, and find a large number of gunmen, the Voice, and Sgt. Kent, who has still gotten kidnapped despite the earlier intervention. There's another melee, at the end of which the Voice has turned out to be Candidate Higgins, who is in police custody.
Appearing in "The Man Who Learned Bulletman's Secret Identity"
Featured Characters:
Supporting Characters:
- Sergeant Kent
Antagonists:
- Higgens, as the Voice
- Voice's gang
- Bull Morello
- Morello's Murder Syndicate
- Ratty (Dies)
- Morello's Murder Syndicate
Locations:
Items:
Synopsis for "The Man Mountain"
The "Man Mountain" is about 25 feet tall, seems to have no name, talks like a mental defective, and is on display in a circus sideshow. Machine Gun Kelly robs the circus, and at gunpoint extracts from the two owners the secret of controlling the giant, then he guns them both down. The giant's diet of molasses is what makes him controllable.
Kelly and his gang and their giant go on a crime rampage, banks are looted, security guards and city police suffer at least three fatalities. Bulletman confronts the looters, but the Man Mountain flings him far away, and while he's recovering the gang flees. Barr goes back into mufti, and has a conversation with the Kents. Susan is very annoyed with Jim for going out and getting into action without her, but he reassures her there's plenty of fighting left to do.
Kelly's new plan: A huge gold shipment in armored cars is going over the mountain that night. Man Mountain will kill all of the guards and break open all the trucks. Unknown to Kelly, the lead truck is driven by Bulletman with Bulletgirl sitting shotgun. The gang attacks. Bulletman flies forth and punches out one gunman, then attacks the Man Mountain. Bulletgirl joins him. One of them tags the giant in the solar plexus; the giant forgets his instructions and flees toward a nearby forest. Even dazed and confused, he's pretty fast; he gets away. The Flying Detectives capture all the normal-sized gangsters including Kelly.
The Man Mountain gropes his way back to the deserted hideout, which is a European-style castle atop an extremely steep hill. He's been drinking molasses by the hogshead this whole time, and now is desperate for more. Finding none at the hideout, the Man Mountain goes berserk and smashes a lot of stuff, but also figures out that he needs to free Kelly. He finds his way to the prison, and when he gets there he rips it apart. A lot of prison staff get killed, and a lot of convicts get loose, including Machine Gun Kelly.
Bulletman and Bulletgirl, back in the city, belatedly find out about the chaos at the prison, and fly there. Bulletman flies in first, bowls over some thugs, and confronts Kelly, and his henchmen, and his giant. They're really just no match for him at all, and when Bulletgirl catches up, the fight gets even more one-sided. It ends when Kelly and Mountain and Bullet crash into the ground from a great height, making a deep impact crater in the ground. Bulletgirl and the assembled cops briefly believe that Bulletman's been killed, but he soon crawls out of the crater, alone.
Appearing in "The Man Mountain"
Featured Characters:
Supporting Characters:
- Sergeant Kent
Antagonists:
- "Machine Gun" Kelly (Dies)
- his gang
- Louie
- his gang
- the Man Mountain (Dies)
Other Characters:
- Slick, circus owner (Dies)
- Slick's partner (Dies)
- two bank guards and one policeman (Dies)
- Pete, policeman (Dies)
- Jones, policeman
- prison guard (Dies)
Locations:
- New York City
- nearby mountain pass
- nearby forest
- prison
Items:
Vehicles:
- armored trucks
Notes
- Sgt. Kent gets kidnapped twice in this issue.
- In this issue's four Bulletman stories, four important events are reported in the headlines of four different major newspapers, two in Washington, one in Philadelphia, and one with its home city unidentified. No dates are given on these front pages.
- Murder victim Judge Hatpath's death is announced in a The Washington Press newspaper headline.
- Kidnap victim Admiral Willis's abduction is announced in a Washington Press Guardian newspaper headline.
- Bulletman's defeat of Dr. Mood's invasion force is announced in a The Guardian newspaper headline.
- A banker's murder is announced in a Philadelphia Press Guardian newspaper headline.
- No cross-country chase scenes or mad dashes across long distances are described in this story, so it all takes place in the same area. Therefore, Bulletman's adventures are set in New York City, which is specifically identified in the 4th panel of the 7th page in the 2nd story, as the target of Mood's attack.
- In the 1st story, "The Black Spider":
- At the end of the story, according to Sgt. Kent, the Black Spider is dead; it's not clear what he died from.
- The five henchmen are unaccounted for.
- In the 2nd story, "Dr. Mood":
- New York City is invaded by "heavy, death-dealing tanks. Buildings and people alike fall in their path ...." After one newspaper headline story, this catastrophe is never mentioned again, even in the conversational recap at the end of this same story.
- At least three of those tanks got away.
- The whole time she is suspended over the fire pit, Bulletgirl is still wearing her helmet, so theoretically she could escape at will, and it is not clear why she does not.
- Unusual Geography: On Earth-S, near New York City, there is a well-concealed cave, large enough to contain a small army including tanks, trucks, and bombers. In the Quality Universe there is a corresponding cave, with those same qualities.
- In the 3rd story, "The Man Who Learned Bulletman's Secret Identity":
- In the PDHQ locker room, Bull Morello sees and recognizes Jim Barr's Gravity Regulator Helmet, but neglects to steal it.
- In the 4th story, "The Man Mountain":
- Jim Barr smokes a pipe.
- At this point in their careers, Bulletman's secret identity is known to Susan Kent, but Jim's and Susan's identities are not known to Susan's father Sergeant Kent. But this might be the issue where he starts to get a little bit of a clue about that, going by Sgt. Kent's story-closing remark: "You know, Susan, some of the boys told me that YOU resembled BULLETGIRL. Funny, isn't it?"
- Also featured in this issue of Bulletman were:
- Amazing Oddities
- The Fighting Scout (text story), by Carl Formes
- Brain Teasers
See Also