Captain Marvel Adventures #108 is an issue of the series Captain Marvel Adventures (Volume 1) with a cover date of May, 1950.
Synopsis for "Captain Marvel and the Terrible Termites"
A new species of larger, smarter termites evolves, and seeks to take over the world. Professor Jimcrack learns of this and hastens to warn Billy Batson. The WHIZ Radio building is undermined by the big bugs, and it drops below the ground. One pacifist Termite, Uggo, turns against the Terrible Termite leader, Toth, and exposes him as an unworthy coward. Under Uggo's leadership the Terrible Termites make no further trouble for the humans. Captain Marvel moves the WHIZ building back into place and, assisted by the Termites, repairs all the damage.
Appearing in "Captain Marvel and the Terrible Termites"
Featured Characters:
Antagonists:
- Toth
- Terrible Termites
Other Characters:
- Professor Jimcrack
- Uggo
Locations:
Synopsis for "Captain Marvel and the Betrayal of Mr. Morris!"
Miss White, Mr. Morris’ secretary, and a janitor greet their beloved boss, since he’s nice and friendly. An employee, Henry, asks Mr. Morris to advance him several hundred dollars for an operation for his wife and Mr. Morris is more than willing to do so, since he loves using his money to help people and leaves tons of it around in cash to do so! That day, he meets with two private detectives, Jonas and Gordon, who insist that his employees could just steal any of that cash he keeps on hand and that they can find out which ones are the most suspicious, but Mr. Morris thinks that he can trust the people who work for him. Jonas insists that he won’t know his enemies until it’s too late, asking if he wants protection, but he laughs off the whole idea, even telling Billy about it while heading out. Suddenly, Billy spots a large concrete block being dropped that will surely crush Mr. Morris, calling SHAZAM and summoning Captain Marvel to punch it into dust and a ramp and wagon method that someone used to set up this trap. Mr. Morris now becomes worried as he thinks on who could be trying to kill him. At dinner, he spots Miss Jameson, Billy’s secretary and wonders if she’s poisoned his dinner, so he immediately leaves without ordering anything. He soon finds that his den has been seemingly ransacked and asks his butler, Eric, why this is the case, but finds Eric being evasive and confused about it. Mr. Morris becomes more suspicious and decides to hire Jonas and Gordon as security for their building, only for Billy to soon find them trying to rob his safe. One of them orders the other (named “Duke”) and they try to blackjack him, only for Billy to call SHAZAM to summon Captain Marvel. Mr. Morris bursts in as he goes to punch them over and the private “detectives” claim that they caught Billy and Captain Marvel breaking into his safe. Captain Marvel points out that they’re literally best friends and a confused and suspicious Mr. Morris isn’t sure what to think until Captain Marvel grabs each of the goons by the ankle and dumps them over, showing their pockets are packed with stolen money from his safe. Captain Marvel is confused about the rest of his day and thinks everyone is still plotting against him more than ever, but Captain Marvel says he’ll come back to explain things once he takes them to jail. Later, Captain Marvel invites Mr. Morris to his private banquet room and he finds a surprise birthday party! Miss Jameson reveals she was at his normal restaurant to find out his favorite food and Eric the Butler ransacked his den to find out information about getting him a new fishing rod! Captain Marvel tells him that Jonas and Gordon tried to kill him with the concrete block and Mr. Morris is happy to know all his friends and employees he can trust. Captain Marvel says that a man who brings happiness like him doesn’t make enemies and that it’s impossible!
Appearing in "Captain Marvel and the Betrayal of Mr. Morris!"
Featured Characters:
Supporting Characters:
- Mr. Morris
- Miss White, his secretary
- Henry, WHIZ employee
- Miss Jameson, Billy's secretary
- Eric, Mr. Morris's butler
Antagonists:
- Jonas & Gordon, private "detectives" (either Jonas or Gordon is called "Duke".)
Locations:
Items:
- A New Fishing Rod
- A Large Concrete Block
Synopsis for "Captain Marvel and the Most Dangerous Jobs on Earth!"
Brave men head into a condemned building to recover furniture, but do so with leisure and ease. These are the men of Dangerous Jobs, Inc. Their foreman, Joe, commends how well the men work, except for Carl Joady, who just sat down and didn’t do anything because he’s a coward. Joady complains he has a “sore toe” and is promptly told to basically get lost, but he swears he’ll get his revenge. Billy Batson soon heads out with Dangerous Jobs, Inc. To look into their biggest job yet: moving a whole glacier that is very slowly threatening to destroy a ranchers house by merely setting off explosives on one side of it, which will send the glacier into a ravine. However, Joady plants a bomb to cause an avalanche to kill them all with falling glacial ice, prompting Billy to call SHAZAM to summon Captain Marvel, who just pushes the glacier anyways. Joady runs off to try sabotaging their next dangerous job the next day, salvaging gold from a sunken wreck that’s trapped in a “permanent whirlpool.” They decide to fix this by using a giant fan that will spin the other way, believing this will counteract it. Joady, dressed as a fisherman, throws a wrench into the fan and it begins to tangle up the divers’ air lines, requiring Billy to call SHAZAM to summon Captain Marvel and drag both the men and the salvaged gold to safety. The men of Dangerous Jobs, Inc. are starting to become worried.
Finally, they head off to plug a newly active volcano by shoving boulders into the top, only for Joady to fly by in a plane and drop a bomb in the volcano to make it erupt prematurely. Captain Marvel flies in and picks the boulder up to quash the eruption faster, then tears Joady out of his plane, having figured out that he was behind all the attacks. The men of Dangerous Jobs, Inc. Decide they must be jinxed until Captain Marvel explains everything and they’re empowered to go back to doing the most Dangerous Jobs on Earth as Captain Marvel tells them they’re some of the bravest men he’s ever met.
Appearing in "Captain Marvel and the Most Dangerous Jobs on Earth!"
Featured Characters:
Antagonists:
- Carl Joady
Other Characters:
- Joe Granger, Contractor
- Dangerous Jobs, Inc.
Locations:
Items:
- shipboard crane-mounted submersible giant fan
Synopsis for Captain Kid: "The Candy Kid"
Betty Mae invites Captain Kid over to her house for a party as her date. However, on his way there, Captain Kid finds Pudgy running to the docks, saying that they’re filming a movie there with Gloria Teen, the “Juvenile Queen” and finds she seems to be drowning, diving into help… only to find out he’s ruined this take. The director gives him a boot in the rear and tells him to basically get lost. Pudgy offers that he heard Gloria Teen loves candy and he can buy some for her to make up for it. However, when he goes to get some candies for her, Betty Mae meets him there, buying candy for the party, thinking that he went ahead to get the candy for her so she won’t have to pay for it. Captain Kid pretends that he has to get his “change” from inside the store and buys another big box of candy, but finds Betty Mae is still standing outside. Captain Kid shakes his butt against a nail-filled fence to rip them and runs home to take care of it and has one of Gloria’s men send the box of candy he bought to her hotel, changes his pants and dashes off to the party. However, when he gets there, he finds it’s a party for Gloria Teen and she recognizes him as the one who sent her a box of candy! Pudgy soon finds Captain Kid outside, covered in chocolates, asking if Gloria Teen shot him down, but he says that it was Betty Mae who just didn’t understand...
Appearing in Captain Kid: "The Candy Kid"
Featured Characters:
- Captain Kid
Supporting Characters:
- Bettie Mae
- Pudgy
Antagonists:
- Gloria Teen
Synopsis for "Captain Marvel and Mr. Tawny's Detective Case"
Everyone is delighted to see Mr. Tawky Tawny the Civilized Tiger out with Billy Batson to visit an old bookshop. While he’s there, Mr. Tawny finds a copy of Adventures of Sherlock Holmes in what seems to be a nickel bin, only for the owner, Sam Snerl, to state that the unseen bottom half of the signs says they’re “Old Books 5¢ to $1.00,” specifically to steal more money from people. However, once they get back to Mr. Tawny’s house, Billy finds that this book is not only signed by Sir Arthur Ignatius Conan Doyle himself, but that this was a royal copy made for only Kings to read, meaning it’s incredibly expensive and rare. Billy goes to get this sort of book appraised, but Mr. Tawny doesn’t care or even understand the concept of the book being expensive, saying he merely hopes it’s entertaining.
The next evening, Billy is alack to find that Mr. Tawny is now dressing like Sherlock Holmes and starts “deducing” that Billy had hot dogs for dinner (he has mustard on his chin,) and that he ran there because he’s sweating and has dilated pupils. Billy quickly deduces himself that Mr. Tawny is trying his best to try being a detective. Mr. Tawny shows off his skills by saying he got the jump on Billy and appraised the book, finding it’s worth $5,000 now and that he’s going to find a local prowler in the area. Hearing someone shouting for help, Mr. Tawny takes off to investigate as Billy calls SHAZAM to summon Captain Marvel to provide backup. When a man in a draping mask with drawn-on eyes appears with a gun, Mr. Tawny accuses him of being a burglar and says he’s not afraid of him trying to shoot him: he knows Captain Marvel would punch him over at that moment. Mr. Tawny goes to unmask him, but the goon shoots out a streetlight to escape into the dark. They look around the house that the burglar was trying to break into and Mr. Tawny finds a fingerprint and a hair. Mr. Tawny notes this means that the burglar has a short mustache and then starts playing a harp to “cogitate” about this. Captain Marvel looks around and soon finds the prowler out again, but runs headfirst into Mr. Tawny, who also figured that he’d be skulking around the area. He finds that the goon dropped a pencil on the way out with a matching fingerprint and that he’s solved the case now and it involves his Royal copy… but says he’ll solve it in the morning and goes to bed. Captain Marvel decides to return Billy in the meantime to sleep over and read the book himself. However, in the night, the prowler returns and knocks out Billy with a pistol-whip, only for Mr. Tawny to reveal he knew he’d come and throws a lamp at his head. The burglar tries to fire at the Civilized Tiger a few times until Billy recovers and calls SHAZAM to punch out the goon. Mr. Tawny points out he now knows that it was Sam Snerl, the crooked bookshop owner. He has a pencil-thin mustache and a pencil stub behind his ear, further, he knew that someone had bought a famous book from him, but didn’t remember who he sold it to, so he was stalking around the area to try to find it. What’s more, he knows that Captain Marvel also found out it was Snerl because he set up Billy as bait for the prowler to read the book, meaning they all worked together to stop him! Captain Marvel is impressed as Mr. Tawny plays the harp and Captain Marvel takes Snerl to jail.
Appearing in "Captain Marvel and Mr. Tawny's Detective Case"
Featured Characters:
Supporting Characters:
Antagonists:
- Sam Snerl
Locations:
Notes
- Also appearing in this issue of Captain Marvel Adventures were:
- Dopey Danny Dee: "Soft Coal"
- "New Moon" (text story, featuring Jon Jarl), by Eando Binder
- Tightwad Tad: "Generous Hearted"
- Brad and Tad: "Way Out West"
- Rubbernose Randolph: "Boo Hoo!", by Art Helfant
See Also