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"The Red Bee: "The Taxi Cab Racket"": A protection gang is extorting a taxicab company until the Red Bee puts them out of business.

Quote1 The Red Bee stopped you! You fools ... Isn't there a man among you who can whip this fantastic creature?! Quote2
Boss Buddan

Hit Comics #7 is an issue of the series Hit Comics (Volume 1) with a cover date of January, 1941.

Synopsis for The Red Bee: "The Taxi Cab Racket"

A protection gang is extorting a taxicab company until the Red Bee puts them out of business.

Appearing in The Red Bee: "The Taxi Cab Racket"

Featured Characters:

Supporting Characters:

  • Tom Darrow, the District Attorney
  • Michael the Red Bee's bee

Antagonists:

  • Buddan (Single appearance)
  • Buddan's gang

Locations:


Synopsis for The Strange Twins: "Teamup in Africa"

Doug and Rod Strange learn of their brotherhood and become friends.

Appearing in The Strange Twins: "Teamup in Africa"

Featured Characters:

Supporting Characters:

  • Wing Low

Antagonists:

  • Sanders Gang

Other Characters:

  • Maj. Philip Elliot (Single appearance)

Locations:

Items:

Vehicles:


Synopsis for Bob & Swab: "On Little Diomede"


Appearing in Bob & Swab: "On Little Diomede"

Featured Characters:

Supporting Characters:

Antagonists:

Other Characters:

Locations:

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Vehicles:

  • USS Scarab

Synopsis for Betty Bates: "The Will of Mr. Mark"


Appearing in Betty Bates: "The Will of Mr. Mark"

Featured Characters:

Supporting Characters:

Antagonists:

  • Karlo (Single appearance)
  • Karlo's female boss

Other Characters:

  • Mr. Mark (Single appearance; dies)

Locations:

Items:

Vehicles:


Synopsis for Hercules: "Cooky Stover"

A tenement fire breaks out in the heart of town; women and children are trapped; walls are collapsing; a crowd gathers. Joe Hercules in his blue business suit is in the crowd; he rushes inside and props up some walls while several people escape. His suit is damaged and soon he's down to the blue trunks again, celebrating with the firemen and meeting their dog Spots. Meanwhile and elsewhere, Cooky Stover is boasting about how he can get at the strong boxes of the Carson Bank, and so soon his girlfriend will be wearing nifty trinkets. That night Cooky's gang does some safecracking in the bank and departs over the rooftop into the firehouse next door, headconking some firemen and stealing their uniforms, then escape in a hook-and-ladder truck with sirens screaming. Spots the firehouse mascot runs out to find his new friend Hercules. He gets into Joe's room (at the hotel or boarding house or wherever he's staying) and wakes him up; Joe gets dressed in his cape and boots and runs to the firehouse, where the dazed firemen are just now rallying back up. Soon he's sprinting across the city; the firetruck is still zooming along; he jumps onto it from an overpass and starts punching out crooks. Just then a steam-whistle fire alarm goes off; there's a fire elsewhere in the town and this is this town's only fire engine! Plus Cooky has just now shot a bullet through its gas tank, creating a leak! To save himself from a herculean thrashing, Cooky agrees to help out Joe with the fire; he and all his men get back into the truck, which Joe then lifts over his own head, and sprints to the scene of the fire. The crooks work the hooks and ladders and hoses, and save a bunch of lives, while Hercules goes inside and pulls out more people. As soon as they think Joe's not looking, Cooky and his men flee the scene, into a nearby cold storage warehouse, but really Joe is still looking, and he spots them piling into a meat locker. By now some real firemen have shown up; Hercules charges into the warehouse, knocks down some doors and walls and yanks down a staircase, dumping the crooks onto the floor; they all end up under arrest.

Appearing in Hercules: "Cooky Stover"

Featured Characters:

Supporting Characters:

Antagonists:

  • Cooky Stover (Single appearance)
  • Cooky's gang
  • Cooky's girlfriend

Other Characters:

  • some firemen
  • Spots, a firehouse dalmation

Locations:

Items:

Vehicles:


Synopsis for G-5, Super Agent: "The Baron and the Gunsight Plans"

The plans for the most accurate machine-gun sights ever invented are stored in a safe in the back of the Capitol Building, and one night a burglar breaks into this safe but is caught in the act by a night watchman. The burglar shoots the watchman dead, and soon the news gets out that a foreign power now possesses this dangerous technology.

Soon in a room on the Rue de Pais in Paris, Baron Hortessel prepares to turn over the plans to his espionage bosses, but G-5 Super Agent shows up instead. One spy pulls a luger but not quickly enough; he gets punched out; the Baron and the other guy are locked in a closet; the Super Agent leaves with the recovered plans. Hortessel gets to a telephone, and a state car reaches the beach from which G-5's plane has taken off, just moments too late. A large number (70 or more) of ME-110s and other aircraft, returning from a raid, is diverted to the pursuit of this plane. Scotty the pilot tries to evade them by gaining a lot of altitude, but some Stukas stay with them and are actually fast enough to be catching up. G-5 mans the small plane's only machine gun, and shoots down at least two of these divebombers, while Scotty twists and turns the getaway plane, until the Axis pursuers run low on fuel and abandon the chase. Scotty and G-5 and the recovered plans make it back to England.

Appearing in G-5, Super Agent: "The Baron and the Gunsight Plans"

Featured Characters:

Supporting Characters:

Antagonists:

  • Baron Hortessel (Single appearance)

Other Characters:

Locations:

Items:

Vehicles:


Synopsis for The Old Witch: "The Ghost's Revenge"


Appearing in The Old Witch: "The Ghost's Revenge"

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Other Characters:

Locations:

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Synopsis for Blaze Barton: "The Earth Presidential Election"

Prof. Solis becomes President of Earth, 5020.

Appearing in Blaze Barton: "The Earth Presidential Election"

Featured Characters:

  • Blaze Barton

Supporting Characters:

  • Professor Solis

Antagonists:

  • Krako (First appearance)
  • Martians
  • Crust-Men

Other Characters:

Locations:

Items:

Vehicles:


Synopsis for Jack & Jill: "The Lucky Charm"


Appearing in Jack & Jill: "The Lucky Charm"

Featured Characters:

Supporting Characters:

Antagonists:

  • an unnamed killer

Other Characters:

  • Algernon (Single appearance)

Locations:

Items:

Vehicles:


Synopsis for Lion Boy: "Exiled from the Pack"


Appearing in Lion Boy: "Exiled from the Pack"

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Synopsis for Tommy Tinkle: "On Skeleton Island"


Appearing in Tommy Tinkle: "On Skeleton Island"

Featured Characters:

  • Tommy Tinkle

Supporting Characters:

  • Choc Lit Drop (First appearance)
  • Jy-Gantic (First appearance)

Antagonists:

  • Low-Zal (Single appearance)

Other Characters:

Locations:

Items:

Vehicles:


Synopsis for Neon the Unknown: "The Four Lamas"

Deep in the hills of Tibet, four Lamas, masters of the mystic sciences of the Orient, concentrate their thoughts on a huge luminous globe, thoughts of conquest and tyranny. By sheer force of will power, they plan a mental invasion of the world. Their electric thought waves fly to a small town in Central Europe, where the president of a tiny republic is orating about the importance of peaceful trade relations with all nations; in mid-speech he starts calling for hate and war. President Karla mobilizes all of his armed forces. Before they can march, Neon the Unknown confronts Karla in his presidential office, and learns that Karla's behavior is being compelled in some mysterious way. Then in Tibet the Four Lamas return from their rest break, and reconvene at their table of concentration. They bend their wills together, and the president again becomes a fiend; observing this, Neon figures out what's going on, for he too knows something of thought transference. It's time for an experiment. Neon grabs Karla and flies him out the window, westward toward the Atlantic; Karla's ravings grow milder, so Neon reverses direction and flies east. As the Man of Unknown Powers soars toward Tibet, the president grows hideously fierce, gaining in strength and ferocity until Neon is forced to assume a neonic shape to control the maddened man. In this blaze of light he is drawn toward the hidden lamasery, bursts in, and drops Karla onto the table, startling the Four Lamas. But Karla can only think to ask for clarified instructions, so they direct him to return to his still-unnamed central European country, to destroy all resistance to his ambition, to build his army and starve his people. Unobserved, Neon has now seen enough, and he drops into their midst. All four focus their minds upon the Man of Mystery, and at first he's weakened, dazed, confused, but then he grabs Karla and flings him on the floor, knocking him out. The Three Lamas line up across the table from Neon and a brow-furrowing contest ensues, for many hours, until the Orientals fall to the floor exhausted, still vainly trying to outwit their opponent, but the terrific effort is too much for them, and their minds explode. Karla's normal personality returns, and he's very grateful for Neon's help.

  • Somewhere between the 5th and 6th panels of page 5, of this six page story, the Four Lamas become Three, with nobody noticing. At story's end, all three of their minds explode, right there on-panel, and it certainly looks fatal. The missing Fourth Lama is never mentioned again.

Appearing in Neon the Unknown: "The Four Lamas"

Featured Characters:

Supporting Characters:

Antagonists:

  • The Four Lamas (Single appearance) (three die)

Other Characters:

  • President Karla (Single appearance)

Locations:

  • Tibet
  • unnamed Central European republic

Items:

Vehicles:

Notes

  • Includes the text story, "The Murdered Butler", by Toni Blum.
  • The Red Bee:
    • In this issue's story, Rick's boss is still Tom Darrow, who is mentioned by name for the first time since issue #2.
    • Tom and Rick both routinely pack concealed firearms.
    • In one melee, our hero runs into a wall head first, hitting it hard enough to knock himself out. This is the (at least) 4th cranial concussion of his career.
  • In this issue's G-5, Super Agent story, the bad guys are never explicitly identified as German, although the pursuing planes are identified as "black-tailed Junkers" and we are shown some ME-110s.
  • After this issue of Hit Comics, Jack and Jill move to National Comics, starting there the following month (Feb 1941) in issue #8.
  • Neon the Unknown:
    • One of the Four Lamas, invisible and forgotten, apparently escaped the brain-exploding fate met by the other three. He was never seen or mentioned or remembered again. This takes "the power to cloud men's minds" to a whole new level; he may be the most dangerous supervillain in the Quality Comics Universe.

Trivia

  • Jack and Jill with art by Nick Cardy is credited to "Lowell Riggs".


See Also


Links and References

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