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"Mary Marvel: "The Night Before Xmas"": Mary Batson invites Orphan children to her home for Christmas. She and her adoptive mother go to buy presents for the children. At a large toy shop a clerk acts strangely, saying he wants to hide a Toy Band so nobody buys it. When Mrs Bromfield asks if the

Quote1 You big lug! You as good as said I was a sissy! Quote2
Pinky, the Whiz-Kid

Wow Comics #9 is an issue of the series Wow Comics (Volume 1) with a cover date of January, 1943. It was published on December 9, 1942.

Synopsis for Mary Marvel: "The Night Before Xmas"

Mary Batson invites Orphan children to her home for Christmas. She and her adoptive mother go to buy presents for the children. At a large toy shop a clerk acts strangely, saying he wants to hide a Toy Band so nobody buys it. When Mrs Bromfield asks if they have a toy band he says they are out of them, but they are wound up and march out. The clerk says they are not worth her money and not for sale. When she insists on buying them the clerk takes out a bat, threatening to hit her. Mary wants to get help, then remembers to transform. She says the clerk should sell it, and when he hits her the bat breaks on her head. She throws him away then transforms. The Manager lets them buy the band and discharges the clerk, who tells a group of crooks who bought them, one says he was supposed to buy them like a customer. At the Bromfield house on Christmas Eve the orphans play then go to bed. Mary stays up to read, reading The Night before Christmas. Then a 'Santa' comes down the chimney and starts taking presents. Three more come down and take the toy-band players. Mary transforms to a Marvel, and has machine-gun bullets fired at her, which bounce off. She crumples the gun like tissue paper, not wanting the orphan kids to be woken. The crooks all attack her at once, but are knocked aside. One smashes a chair over her head, but she withstands that. The crooks leap out of the window with their loot, but she flies out and brings them back. However Mrs Bromfield has woken and calls to Mary. Mary is about to revive the crooks to ask why they want the toy band, but doesn't want Mrs Bromfield to know about the crooks or it would spoil her Christmas. She transforms behind a curtain to muffle the sound and says she knocked over a lamp. Mrs Bromfield says she'll go back to sleep and tells Mary not to stay up too late. However when Mary goes downstairs again she is seized and prevented from speaking by one of the Santas. Mary is then tied to a chair and gagged, and one Santa decides she is a witness and must be taken care of. He prepares to cosh her, but other Santas come down the chimney and see what is happening. One reveals himself as Captain Marvel, who saves Mary, the other two are Mr. Scarlet and Pinky the Whiz Kid who stop two other crooks. Cap removes Mary's gag, and she says she is ashamed at getting caught and wants to handle the last crook herself. She transforms and defeats him. One of the toys breaks open, revealing jewels inside. She realizes the crooks were jewel smugglers, who got jewels past the police by hiding them in toys. However now the rest of the house has been awakened. Cap sees it is 12 O'Clock, causing all the heroes to say 'Merry Christmas.' The crooks are presumably arrested.

Appearing in Mary Marvel: "The Night Before Xmas"

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  • Mrs. Bromfield (Mary's foster mother) (First appearance)
  • Peeves (The Bromfields' butler) (First appearance)

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Synopsis for Mr. Scarlet: "Make-Believe Mastermind"

Scarlet and Pinky take down three high-profile criminals in quick succession, while Brian Butler's workload expands accordingly. Soon, Brian Butler loses his job as Special Prosecutor, thanks to the agitation of a "citizens' committee," and an irate Mayor (as they see him as a lazy incompetent letting Mr. Scarlet doing his job for him). Butler opens a private law office. Ten weeks go by with no clients. Butler's ex-secretary Miss Wade finds a new job as a night nurse for old Cholmondely Creep; and argues bitterly with Brian before leaving for good. A car crash outside the office calls Butler's attention to a subway booth on the corner, which had not been there until then. Mr. Scarlet and Pinky costume up to investigate, and shortly find the booth to be a papier-mâché fake, in which four robbers are sticking up would-be subway passengers. Fisticuffs ensue but the hoods get away when their fake booth catches fire, diverting Scarlet's attention to extinguishing it.

But it soon turns out that there's only one papier-mâché shop in this city, so Mr. Scarlet and Pinky go sprinting over to visit it, and there they are surprised to encounter the 4-man robbery gang; further fisticuffs ensue and two of the robbers are thrashed while two escape. Pinky pursues the escapees while Scarlet follows up on another clue.

That evening Mr. Scarlet arrives at the mansion home of wealthy, bedridden Cholmondely Creep, who is regaling his nurse, his physician, his butler, and his secretary with some purely hypothetical plans for purely hypothetical crimes. It's his hobby, you see. Meanwhile Pinky has found a fake garage, and signals Mr. Scarlet with a red rocket, sending a scarlet streak across the sable sky. The garage turns out to be another papier-mâché fake building, and packed with thugs; another fistfight starts up, and ends with both heroes getting conked on their heads with blunt instruments. They're quickly tied up, stuffed into a car, and sent rolling down a hill and into the river. Scarlet gets himself and Pinky loose from their ropes and they escape to the surface. They go to Creep's house and Scarlet questions him, and learns of another phony-front crime plan, involving a fake movie theater at Graham Square. Inside is an even larger gang than before, and one of them wears a mask. The dynamic duo punch their way through a large number of gangsters and take down the masked man, who turns out to be Cholmondely Creep's doctor.

After all this, Butler is still a struggling, client-less lawyer; Miss Wade has been fired from her nurse job (Mr. Creep's heart problem was made up by the doctor); and Pinky has a few choice thoughts on the subject.

Appearing in Mr. Scarlet: "Make-Believe Mastermind"

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  • the Mayor
  • unnamed head of a Citizens' Committee
  • Cholmondely Creep and his staff:
    • a secretary
    • a butler

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Synopsis for Phantom Eagle: "Down Under"


Appearing in Phantom Eagle: "Down Under"

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Synopsis for Commando Yank: "The Terrific Toy"


Appearing in Commando Yank: "The Terrific Toy"

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  • Commander Toito (Single appearance; dies)

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Synopsis for Spooks: "Creepy Fantasy"


Appearing in Spooks: "Creepy Fantasy"

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Notes

  • Mister Scarlet:
    • Brian Butler loses his job as Special Prosecutor for the city in this story, because citizen groups saw him as being lazy, leaving his job of capturing major criminals up to Mister Scarlet! This starts a series of stories where Brian is a struggling lawyer with very few paying clients, and Pinky won't stop complaining about having no money.
    • "Cholmondely" is pronounced "Chumley."
    • In the captions, Mr. Scarlet and Pinky are called "the dynamic duo," at least twice.
    • Mr. Scarlet and Pinky both get head-konked unconscious with blunt instruments. This is Scarlet's seventh,[1][2][3][4][5] and Pinky's third,[6][7] cranial concussion.
    • Max Mugg, Dean of the Crime College, was last seen in America's Greatest Comics #4.
    • George Stimson, the Inhuman Voice, was last seen in Wow Comics #6.



See Also


Links and References

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