Friday, August 24, 2018

Patsy and the Phantom Magician-Mel Graff-1935 (1937)


A long one today but this just MIGHT be the very first superhero comic book story of all! THE ADVENTURES OF PATSY was a fairly newspaper strip about a little girl and her family in Hollywood. Only in the beginning, it was something very different! Patsy's lost in a fairy tale land with some scary menace but her sidekicks include The Phantom Magician! Bill Blackbeard famously made the case for Popeye to be the first superhero of them all but this guy has the suit, the emblem,the cape (sometimes) and even a mask! Certainly more the traditional comic book hero than Popeye. The Phantom Magician premiered in Patsy's strip in the Spring of 1935 and appeared almost daily until August, at which point he finally gets Patsy back home, takes off his mask, and pretends to be her Uncle, never using his magic superpowers again. These reprints come from FAMOUS FUNNIES in early 1937, STILL a year before Superman!






















4 comments:

Alejandro Capelo said...

I know a series of press strips titled "Adventures of Patsy", by William Dyer, is it the same? (forgive the mistakes, I'm from Spain and I do not speak English).

Booksteve said...

Yes, the same! William Dyer was a later artist for the same strip. (And your English is better than some people I know! Thanks for commenting.)

Jon said...

In comics, Hugo Hercules appeared in 1902. Mandrake the magician appeared in 1934. So the Phantom Magician isnt the first superhero in comics.

Booksteve said...

Neither of those have costumes, masks. Hugo is just a strong guy and Mandrake is a stage magician. Hardly what one thinks of when one thinks of a superhero.