Green Mask, The
Entry updated 5 January 2026. Tagged: Character, Comics, Publication.
US Comic (1940-1946). Fox Publications, Inc. 17 issues numbered #1-#11, then vol 2 #1 to vol 2 #6. Artists include E C Stoner and Al Zere. Scriptwriters include Will Eisner. Initially 68 pages, down to 36 by end of run. Initially 6-8 long strips and a short text story per issue, down to 3-5 long strips and a short text story for the shorter issues; also occasional short filler pieces. #1 was entirely made up of Green Mask tales (including the text story), subsequently they would be 1-4 (usually 2-3).
The Superhero the Green Mask first appeared in Mystery Men Comics #1 (1939) and was in all issues until the last (#31, 1942); he was deemed worthy of fronting his own comic (sellers were assured this featured "another old favorite, not a new comic"). #1 opens with his origin story: Micheal Shelby is the son of a senator about to present a bill to Congress (see Politics) "making the death sentence mandatory for members of criminal gangs", for this he and Michael are shot by agents of The Grim Circle gang: the senator dies but a Scientist friend treats the mortally wounded son with his untested "Vita-Ray machine": a fault means he receives too high a current, so Michael finds he can fly and has increased strength (see Superpowers), as well as a "paralyzer gun"; he vows vengeance and to "wipe crime from the face of the Earth". Meanwhile The Grim Circle assassinate an ambassador, hoping to force the USA to enter World War Two; their attempt to murder the investigating Green Mask injures an orphan boy: he is treated with the Vita-Ray machine and becomes Domino ("the miracle boy"), Michael's boomerang-wielding sidekick. The Grim Circle has a pit of acid and its own Mad Scientist, Igor, who has invented a radio-controlled "super power shell" (see Weapons). The next tale with genre elements was "Super Scientists of Death" in #8, said scientists having discovered the secret of Immortality by using other people's blood; they also have a device which changes blood to the correct type. Donors are abducted by a mechanical mole and a people-attracting Magnet.
In #10 the name "Michael Shelby" is dropped: "Walter Green, better known as the Green Mask" has been called up and "is now busily engaged exterminating Japs" (Domino's fate is unmentioned). However, his 15-year-old "motherless son", meek bespectacled Johnny spontaneously changes into the Green Mask when he gets angry (and cries out "E-E-E-Ow") but has no memory of his transformation when he reverts (though this is forgotten in at least one strip). Aside from minor elements appearing in a couple of subsequent tales, the first genre story of the new incarnation is vol 2 #4, with Johnny mulling over Einstein's Theory of Relativity: "Space is curved. That means time doesn't end. It's like a circle ..." concluding that Time Travel would be possible. Shortly after, as the Green Mask, he rescues a girl in a Balloon that has ascended so high they see a path in the sky – he declares "we've reached the place where space is curved", they walk the path, and after meeting pirates, find themselves in 9484: the present inhabitants (who might be Posthuman) say humanity (or at least its twentieth-century form) is extinct and want to kill the couple, fearing the germs they carry. They escape and return to the present. Vol 2 #5 has a radar-controlled Robot copy of the Green Mask operated by criminals. Another of the issue's strips has Johnny living with his parents, contradicting #10 (the father doesn't appear to be the ex-Green Mask), its plot has a scientist creating "Brainol", which the opening blurb describes as tampering with "brain processes", though it just seems to put people in a stupor.
From #2 non-Green Mask strips also appear, most being familiar from other Fox comics. A few are fantasy strips, some with anthropomorphic animals, others include Zanzibar the Magician who becomes shipwrecked at the South Pole and finds it inhabited by Walrus Men (see Lost Races) and a Monster, but his Magic powers overcome them (#2 only). Evil scientist Dr Doom, working from his laboratory in space, turns cats into pygmy henchmen, people to stone and has a paralyser ray; his motives seem to be malice and the need to experiment (#4 only). Navy Jones has an advanced submarine and works with underwater civilizations and Captain Nemo (see Jules Verne) (#5 & #6 only). The Night Bird is introduced in #5, though only a costume makes him a superhero (last appearance #9). #7 has young bootblack Timothy Smith hit so hard by a bully that it sends him to a Fantasy land. The Tumbler is a circus acrobat who dons a costume to fight crime (#7 & #8 only). Though only a one-off appearance in this comic, #10 has the first Rocket Kelly strip: he has a rocket-powered airplane and would soon get his own comic (see Rocket Kelly). Planetary adventurer Rick Evans (see All Good Comics) appears in #11 and three further issues; in #11 astronomers warn him a "robber planet, unattached to any solar system, [is] deliberately heading to Earth to destroy us" by using its gravitational pull "to rob our planet of its oceans, forest, soil". Evans is to be accompanied by Professor Astra "a modest but very brilliant scientist", who turns out to be an attractive blonde woman; Evans is surprised but has no objection (see Women in SF). As they approach the planet their Spaceship is pulled towards it by a "gravitation suction bolt fashioned by a brain". Landing they find a parched landscape, though comic-relief sidekick Stringbean locates a pool and drinks from it, swelling up like a melon because his "gravitational pull made you swallow a terrific amount of water". They are caught by the Alien inhabitants but escape: initially planning to sacrifice themselves (see Suicide) by crashing the spaceship into the alien's domed base, when the ruler sends a robot bomb after them, Evans is able to pull away and have the bomb crash into the dome. In 2(#2) Astra's father, also a scientist, has been asked by the World Council to make "an explosive so powerful it could move our planet to a more favourable position in the Solar System" (what is wrong with Earth's current location is unexplained): he is kidnapped by aliens in a comet and the explosive, X090, becomes unstable in his absence. A forgettable story in vol 2 #3 has cavemen (see Origin of Man) and Dinosaurs. Vol 2 #5 features a spider alien planning to wipe out life on Earth with "inter-planetary vibrations" so it can be colonized by his people (see Imperialism).
The Green Mask is one of the many unremarkable superheroes of the era, usually fighting mundane criminals and spies. In #9 he is responsible for the death of a grief-stricken man who tries to shoot the murderous surgeon who killed his wife; though our hero goes on to pursue the surgeon, there is no expression of remorse. The stories liven up only when sf or fantasy tropes are added to the mix. For similar reasons the Rick Evans strips are the best of the non-Green Mask content; the cavalier attitude towards science (see Scientific Errors) provides some pleasing absurdity. Less happily, early issues were overly fond of Yellow Peril tales. [SP]
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