Leading Comics
Entry updated 16 March 2026. Tagged: Comics, Publication.
US Comic (1941-1950). World's Best Comics (DC Comics). 44 issues, but only #1-#14 considered here (see below). Artists include Henry Boltinoff, Arturo Cazeneuve, Mort Meskin, George Papp and Jon Small. Script writers include Henry Boltinoff, Joe Samachson, Jerry Siegel and Mort Weisinger. Initially 68 pages, down to 52 by #14; 6-7 long strips and a short text story per issue, plus short strips as filler.
Leading Comics #1-#14's long strips covered in this entry featured five Superheroes; from #15 (May 1945) they were replaced by stories of humorous anthropomorphized animals. The five leads continues to have adventures in other DC titles after their eviction. The heroes were The Star-Spangled Kid, a patriotically clad superhero whose car has helicopter blades enabling it to fly (first appearance: Star Spangled Comics #1, October 1941); Vigilante, a present-day cowboy (Action Comics #42, November 1941); The Green Arrow, a costumed and masked bowman (More Fun Comics #73, November 1941); Shining Knight, a chivalrous knight with magic sword and flying horse (Adventure Comics #66, September 1941) and Crimson Avenger, a costumed superhero who throws a gas capsule to make a dramatic entrance (Detective Comics #20, October 1938). They form a team called The Seven Soldiers of Victory, the number including two of the three sidekicks; omitted despite participation in the adventures is Crimson Avenger's Wing, who – being Chinese – is the only non-white member (see Race in SF). The Seven Soldiers were DC Comic's second superhero team, the first being the Justice Society of America (who first appeared in All Star Comics #3, Winter 1940-1941, and comprised Doctor Fate, Hourman, the Spectre, Sandman, Atom, the Flash, Green Lantern and Hawkman).
In #1 the "Napoleon of Crime" The Hand learns he only has a month to live, and decides to depart memorably by arranging for five villains to each commit a crime where they will face one of the above heroes. They are The Dummy (here looking like a living dummy; but in #8, where he is the main villain, he seems to be a man who resembles a dummy); Red Dragon (red-veiled with top hat and tails); Professor Merlin (an evil Scientist); Big Caesar (a mundane crook) and Needle (lanky and armed with a needle gun). These confrontations make up the issue's next five strips. Tasks include stealing a newly developed Ray Gun, whilst The Hand uses a video screen to monitor progress. After defeating their respective foes, the heroes come for The Hand, who has just learnt there is a cure for his condition, only to perish under some of his collapsing super-Technology.
Subsequent issues either follow this format, or tweak it by having the heroes help someone who has five problems to deal with (though in #11 the adventures are linked by a recurring hat). In #2 the co-ordinating criminal is the Black Star, whose black light turns creatures into giants (see Great and Small). #3 has Dr Doome using a one-directional Time Machine to extract history's greatest conquerors (Alexander the Great, Nero, Attila the Hun, Ghengis Khan and Napoleon) so they can steal five rare metals to fund the building of a second time machine that will enable them to travel to and conquer the future. The Green Arrow's story has a scientist who has built radium-powered Robots, one with unintended self-awareness (see AI) and a broad sense of Humour. The Sense Master (#4) is apparently paralysed and communicates by robot, though it is revealed that the Sense Master is a dummy while the real villain wears a robot suit; he uses hormone extract to enhance a different sense in each of five criminals. Other issues have scientists inventing a Spaceship and a ray that supplies perpetual youth (see Immortality; Rejuvenation) (#5); a Lost Race with advanced technology in Antarctica (radioactive minerals beneath their settlements prevent ice from forming) (#7); a scientist whose Invention makes those affected see what they most want to see (#10); robots in smart suits (#13); another scientist discovers the means to intensify literary characters who already seem to have a life of their own, enabling them to step out of the page: these include Humpty Dumpty, Falstaff and some Lilliputians (#14).
As the Justice Society of America had the first pick of the DC Comics superheroes, The Seven Soldiers of Victory was the second-string team, though the Green Arrow is nowadays better known than some of the original Society members (see also Justice League of America). The stories are often entertaining, with some self-aware Humour: in #6 The Green Arrow relaxes by reading The Black Arrow (presumably the Robert Louis Stevenson novel) and though finding it enjoyable thinks, "This fellow does things with a bow and arrow that can't be done. It isn't realistic!" [SP]
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