The Fiery Mask

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Daring Mystery Comics

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The Fiery Mask

The Fiery Mask was a short-lived super-hero of the early 1940's. He was part of the Big Bang of super-hero creation in 1940. He appeared in Daring Mystery Comics, a magazine that seemed to feature new characters in every issue, few of which ever turned into series. By the way, despite its title, I cannot see anything especially daring about Daring Mystery Comics. It seems largely like other comic books of the era in style and subject matter.

The Fiery Mask (1940). Writer: Joe Simon. Art: Joe Simon. Doctor Jack Castle accidentally becomes the Fiery Mask, when he is exposed to a mad scientist's machine. The origin of the Fiery Mask; and the first story about the character.

The physical transformation of Jack Castle anticipates the origin of Steel Sterling in "The Man of Steel" (Zip Comics #1, February 1940). In both stories, the hero's body is completely transformed.

Castle is originally brought in by the police to help out with the mad scientist's case. The tale shows some good tracking by Castle of the villainous scientist. Castle's detection ideas here recall R. Austin Freeman's prose mystery short story, "The Puzzle Lock" (circa 1925).