#power comics

Miss Espionage was a genuinely intriguing character, who combined elements of Golden Age ghost stories, with postwar tales of spies and treachery, at least in her origin story. She debuted in Power Comics #3, as a mysterious female spy for the Nazi “resistance” in defeated Germany and bearing a stunning resemblance to Mati Hari, the Dutch exotic dancer shot by the French for spying for the Germans during the First World War. The real name of Miss Espionage is never revealed, although she confesses to the American counter-intelligence officer on her trail, Major Smithson, that she is indeed the daughter of Mata Hari, seeking vengeance on the Allies who executed her mother. On the verge of capture, Espionage suddenly changes sides, and vows to work as a spy for the Americans, in the broad cause of "peace".

This quite convoluted origin story was clearly intended to launch a serious comic run for the character, but Miss Espionage only made one more appearance, in Power Comics #4, after which she disappeared entirely. A clue as to why this might have been is the jarring change of tone in her second adventure. Whereas in the first Miss Espionage tale , working for a German spymaster called Von Bulow (who later attempted to murder her), Espionage was a mysterious wraithlike figure and a stealthy mistress of disguise, in her second outing she is transformed into a brash fist-fighting figure, out to stop a criminal plot to provoke another war in the Pacific to the benefit of arms traders. In this version, Miss Espionage suddenly appeared rather unoriginal and derivative and it may have been this that led to the title’s abrupt cancellation, along with Power Comics itself.

It is a shame that the character’s unusual beginning in a story probably scripted by Bill Woolfolk, and beautifully illustrated by Rudy Palais, was somewhat wasted. The idea of a reincarnated female spy applying her ethereal talents to fight recalcitrant Nazis, evil arms dealers and, presumably, communists, was definitely worth developing but the by-the-numbers hard boiled secret agent heroine Espionage became probably did for any possibility of transfer to another title after Power Comics closed. A missed opportunity, I think.

The splash panel featured is from the Miss Espionage story in Power Comics #3 (August 1945).

Bonnie must be one of the more whacky Golden Age comic book heroines. In an unnamed swing era US city, Scottish Bonnie appears able to make a living wowing jive fans with bagpipe music and Scottish ballads in urban night clubs. In this four page one-off, which appeared in Power Comics, Bonnie’s attachment to her bagpipes is so great that she is driven to kayo two crooks who had the temerity to steal the club’s takings and stash them in Bonnie’s pipes. When Slick and Greasy, no-good small-time thieves, try to snatch the bagpipes back, she makes short work of them in impressive street-fighting style before handing them over to Detective Johnny Noderick of the local police.

Caricatured and slightly bonkers though it was, the idea of a red-haired feisty bagpipes-playing young Scotswoman making it on the mean streets could have been worth a longer shot than Bonnie was granted. Perhaps the whole premise was so far-fetched, even for a 1940s “funny”, an audience was unlikely to have been found, thus relegating Bonnie to an entertaining but decidedly eccentric footnote in the story of comic book heroines. Shades of Bobbie Burns indeed!

The page featured is from the one and only Bonnie story, Bonnie Blows The Blues, which appeared in Power Comics #2 (July 1945).