V-Man
| V-Man | |
|---|---|
| Publication information | |
| Publisher | Fox Features Syndicate |
| First appearance | V...– Comics #1 (January 1942) |
| In-story information | |
| Alter ego | Jerry Steele |
| Partnerships | The V-Boys |
| Abilities | Originally, no powers, but in excellent physical and mental condition; currently, involuntarily makes people ill. |
V-Man is a fictional patriotic-themed superhero character who first appeared in January 1942.
V-Man debuted in the first issue of Fox Feature Syndicate’s V Comics; the title is often listed as “V...– Comics” because three dots and a dash—the Morse code signal for the letter V—overlapped the V on the cover. Along with the stories there appeared a page intended to start a V-Man fan club amongst the readers, called the V-Boys and V-Girls. The series only lasted two issues (January and March, 1942). V-Man then made appearances in seven issues of Fox's Blue Beetle comic, starting with issue #13.
In 2008, V-Man, along with many other characters who’d fallen into the public domain, was included in Dynamite Entertainment’s Project Superpowers; after decades of being trapped in the Urn of Pandora, he was now transformed in such a way that anyone who comes near him becomes fatally ill, and he has to be constantly quarantined as a result. According to writer Jim Krueger, he now represents “that person who gets out of prison but can’t live a free life.”
During World War II, American Jerry Steele freed the inmates of a German prisoner-of-war camp, but was himself captured and apparently executed; however, a peasant was able to revive him with an herbal remedy and smuggle him to a safe haven. There, a man named Father Duroc asked Steele to take an oath called the V-Pledge, after which Steele was suddenly possessed of greater physical and mental fitness and courage, and garbed in a patriotic costume. As V-Man, he fought enemy soldiers in Europe and England. His principal gimmick was a miniature radio in his ring. He was aided by a group of teenagers called The V-Boys, who each wore a sweater with a large V on the front. The V-Boys were aware of V-Man's secret identity and communicated with him using the aforementioned ring.
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