Dr. Vile – a dead antagonist that helped to crack the foundations of Halycon City and my Masks world.
Dr. Vile – a dead antagonist that helped to crack the foundations of Halycon City and my Masks world.
Dr. Vile – a dead antagonist that helped to crack the foundations of Halycon City and my Masks world.
Another NPC, albeit by game time – dead:
Dr. Vile
(yes he is an homage to Dr. Evil, they both are/were silver age villains of a sort – and yes he has a minion – Little Viler (who may still be alive))
Dr. Vile was Morning Star’s foe for as a long as there has been issues featuring them. The typical Silver Age Shenanigans occurred with monthly regularity. Dr. Vile would hatch a scheme to “finally stop” his hated arch nemesis, and every “month” it looked like he just might do it.
Eventually he tired of this routine. He wanted something different. So he enlisted the help of scientists of all the vilest sort. They worked and worked to discover anyway to defeat Morning Star once and for all. Most of the ideas were rehashes of his own.
Then they approached the burgeoning science of DNA. Dr. Vile’s interest was piqued, “What sort of genetics does a ‘superman’ have?” he wondered. So he resorted to his tried and true schemes, got caught, and got a hair sample. Well, the results were not as quick as 23 and me, so he there were a couple more issues before the scientists came back with the results.
Turns out Morning Star is a plant based sapien (his mama was an oak, his dad a cactus). “This explains his ability to capture and use the sun’s energy.” Dr. Vile was furious, “I’ve been knocked around by a ^@*!(#) Potted Plant!!!”
Well he demanded to know how he could uproot this weed in his garden. The scientists threw out many ideas. He shot down all of them. “Its brainstorming, there are no right answers.” they complained, and he shot them (in Silver Age land evil minions can die, its okay – and off camera – in fact it looks like one of those gag guns, but shoots real bullets).
Finally they came up with one idea: Sunblock. As one of the scientists explained, “If we keep him from being able to absorb sunlight, it may reduce his powers, or even kill him.” Dr. Vile loved that idea, especially the killing part. So he set them to work, and science is slower at this time, so it took a couple more issues before the tincture was done. Then, to his dismay, Dr. Vile found out that the formula would have to be applied in stages, which meant a couple more issues of getting beat up. But he decided it was worth it.
And it was worth it. Six Issues, and many butt kickings, later, Morning Star noticed a hug lack in his powers (he could only generate a shield sized light construct). Dr. Vile was all set to whoop #@!. That issue, things were going swimmingly well. Morning Star, without his powers, had to rely on his physical prowess, which wasn’t as great, but still good. Dr. Vile however was using all manner of devious ways to knock the hero about: mechanical men, laser bolts, and mechanical men with laser bolts. It was all going really well, until Morning Star “threw” his shield at Dr. Vile. Dr. Vile dropped the control pad, and the laser bolt armed mechanical men started firing wildly. Also, Dr. Vile was hiding behind a vat of liquid, well that vat was hit, that vat leaked and Dr Vile, as heretofore mentioned, was near that vat.
The liquid in the vat was an acid, it burned Dr. Vile’s face and he ran away. Morning Star cleaned up the raging robots.
Back at his lair Dr. Vile brooded and ate a lot of ice cream.
He decided he had to end Morning Star for good – this time. And so he decided to work up a #6. It took him an issue or two to get it just right. He did, the town was terrified, and right on cue, Mr. Morning Star showed up! Still he was “powerless” the sunblock hadn’t worn off. Dr. Vile stockpiled a lot of guns. “No elaborate plans this time. I am going to just shoot that #$%^ head.” He said to himself.
The tussled. Eventually Dr. Vile did get the upper hand. It helped that he was able to administer the final dose of sunblock. Stripped completely of powers, and not THAT good of an athlete Morning Star was pressed to his limits. Especially when bullets were flying at him.
One shot pierced his thigh. Morning Star was down. In the dirt. Dr. Vile closed for the kill, a gleeful look of evil spread slowly over his face (it took a whole panel, it was creepy). A shadow fell on his face as well, he brought the gun to bear, Morning Star held up his hand – futilely.
BOOM!!!!
The town was rocked by a massive explosion. The battle had taken place downtown. It leveled a city block. 1000s of people were killed or wounded. Neither Dr. Vile or Morning Star could be found. Their location had been tracked by the Cities Supers, but no bodies there remained.
Wow! I love the backstory, and I would never have guessed from your other art that Morning Star was plant-based, so I feel as gobsmacked as Dr. Vile!
Leah Libresco I was gobsmacked too. When I started to think about the world Morning Star just appeared, then Dr. Vile, and I wondered how Morning Star’s powers worked, and it just jumped out at me: he is a sapien, but with a plant biological origin, not an animal. Then it was simple how he had powers – some kind of photosynthesis. Then it was even simpler to figure out how to hinder his powers: block teh sun.