April 1967: The Power of the Plump

Offhand, I can think of only two comic book characters who combined portliness with power: Harvey Comics’ Little Lotta and Lightning Comics’ Fatman, the Human Flying Saucer.

Come to think of it, both characters were also pretty cheerful and comfortable in their considerable skins, unlike fitness-frantic Americans of the 21^st century.

“Otto Binder and C.C. Beck, the two men most responsible for the success of Captain Marvel, collaborated on only one other comic book character,” noted comics historian Don Markstein. “Their whimsical point of view, which had been such an important element in Captain Marvel's success, took over almost completely in this one — Fatman, the Human Flying Saucer, was very heavy on the whimsy.”

And hey, his name just happened to rhyme with that of the most popular character on TV at the moment. This Fatman was, of course, no relation to the parody hero of the same name who appeared in Batman 113 (Feb. 1958).

“Beck and Binder chose to reunite for another attempt to catch lightning in a bottle, as it were,” wrote Jon Morris in his book The League of Regrettable Superheroes.

The Nero Wolfe of superheroes, Fatman was “…a plump but athletic character named Van Crawford who was happy to spend his idle time indulging his many and varied hobbies and collections,” Morris noted. “When a spaceship — also a shape-changing alien — crashes within sight of his daily constitutional, Crawford rushes to its aid. He is rewarded for his efforts with the power to transform himself into a UFO.

“Decked out in a suit resembling a verdant version of Captain Marvel’s famous duds, Fatman battled a roster of foes that included the titanic Anti-Man, the hideous Brainman from Mars, underground gnome Grollo, Syntho the Patchwork Man and the lovely but evil Lunita the Moon Witch.”

The Corpulent Crusader was a much sunnier effort than his fairly dreadful companion at Lightning Comics, Tod Holton, Super Green Beret. Both titles, like their publisher, were short-lived.

October 1941: The World’s Mightiest Mortal, Nothing More

The creative forces behind Fawcett’s million-selling Captain Marvel had their own explanations for his considerable success.

“Billy Batson was Captain Marvel — as a boy of 14,” artist C.C. Beck recalled. “He had the same nose, cleft chin, and dimples as Captain Marvel. Only his eyes were different — and his hair became magically combed back when he changed to his adult form.”

“And Captain Marvel, although he had the powers of Solomon, Hercules, Atlas and other great heroes, was really a small boy at heart. He was merely Billy Batson grown up, not a godlike creature from another planet nor a Frankenstein’s monster sort of being created by a mad scientist or by a nuclear accident. He was just the World’s Mightiest Mortal, nothing more.

“As such, he was human, which few of the other comic book heroes of the time were, and therein lay his appeal to readers all over the world.”

And the writer emphasized the character’s light, satiric touch.

“The Captain Marvel and Marvel Family stories aren’t humor in the strictest sense, but rather satire and parody of life situations and the doings and shortcomings of humans,” Otto Binder told Bill Schelly. “The secret of it all was that Cap and Billy were dead serious and never made a joke at all. It was how we played up the slapstick and puns and situation comedy that made it all funny. 

“But remember this: young kids don’t get the joke at all. They take it seriously, namely, the battle between good and evil with the good guy … always winning. 

“In a sense, Captain Marvel was like Jonathan Swift’s satires of political situations [or] Alice in Wonderland which to the adult is a study of human nature. I always felt I was exploring and exploiting human nature too, digging out its zany aspects to show that much of life was a joke and full of craziness.”