Seen In: The aptly named Crack Comics #1-22, in the 1940s; The Shade #4 in 2012. Quote: "When I married the girl you loved you went into a jealous rage-- two years later, you kidnapped my only daughter-- I knew it was you but didn't tell the police as I didn't want my wife's past connected with a nasty rat like you-- She died of a broken heart when the police got nowhere!!!" Madame Fatal sure sounds like a villain name, doesnt it? Maybe some French femme fatale collaborator with the Nazis, plotting to tempt Captain America to his doom? If only. The Mrs. Doubtfire of superheroes, Richard Stanton dressed as an old lady to fight crime, a disguise that was no doubt very effective until the first punch was thrown and word started to get around about a mysterious octogenarian crime-fighter. Despite the "Madame," he clearly identified as male. He was on a mission to find his kidnapped daughter, learned she was still alive, then apparently forgot all about her. Like some others on this list, Madame Fatal was a trendsetter-- the first cross-dressing superhero... and what a role model he was, basically letting his own wife die of heartbreak and abandoning the hunt for his daughter out of... boredom, one supposes. The second cross-dressing superhero, the luchador-like Red Tornado, who dressed as a man, was practically Avengers material by comparison. When DC bought all the characters Quality Comics had ever published, it opted to publish almost all of them-- including Phantom Lady, famous only for having a skimpy costume, and the Black Condor, a man who learned to fly because he was adopted by birds-- yet somehow neglected to give Madame Fatal his gritty reboot.
T Campbell has written quite a few online comics series and selected work for Marvel, Archie and Tokyopop. His longest-running works are Fans, Penny and Aggie-- and his current project with co-writer Phil Kahn, Guilded Age.
