Mr. Mystic!

The Spirit Section was never just the adventures of the Central City protector. Also included in the package were the misadventures of Lady Luck and our focus today -- Mr. Mystic. As far as I can find out, only the first five Mr. Mystic adventures have ever been collected and that was way back in 80's when a slender comic from Eclipse slithered into the comic shops of the time. 

The highly underrated Bob Powell was the artist behind this Will Eisner creation. Mr. Mystic was just one of a cavalcade of magicians who wandered across the comics landscape. Mandrake the Magician by Lee Falk had become a success in the newspaper comics years before and being a magician was an easy way to explain "super-powers". The writer Eisner and the artist Powell use the name "W. Morgan Thomas" on his work for Mr. Mystic. 

"The Origin of Mr. Mystic" June 2, 1940

This story is a crushed version of the movie Lost Horizon...sort of. Americans are fleeing invading armies and a diplomat we only know as "Ken" insists that a Professor Padewski take his seat aboard the overcrowded plane. Ken then finds a plane, but crashes. He is scooped up by a sect of monks called "The Council of the Seven Lamas" and almost immediately given vast magical powers by the act of putting a brand on his forehead. The Lamas disappear and Ken now gifted with almost limitless power to create and transform objects hears a voice which tells him he will be "Mr. Mystic". A tuxedo, cape, and turban appear and he's on his way to save Padewski yet again. 

"Karoly Gore, the Dictator of Europe" June 9, 1940

This yarn sees our hero go to capture a notorious dictator for a million dollar reward he will use to ease the suffering caused by the dictator. Gore himself proves to be a weak man, easily defeated, but the woman named Elena is much more dangerous and has powers of hypnosis she uses to opposed Mr. Mystic. In the end of course Mr. Mystic wins the day. 

"The Slave Traders" June 16, 1940

Mr. Mystic finds a woman near death in the desert. Just before she dies, she tells him of slave traders who had captured her. Mystic marks her grave with a tree which shall never die then off he goes to stop the slave traders. He stops the trade and saves a woman named Wooding, using a flying carpet in the process. 

"The Zombies of Dr. Gung" 23, 1940

Elena returns from seeming death to battle Mr. Mystic again. This time the action is in Hong Kong where a Dr. Gung is busy creating "zombies" by using rays to rob men of their ability to reason. Mr. Mystic was given a necklace by the Lamas which gave him supreme power and Elena spots it and covets it immediately when he follows her trail to Gung's place. 

"The Burch Gang Smugglers" June 30, 1940

Mr. Mystic comes to America for the first time in the series, and just in time to save two young lovers named Bill and Shamrock from the clutches of smugglers. Mr. Mystic walks on water to save these two and to stop the gang. And in classic pulp hero fashion, he disappears before he can be thanked by the couple. 

Mr. Mystic looks from this small sampling to be a rather typical magician-superhero type of the time. He's very similar in many ways to Yarko the Great created by Eisner and others for the Iger Studio when Eisner was a part of that operation. It's surprising that a Mr. Mystic collection of greater breadth hasn't been done in all these decades. 

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