Doc Savage - Villains

Villains

Doc's greatest foe, and the only enemy to appear in two of the original pulp stories, was the Russian-born John Sunlight, introduced in October 1938 in the Fortress of Solitude. Early villains in the "super-sagas" were fantastic schemers bent on ruling the world. Later the magazine was retitled Doc Savage, Science Detective, with a more realistic detective feel where Doc broke up crime rings. With a new editor, the last three magazines returned to the super-saga, then was canceled, as were most other pulp magazines.

A keynote of Doc's adventures is that no matter how fantastic the monster or menace, there was usually a rational scientific explanation at the end. A giant mountain-walking spider was revealed as a blimp, a scorching death came from super-charged electric batteries, a "sea angel" was a mechanical construct towed behind a submarine, Navy ships sunk by a mysterious compelling force were actually sabotaged, and so on. But Doc Savage also battled invisible killers, a murderous teleporter, and superscientific foes from the center of the Earth.

In early stories some of the criminals captured by Doc received "a delicate brain operation" to cure their criminal tendencies. The criminals returned to society fully productive and unaware of their criminal past. It is referred to in Truman Capote's book, In Cold Blood, as an older Kansan recalls Doc's "fixing" criminals he had caught.Template:1966 ed. p307