Marvel’s 1940s superhero, the Vision, could be as grimly efficient as DC’s Spectre when it came to executing evildoers.
For example, in Marvel Mystery Comics 17 (March 1941), the cackling racketeer Vince Garone is murdering truckers in a bid to take over the industry.
“The suckers!” Garone boasts. “I’ll have the whole bunch crying to sell their outfits before I’m through with ’em. I’ll show ’em there’s only one big shot in this racket!”
Enter the Vision through a cloud of smoke (good superheroes always require a flashy, stylish method of transportation).
The Vision engineers an attack on Garone’s headquarters by independent truckers, prompting Garone to flee through a secret exit to a car in which he can escape.
But the superhero is in hot pursuit in a red roadster he’s acquired from somewhere, with his cape streaming in the wind. The Vision forces Garone off a cliff by startling him with the image of a gigantic pair of staring eyes with death’s head pupils — very much a Spectre move.
Watching the smoking wreckage, the Vision declares, “It was only just that Vince Garone share the same fate as his victims.”
Although one is an extra-dimensional being and the other a ghost, both the Vision and the Spectre fall into the category of “spirit of vengeance” superheroes.
“The body count of early Spectre stories was high, but the house style at DC soon changed, and the grim character softened much over the next few years,” noted The Jack Kirby Collector. ‘” If (Joe) Simon and (Jack) Kirby had seen and talked about the Spectre strip before creating The Vision, then they distilled the best the DC feature had to offer, and added their own power and style to the mix.”
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