Who Is the Skull Killer?

[egypturnash]

I was idly chasing links through the world-wide web and ended up looking at a thread on Warren Ellis' board in which he invites people to reimagine an obscure bit of pulp nonsense:

One of the more outré of the pulp characters—and given the genre, that’s quite saying something, believe me—the Octopus was actually the villain of the piece in his single issue, The Octopus v1 #4, 1939, written by...well, it's not exactly clear. It might be Norvel Page, or it might be Ejler and Edith Jacobsen. A rather over-the-top mad scientist, the Octopus worked from a big city hospital and plotted world conquest. His appearance might explain his desire to dominate the world; he's sea-green, with four "suction-cupped weaving tentacles" set above "hideously malformed" legs. He wears a small mask, and behind it can be seen two enormous, luminous, purple eyes. He was the leader of the Purple Eyes, a cult bent on world domination and mass destruction. The Octopus’ chosen method was an "ultra-violet ray" which devolved men and women and turned them into deformed, life-hating monsters hungry for human flesh and glowing with “ultraviolet purple.” Against the Octopus was set Jeffrey Fairchild, a young millionaire philanthropist (he eventually stopped the Octopus, of course). He had three identities. The first was Jeffrey Fairchild, hospital administrator. The second was was kindly Dr. Skull, the old man who made a practice of helping the poor in the slums. (His good works didn’t help him when everyone thought that he was the Octopus, however) In his other identity he was the “Skull Killer,” who fought crime and left a skull-imprint, ala the Spider, on his enemies. Fairchild was assisted by Carol Endicott, Dr. Skull’s nurse.

I found the Skull Killer to be more interesting to play with than some guy with tentacles. He kinda ended up being a Baron Saturday-looking guy, which is maybe kinda appropriate for a doctor.

edit: Oh, awesome, it was the first piece Ellis showed on the blog post he made about this round.

Comments

[enui-iune.livejournal.com]

apparently Mr. Ellis likes it :)
http://www.warrenellis.com/?p=7311

[shatterstripes.livejournal.com]

ooh, awesome! first one he excerpts. Thanks!