Black Terror
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The Black Terror is a fictional character and a superhero who originally appeared in Exciting Comics #9, published by Nedor Comics in 1941. Some Black Terror stories were written by Patricia Highsmith before she became an acclaimed novelist.
The character has been revived by various publishers over the years, including Eclipse Comics, AC Comics, and, most recently, America's Best Comics.
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[edit] Character history
The character first appeared in the Golden Age of Comic Books in Exciting Comics #9, published in 1941 by Nedor Comics. He was one of that publisher's most popular superhero characters, operating until at least 1949.
His secret identity was pharmacist Bob Benton who formulated a chemical he called 'formic ethers' which gave him various superpowers. He used these powers to fight crime with his sidekick Tim Roland, together known as the Terror Twins.
[edit] Revivals
[edit] Eclipse Comics
Eclipse Comics did a four-issue mini-series 'revival' of the Black Terror. In this issue, the character is an undercover FBI agent operating against organized crime, who would dress up like the Black Terror for certain operations. He had no superpowers or any connection to the original character.
[edit] AC Comics
AC Comics revised the Black Terror, starting in their Americomics title. In it, now retired Bob Benton returns to action after an attempt to shake him down for protection money lead to the death of his wife. He would now operate as an over the top vigilante, now just called the "Terror".
Later, most likely due to copyright issues, he would become a criminal enforcer and be known as the "Terrorist".
[edit] America's Best Comics
The Black Terror, along with other heroes from Nedor Comics, were revived by Alan Moore in his series Tom Strong, published by America's Best Comics. This revival set the characters on a parallel world called Terra Obscura, which was also the title of the resulting mini-series.
In Tom Strong #11, Moore and co-creator Chris Sprouse more fully introduce the idea of Terra Obscura being a parallel Earth, "but in our own dimension. In our own galaxy". In this issue, Tom Strange is revealed to have run across the Milky Way for 30 years to reach Strong for help in stopping an alien menace which killed or imprisoned most of the science heroes of Terra Obscura. Strong himself theorized that the duplicate Earth "must be due to some near-inconceivable fluke of mathematics, of statistical probability".
The parallel Earth, it is revealed by Strange, was formed much as our own, except that once Earth had completely formed, something large collided and combined with it - a vast spacecraft. The pilot of the spacecraft survived in the Moon, until awakened by astronauts on July 20, 1969. It apparently followed them back to Earth, where it began construction of a ship to return home - by converting the entire Earth into a spaceship. In the process, it was engaged in battle by the members of SMASH (see below). It killed some members, and trapped others in suspended animation for 30 years, until freed by the combined efforts of Tom Strong and Tom Strange.
In Tom Strong #12 it is revealed that The Black Terror had been killed in battle with the alien. However, Benton, a polymath, had transferred his consciousness into a computer program called Terror 2000.
In the Terra Obscura series, The Terror 2000 program institutes a crime prevention program in Invertica City, wherein technologically produced versions of the Black Terror (referred to as The Terror) fight crime. A corporation running the program tries to sell it to other cities in the US.
Eventually, the Terror transfers its consciousness into the now deceased Tim and tries to acquire power from the returning Captain Future's spaceship. He is defeated by a time travelling version of his original self, the Black Terror.
