Stardust the Super Wizard
Stardust the Super Wizard | |
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Splash page from Fantastic Comics #14 (April 1941). Art by Fletcher Hanks. | |
Publication information | |
Publisher | Fox Feature Syndicate |
First appearance | Fantastic Comics #1 (Dec. 1939) |
Created by | Fletcher Hanks |
In-story information | |
Abilities |
Superhuman strength Flight Invulnerability Other powers as required in story |
Stardust the Super Wizard is a fictional character, a comic book superhero from the Golden Age of Comics. Created by writer-artist Fletcher Hanks, he first appeared in Fox Comics' Fantastic Comics #1 (Dec. 1939).
Publication history
Stardust appeared in 16 issues of Fantastic Comics (Dec. 1939 - March 1941), as well Big 3 Comics #2 (1941, undated on cover). Some of his Golden Age adventures were reprinted by AC Comics decades later, and collected in the books I Shall Destroy All Civilized Planets!: The Comics of Fletcher Hanks (2007, ISBN 1-56097-839-2), and You Shall Die by Your Own Evil Creation! (June 2009, ISBN 1-60699-160-4) edited by Paul Karasik.
A new story of Stardust appears in Image Comics' Next Issue Project of Fantastic Comics #24. Stardust also makes a cameo in a panel of Savage Dragon #141.
AC Comics used the character in Femforce #137 and 140, in which AC's own Stardust (a superheroine who had no ties to the original) met the Super Wizard.
Stardust is mentioned in the "Minions of the Moon" segment of Alan Moore and Kevin O'Neill's The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen, Volume III: Century.
A reimagined version appears in two webcomics, one by writer Jason Derr and artist Simon S. Andrews. and another written and drawn by Joey Peters.[1][2]
Fictional character biography
Stardust is an alien from an unnamed planet (in some stories, a star), whose "vast knowledge of interplanetary science has made him the most remarkable man that ever lived." He arrives on Earth vowing to clean up crime, and uses the powers that his knowledge has given him to fight all evil-doers.
Powers and abilities
In addition to such powers as super strength, flight, and invulnerability, Stardust's powers included "retarding rays" that slowed down moving objects, thought recording, the "delicate detecting unit" (a combination of ESP and super-vision), the ability to transform into a human-sized star, and many others.