| Characters | Captain Marvel (Billy Batson), Captain Marvel Jr. (Freddie Freeman)(First appearance as Captain Marvel Jr.), Mary Marvel (Mary Batson), Supporting Characters:, Spy Smasher (Alan Armstrong) (First appearance), Minute-Man (Jack Weston) (First appearance), Bulletman (James Barr) (First appearance) |
| Notes | Spy Smasher, Bulletman and Minute-Man are all characters previously owned by Fawcett Publications. In 1953, National Periodical Publications concluded a twelve-year lawsuit against Fawcett citing that their flagship character, Captain Marvel was a creative infringement upon their own intellectual property, Superman. As such, Fawcett discontinued all of their super-hero line of comic strips and Spy Smasher, Bulletman and Minute-Man lapsed into obscurity. By 1980, DC Comics purchased the copyrights to the characters, but they only made scant appearances during the Silver Age.
The flashback sequence from this issue is told from the perspective of Bulletman.
Freddie Freeman becomes Captain Marvel, Jr for the first time in this issue. Captain Nazi sent Freddie Freeman's grandfather into a coma in issue #7. This story mirrors Freddy's Golden Age origin as presented in his historical first appearance in Whiz Comics #25.
Trivia:
Unlike Captain Marvel and Mary Marvel, Freddie Freeman does not say the magic word "Shazam" to change into Captain Marvel, Jr. Instead, he actually invokes "Captain Marvel" in order to switch back and forth between identities. This causes various problems for Junior as he can never refer to himself by name or else he will automatically summon the magic lighting. This inconvenience will later cause him to refer to himself as CM3.
In the letters column |
