''Invisible Scarlet O'Neil'' is a 1940-1956 American

comic strip A comic strip is a sequence of drawings, often cartoons, arranged in interrelated panels to display brief humor or form a narrative, often serialized, with text in balloons and captions. Traditionally, throughout the 20th and into the 21st ...

written and drawn by Russell Stamm, who had previously been an assistant to

Chester Gould Chester Gould (; November 20, 1900 – May 11, 1985) was an American cartoonist, best known as the creator of the ''Dick Tracy'' comic strip, which he wrote and drew from 1931 to 1977, incorporating numerous colorful and monstrous villains. Ear ...

on ''

Dick Tracy ''Dick Tracy'' is an American comic strip featuring Dick Tracy (originally Plainclothes Tracy), a tough and intelligent police detective created by Chester Gould. It made its debut on Sunday, October 4, 1931, in the '' Detroit Mirror'', and it ...

''. The strip focused on Scarlet O'Neil, a plainclothes

superhero A superhero or superheroine is a stock character that typically possesses ''superpowers'', abilities beyond those of ordinary people, and fits the role of the hero, typically using his or her powers to help the world become a better place, ...

(and one of the first superheroines) with the power of

invisibility Invisibility is the state of an object that cannot be seen. An object in this state is said to be ''invisible'' (literally, "not visible"). The phenomenon is studied by physics and perceptual psychology. Since objects can be seen by light ...

Publication history

Originally published by the ''

Chicago Daily Times The ''Chicago Daily Times'' was a daily newspaper in Chicago from 1929 to 1948, and the city's first tabloid newspaper. It is best known as one of two newspapers which merged to form ''Chicago Sun-Times'' in 1948. For much of its existence, the ...

'' and distributed by its syndication service, ''Invisible Scarlet O'Neil'' began on June 3, 1940. In September 1949, the title of the strip was reduced to simply ''Scarlet O'Neil'', and her invisibility powers were seen much more rarely. Starting September 13, 1954, Emery Clarke drew the strip from Stamm's scripts. The title was changed again to ''Stainless Steel'' on October 24, 1954, and the character of Scarlet was dropped. The strip ended in 1956.

Characters and story

Scarlet used her power of invisibility mostly to help out strangers in need and help the police catch dangerous criminals, as explained by comics historian

Don Markstein Don Markstein's Toonopedia (subtitled A Vast Repository of Toonological Knowledge) is an online encyclopedia of print cartoons, comic strips and animation, initiated February 13, 2001. Donald D. Markstein, the sole writer and editor of Toonopedi ...

In other media

Scarlet O'Neil also appeared in a

comic book A comic book, also called comicbook, comic magazine or (in the United Kingdom and Ireland) simply comic, is a publication that consists of comics art in the form of sequential juxtaposed panels that represent individual scenes. Panels are oft ...

series published by

Harvey Comics Harvey Comics (also known as Harvey World Famous Comics, Harvey Publications, Harvey Comics Entertainment, Harvey Hits, Harvey Illustrated Humor, and Harvey Picture Magazines) was an American comic book publisher, founded in New York City by Alfr ...

, as well as

Big Little Books The Big Little Books, first published during 1932 by the Whitman Publishing Company of Racine, Wisconsin, were small, compact books designed with a captioned illustration opposite each page of text. Other publishers, notably Saalfield, adopted t ...

, and a 1943 prose novel. Atlantis Studios in 2007 published a one-shot comic book ''Untold Origins of Invisible Scarlet O'Neil'' on the history of the character. In 2017 Babes With Blades premiered a play by Barbara Lhota based on the strip.

Graphic novel

In 2012 New Legends Productions published a graphic novel with a contemporary setting written by the son of the creator, Russell Stamm Jr., and artwork by Wendell Cavalcanti (pencils), Rob Jones and Elton Thomasi (inks).Invisible Scarlet O'Neil Returns!
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References

External links

Russell Stamm's ''Invisible Scarlet O'Neil'' official site
1940 comics debuts 1956 comics endings American comics characters American comic strips American superheroes Comics about women Comics characters introduced in 1940 Female characters in comics Fiction about invisibility Fictional characters who can turn invisible Golden Age superheroes Female superheroes Superhero comic strips Comic strip superheroes {{comic-strip-stub