DR. DOMINO
Real Name: Unrevealed (possibly Domino)
Identity/Class: Human mutate
Occupation: Con man, swindler
Group Membership: None
Affiliations: None
Enemies: The seeress
Known Relatives: None
Aliases: None
Base of Operations: His lab in an unknown American city
First Appearance: Strange Tales I#64/1 (August, 1958)
Powers/Abilities: Dr. Domino was a clever con artist. Although he was actually 80 years old, he had been involved in a lab accident at the age of 21 which had apparently stopped/slowed his aging.
History: (Strange Tales I#64 (fb) - BTS) - About six decades earlier, Dr. Domino was involved in a lab accident which somehow stopped/slowed his body's aging process.
(Strange Tales I#64) - Dr. Domino concocted a scheme to swindle wealthy, elderly women out of their money--he claimed he had developed a "youth serum" and had even used it on himself; since he was 80 years old (and all public records showed him to be such an age), he attributed his youthful appearance to the "youth serum" he created.
Domino held a public demonstration "medicine show" where he had some elderly women step into a booth, close the curtain, take the "serum," then emerge, miraculously looking 40 years younger--in actuality, it was all just a part of his ploy and the old women (who were "in" on it) slipped out the back door of the booth and were replaced by younger, beautiful women wearing the same clothes.
After collecting some money from his hopeful clients as a down-payment, Domino returned to his lab, where he was visited by an aged seeress. After demonstrating her magical powers to him, the crone told Domino that she had heard stories of his wonder potion and wanted some of it to restore her youth and beauty. Domino admitted to the seeress that his claims had all been a scam. Angered, the seeress placed a curse upon Domino then disappeared.
When Domino awoke the next morning, he found his youthful appearance gone--his years had finally caught up with him.
Comments: Created by an unknown writer and Al Williamson.
A pretty lame cover story--the cover of the issue made it look a lot more interesting than it actually turned out to be (not all the "Classics" were classic, I guess)--from seeing the cover alone, I got the impression that it was going to be another redoing of the ol' "alien-diguised-as-man-kidnaps-humans-for-interplanetary-zoo" plot.
Could that lab accident that previously halted Dr. Domino's aging perhaps has some connection with the formula created by Simon Drudd, Fu Manchu's elixir vitae, or maybe the Sacred Water-Skin--perhaps Domino was exposed to a similar chemical compound?
And the seeress--could she have been one of the witches of New Salem? Or perhaps she was 18th Century witch Amanda Dalton (from Journey Into Mystery I#58) (who was young and beautiful a couple centuries ago) living in modern times?
And a big THANK YOU to Dennis Giansante for scanning this story for me!
Profile by John Kaminski
CLARIFICATIONS:
Dr. Domino has no known connections to:
The seeress has no known connections to:
The seeress was an old woman who claimed to be centuries old and possessed of many magical abilities. She demonstrated such powers as passing through walls and levitating furniture; but the seeress said that she did not have the power to restore the youth and beauty that once were hers. She had heard stories of Domino's youth serum and hoped that it could help her. When Domino revealed to her that it was all just a scam, the seeress placed a curse on him which made him appear his actual chronological age.
--Strange Tales I#64/1
images: (without ads)
Strange Tales I#64, p1, pan1 (main image)
pan3 (head shot)
p3, pan7 (seeress shows powers)
pan5 (seeress head shot)
First Posted: 05/20/2006
Last updated: 05/20/2006
Any Additions/Corrections? please let me know.
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