CGC Featured Comic of the Month: Mystery Men Comics #1

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Name of comic: Mystery Men Comics #1

Comic publisher: Fox Features Syndicate

Date: August 1939

Variants: none

What makes it special? Hitting shelves only one year after the debut of Superman, Mystery Men Comics #1, by Fox Features Syndicate and creator Charles Nicholas Wojtkoski, was the first appearance of the Blue Beetle, Dan Garrett!

Why is it interesting now? The latest incarnation of the Blue Beetle, Jaime Reyes, has been featured in multiple cartoons and video games since he was first introduced in 2006, and makes his film debut in the 2023 film, “Blue Beetle,” played by actor Xolo Maridueña.

Did you know? There have already been three different characters to carry the mantle of Blue Beetle. The first was Dan Garrett (first appearing in this comic) who was a police officer turned masked vigilante with the help of a special vitamin that granted him super powers. This version of the character was published by Fox Features Syndicate, and later by Holyoke Publishing and then Charlton Comics. By 1966, DC Comics acquired the Charlton library and introduced an all-new Blue Beetle, Ted Kord, in Captain Atom #83. Kord was a scientist and inventor who used his tech to fight crime. DC then introduced the Jaime Reyes in Infinite Crisis #3 and made him their newest, and current, Blue Beetle in 2006’s Infinite Crisis #5. Unlike Garrett or Kord, Jaime’s powers come from an alien symbiotic scarab that he controls telepathically.

Total graded by CGC: As of July 28, 2023, there were a total of 39 copies of Mystery Men Comics #1 in the CGC Census.

CGC highest graded: There is only one copy of Mystery Men Comics #1 graded CGC 9.2.

Sales highlights: A CGC 9.0 copy was sold by ComicConnect in 2017 for $41,000.

CGC Comics Registry Champion: Registry user Straw-Man’s set lou & joe's mm's includes the single-highest-graded CGC 9.2 copy of Mystery Men Comics #1. The comic helped earn this collection the Best in Set Type Award from 2020 to 2023. Explore this and other great collections in the CGC Comics Registry.

Previous Featured Comics of the Month:

• Action Comics #252
• Amazing Spider-Man #149
• Avengers #8
• Captain America #100
• DC Comics Presents #67
• Man of Steel #1
• Omega Men #3

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