Doctor Watson (Earth-616)

Doctor Watson
Name	Doctor Watson
Current Alias	Doctor Watson
Aliases	Dr. Watson
Affiliation and Relationships
Affiliation	pet and ally of Terry Vance
Physical Characteristics
Gender	Male
Hair	Brown
Origin and Living Status
Origin	Monkey
Living Status	Alive
Reality	Earth-616
Personal Information
Identity	No Dual
Education	Trained by Terry Vance
Creators and Appearances
Creators	Ray Gill, Bob Oksner
First	Marvel Mystery Comics #10 (June, 1940)
First	Marvel Mystery Comics #10 (June, 1940)

History

Doctor Watson was the pet monkey of boy detective Terry Vance who was active in the 1940s. Watson was named after John H. Watson, partner to the fictional detective Sherlock Holmes in the stories published by Arthur Conan Doyle. Watson was a particularly bright ape, who often assisted Terry in his cases by being able to get to places that Terry was incapable of reaching.

1940

Dr. Watson's first recorded appearance was when he assisted his master Terry Vance in exposing the greedy step-son who murdered his stepfather, a wealthy doctor, in order to cash in on the family fortune. When Terry was captured by some men sabotaging race cars to hedge bets, Dr. Watson led Terry's reporter friend Deadline Dawson to the criminals hideout and helped to free Terry. Accompanying Terry and Deadline on a drive, Dr. Watson sought shelter with them when it began to rain by going to a nearby mansion. There, Watson discovered the body of the gardener, whom Terry deduced was murdered by the owners secretary. When the secretary attempted to shoot Terry with a gun, Dr. Watson knocked the man out with a lamp. While helping Terry expose art thieves, Dr. Watson once more saved the life of his master, rescuing him from an fall in an elevator shaft. When Terry was coming to the rescue of kidnapped actress Diana Dunn, Dr. Watson distracted her captors while Terry saved the girl.

1941

When Terry and Deadline Dawson began investigating the murder of a penniless writer found dead in his slum apartment, Dr. Watson tripped up his murderer allowing Terry and Deadline to catch him. When investigating the disappearance of wealthy gambling addict Fred Rochell, Terry, Deadline Dawson and Scoop O'Brien found themselves captured by illegal casino owner Pinelli. They were freed by Dr. Watson, who then assisted in Pinelli's capture. When Terry was investigating an explosion at the Broome Chemical Plant, Dr. Watson located a phony bomb planted by Claude Kane, the security guard at the plant, which contained a confession letter implicated Killer D'Arcy and his gang of being responsible.

Later, Dr. Watson helped Terry expose a local bike thief, helped Terry and his school bicycle club pretend to be ghosts to scare city official Mr. Grabbit into going straight, and exposed bank robbers who used a sensitive microphone to learn safe combinations.

Accompanying Terry to Washington D.C., Terry had Dr. Watson pilot his new remote control model plane and attach it to a passenger plane that had its landing gear sabotaged by foreign spies, saving the passengers on board, including a high ranking military official interested in Terry's plane design. Later, Dr. Watson had a key role in exposing a monkey trainer at the local circus who used his pets to commit a series of "phantom robberies" in hard to reach places. When Terry and Deadline were invited to a swank party being thrown by the mayor, Dr. Watson was told to stay outside. When the mayors butler attempted to steal an emerald worn by the mayor's wife, Dr. Watson hid in the getaway car and and knocked the driver out with a wrench leading to his capture.

Later, Dr. Watson accompanied Terry on a trip to Maine to visit Deadline's father Bull Dawson at his logging camp. Dr. Watson was then absent from Terry's two subsequent adventures for unknown reasons.

1942

Dr. Watson was present when Terry exposed the murder plot of the Great Voodini, then assisted in tripping up George de Wood following his murder of Aubrey de Wood.

Later, Dr. Watson accompanied Terry and Deadline Dawson into the Carribean, where he briefly abandoned his owner to play with the local apes and enjoy the plentiful banana supply. Returning to the United States, Dr. Watson assisted Terry in exposing the thief of the Pharaoh's Eye Ruby, by unmasking the thief for the authorities. Watson was present when Terry solved the murder of the rodeo cowboy known as the Ghost Rider, and later found a list of victims that implicated Dr. Mefis as the "Phantom Burglar".

When Terry and Deadline were trying to expose the Tropey Stamp Company as a secret Nazi front, Dr. Watson broke into the office and threw a number of their counterfeit stamps into a fan causing ample distraction for Terry and Deadline to round up the crooks. In San Francisco, Dr. Watson, Terry, and Deadline were captured by Imperial Japanese spies who then tied them up inside a Japanese decoy sub set to explode in San Francisco Bay. Breaking free, Dr. Watson freed his friends and helped them redirect the sub back to the Japanese ship, destroying it and preventing an attack on San Diego.

Later, Dr. Watson became smitten by an organ grinder's monkey named Gertie and was shocked to find that her owner was using her to steal government secrets for Nazi spy Felix von Shlecht. Watson convinced Gertie to help Terry and Deadline expose the plot leading to the arrest of Von Shletch and her owner. Watson helped Gertie find a new home as a mascot for the local police station. When a Nazi sabotage agent stole some of Terry's new experimental explosives to use in sabotaging an American aircraft factory, Dr. Watson coated the bombs with Methylene powder to mark the spies hands so that he was caught red handed (or blue as the case literally turned out.

Following the kidnapping of actress Lucy Love, Dr. Watson was sent up to the window of the kidnappers hideout with a microphone so that Terry and Deadline could listen into their plans. Later when Terry was also captured, Dr. Watson quickly slathered his captors with inferred paint, and using a special flashlight led the authorities to capture the kidnappers, freeing Terry and Lucy.

Dr. Watson next assisted Terry and Deadline in getting an exclusive story with rubber inventor Mr. Walker, and stopped Nazi spies from flooding a shipyard with chlorine gas.

1943

When Terry was framed for the attempted assassination of the visiting princess of Borsnia, Dr. Watson accompanied Terry in clearing his name.

Dr. Watson soon had a taste of fame when newsreel footage of the ape rescuing people trapped in a burning building landed him a role in a new film. However a con man attempting to halt production kidnaps Watson, who was later rescued by Terry and finished the role in his film. Later, at the local zoo, Dr. Watson exposed Nazi spy Heinrich Himmelman who was posing as one of the zoos gorillas while waiting to be smuggled out of the country. Dr. Watson earned a rival in the parrot named Gossip, pet to Shirley Booth a young girl who wished to upstage Terry Vance as a detective. The two youths managed to help bring down tire smuggler Snake-Eye Smith however tensions between Watson and Gossip did not warm during the adventure.

When Terry located Colosso, an escaped gorilla, in the school belfry, Dr. Watson knocked the ape out with the bell leading to its capture.

Watson was later present when Terry captured Nazi spies Carl Wertz, and Thomas Miller; stopped Japanese spies attempting to destroy the local dam; exposed quiz show host Mr. Gaines as a Nazi spy, and another Nazi spy smuggling military secrets out of a tailor shop; and exposed Nazi agents attempting to smuggle themselves into the US using an old bootleggers shipping route.

1944

Dr. Watson next assisted Terry in exposing a Nazi spy who was posing as an old lady and using "her" position as an air-raid watchtower attendant to communicate to a nearby Nazi sub on the progress of a local aircraft factory. During this adventure, Dr. Watson went snooping in the "old lady's" home finding a razor that tipped Terry off to the fact that the "woman" was really a man in disguise. Later, Dr. Watson was next present when Terry and Deadline stopped crooks from stealing plans from a chemical plant to sell to the Nazis.

Taking up a job with Terry at a local circus to investigate a series of robberies, Dr. Watson earned the ire of Marko the Magician and later caught him robbing the box office. Marko attempted to frame Terry, but Dr. Watson helped his owner clear his name. Travelling to the Pine Grove Forest, Terry, Deadline, and Dr. Watson stopped Nazi spies from burning the entire forest down.

When Terry and Deadline Dawson were captured by Nazi spies attempting to steal the jewels owned by Old Man Crane, Dr. Watson escaped and lured the police to the scene by stealing a the hats from a number of police officers. In Dr. Watson's last recorded appearance Dr. Watson accompanied Terry, Deadline and local klutz Marmaduke Jones in preventing Nazi agents from stealing oil from an American pipeline.

Dr. Watson's ultimate fate is a mystery, however given the natural life expectancy of his species of monkey, it's likely that Watson has died of old age.

Attributes

Abilities

Dr. Watson had abilities typical of chimpanzees. He was incredibly intelligent.

Paraphernalia

Equipment

For a time early in Terry's career, Dr. Watson had a camera strapped to his chest to allow Terry to take crime photos.

Transportation

On two occasions, Dr. Watson piloted a remote control model airplane designed by Terry.

See Also

• 48 appearance(s) of Doctor Watson (Earth-616)
• 1 appearance(s) in handbook(s) of Doctor Watson (Earth-616)
• 2 image(s) of Doctor Watson (Earth-616)