Why do we love fictional characters? Is it because they draw us out of the world we live in. They can do things we can't. They do things we wish we could. These characters have always fascinated people. From the Scarlet Pimpernel to Zorro, to The Green Hornet to the Lone Ranger. These characters are over the top fantastical and whimsical. Without characters like these we wouldn't have characters like Superman, Batman, and Spider-Man. The fictional characters that littered books and radio and displayed heroic traits and even secret identities that paved the way for the heroes of our beloved comic books that we would later read then and now. With authors like Johnston McCulley, Robert E. Howard, Emma Orczy, Lester Dent, Walter B. Gibson and even William Shakespeare, the comic book characters we know today might not exist. So next time you read a comic book or watch the next big comic book movie, think of the people and characters who helped paved the way for these characters on the page and the screen.
